Eight-year-old Zoë Kotzé has made her first foray into entrepreneurship.
The Grade 2 Kirstenhof Primary School pupil has started her own business called Silkworms and Me.
After keeping silkworms as pets for the first time over three years ago, she says, she hatched her own eggs.
“We just had so many and didn’t know what to do with all of them. And I thought people would really adore silkworms as pets because they are so cute and they are really nice,” the normally shy girl gushes over worms.
“I also wanted to give them a better life. We just can’t keep all of them because we can’t keep up with all their food, having to clean the entire box out from poo and all that.”
However, she explains that unless you’re keeping thousands of silkworms, “they are not too much work, apart from feeding and cleaning their box out everyday. I just think they are pretty good for children.”
Silkworms and Me has sold over two and a half thousand worms in batches of 20.
Zoë offers an additional fee of R5 a week, if customers would like a fresh batch of mulberry leaves serviced to them.
The young business woman also provides customers with instructions to look after your silkworms.
Some of her recommendations include: “You should give them really nice big mulberry leaves and they need to have quite a big box to stay in. And they should have quite few air holes so they can breathe. You mustn’t touch them too much. You can play with them but you must wash your hands, otherwise you will make them sick.
“The really cool thing is you get to see their entire life cycle from egg to moth.”
Unfortunately, parents wanting to gift their children with a stress free first pet will have to wait till next year.
“You only get silkworms in one month of the year. The worms are soon going to be in cocooning and then the moths are going to hatch out. The moths lay out eggs and the eggs only hatch normally in August after a cold spell.” says Zoë.
