Ostrich breeder rides wave of online popularity

While feeding her ostriches, Wang Xue swiftly responds to fans' questions with a sense of humor through her popular livestreaming channel.

Since Wang, 30, an expert in ostrich farming, started live broadcasting on short-video platform Kuaishou with her husband Han Peng, their ostrich farming business has flourished, garnering nearly 3 million fans on the platform.

"The highest viewership for one single live broadcast reached over 6 million," said Wang, adding that riding an ostrich at high speed is an essential part of her broadcasts.

Through practical experience and online research, Wang has accumulated a wealth of knowledge in ostrich farming.

"Young ostriches should be given more vegetables and less concentrated feed. As they grow older, we will increase the concentrate feed and reduce the vegetables," said Wang, who lives in Bayan county, Heilongjiang province.

"Ostrich feed must contain calcium because ostriches grow rapidly. If they are not given enough calcium, they may develop leg paralysis and become unable to stand."

When Wang graduated from junior high school in 2010, she didn't expect that one day she would be livestreaming about the ostrich business. After learning makeup art in Harbin, Heilongjiang, as well as Shenyang and Dalian in Liaoning province, she established a beauty salon specializing in wedding services in Bayan in 2015. Though experiencing a booming start for the first several years, the business eventually declined, which made her fall into depression.

The turning point came in 2022, when Wang's husband asked her to help with livestreaming for his ostrich farming business.

Han started raising ostriches in 2018 after learning about their fast growth and high economic value.

First, he purchased 40 ostriches, and over the following several years his ostrich farming business took shape and expanded.

With the encouragement and support of their families, Wang tried to do livestreaming in front of the ostriches, hoping to reduce her husband's workload and attract more customers.

"However, it was not an easy task," Wang recalled about her first livestreaming experience. "I was selling baby ostriches in the live broadcast room, which attracted only a dozen viewers."

However, Wang didn't give up. Since the beginning, she has consistently done livestreams once or twice a day.

Through her videos, Wang brought fans close to the ostriches, providing details of their habits, farming methods and economic value.

"There were many viewers asking me all sorts of bizarre questions, such as 'Can ostriches play King of Glory?' and I replied 'no' seriously, which amused them," she said. "Gradually, I received hundreds of viewers, then thousands and eventually tens of thousands."

Finally, Wang established her own livestreaming style.

"Nearly 80 percent of the customers learned about our ostrich farm through the short-video platform," she said. "Some of my fans even traveled from afar to buy ostriches at our farm, after knowing more about the ostrich farming and the economic value of their related products."

So far, the couple has expanded their ostrich farm to 10,000 square meters, with annual revenue of over 4 million yuan ($560,000) and a net profit of over 1 million yuan.

Inspired by Wang and Han, nearby villagers have also started raising ostriches.

Wang is confident about the future of their business.

"We have plans to further expand the scale of farming and establish an ostrich slaughter and processing plant to produce ostrich jerky, sausages, dried intestines and other ostrich meat products," she said. "We expect a complete industry chain involving feather products and ostrich egg carving and painting for cultural and tourism projects.

"We hope to expand our market share in the next two years by developing new ostrich products. We aim to become a leader in the ostrich industry," she said.

"I believe more breeders and companies will see the potential of ostrich farming and become interested in investing in the industry."

zhouhuiying@chinadaily.com.cn