Butterfly farming brings fluttering fortunes for Taita

By PASCAL MWANDAMBO

 With youth unemployment being a stark reality in Kenya, it’s inspiring to find a youthful and ambitious farmer who seems to have diverted from the tried and tested modes of farming to engage in a rather innovative venture.

For Clivon Mwachola, butterflies have brought fluttering fortunes to him and he is determined to make his project the trailblazer in this highly scientific endeavour.

“Whenever I meet with people and tell them that I am a butterfly farmer, they look at me with a sense of incredulity and disbelief. They ask me: What does a butterfly farmer do, and what does it involve? Do you want to tell us that you grow butterflies or what?” These are the witty comments that Mwachola, 31, from Wundanyi makes during an interview with the Standard on Sunday.

 With a warm grin on his face he adds:  “Little do they know that my venture is not only a highly scientific project but one that pays dividends and affords me enough money to make a living.”

Business interest

Mwachola says that he began developing an interest in butterfly farming in 2001 when he visited his cousins in Kwale who rears butterflies and exports the pupae.

‘I was very keen to learn what they were doing so that I could replicate the same back home at the Shigharo forest in Wundanyi where there are a lot of rare butterflies, but whose economic potential had remained largely unexploited,’ says Mwachola.

He says that he has always been a lover of nature since he was a student at Kenyatta High School, Mwatate, where he scored grade A in Biology and A- in Agriculture.

 “So when I went back home from Kwale, I decided to try in the tricky venture,” he recalls.

 Mwachola reckons that the harder part in this new venture is getting the right literature on butterfly farming, which would form the basis for the project.

 Shortly after starting the venture, he approached Mr James Mwang’ombe, who was then the coordinator of Taita-Taveta Wildlife Forum (now assistant director of Kenya Forest Service) who gave him reading materials about butterflies and particularly those found in Taita Forest.

 Armed with this knowledge he looked for a group of youths and began hunting for the butterflies in the forests and confining them in meshed cages to await breeding where they would later get the pupae.

  “With the hunt for butterflies on, some locals saw our action as weird, but we pushed on regardless” he says with the impish smile still glued on his face.

He says it takes three to four weeks for the butterfly eggs to grow to larva, which is the stage that is usually exported.

Mwachola told Weekend Business that when business is good, he makes up to Sh7,000 a week.

He has now made collaborative efforts with youths from Chawia, Mghambonyi, Mghange, and Shigharo who have also ventured into butterfly farming and usually supply him larva harvested. He takes the lava to Mida Butterfly Farm in Malindi before being exported to Europe and America where they are in great demand both for decorative purposes as well as silk production.

Harvesting season

Mwachola says the butterfly rearing season falls between August and September when there are enough rains and plants have flowered. This provides nectar to the butterflies.

“Sometimes when it’s dry, we confine some of the butterflies in cages with cotton mesh and give then Ribena juice to stimulate production” he says.