If you're going to build a stand alone farm, how many storeys should it be? Well it could be said it depends on your budget but budget is not the main criteria.
If your budget is good for a single storey then I would advise that you should put your plan on hold wait till you have enough funds.
Since most stand alone are built on agriculture land with most surrounded by trees a double or a 3 storey would be ideal. Of course you could build one which is 4, 5 or even more storeys if you wish.
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(a very successful 3 storeys farm)But having a 2 storeys of 20x80ft, total size is 1600sf x 2 = 3200sf. Presuming that on average (low average) of 1 sf would produce 1 nest (there are many farms that could produce more than 1 nest per sf) that would be 3200 nests per harvest. Lets assume that only 2 harvests per year. This scenario is based on a successful farm.
That would be 6400 nests per year. On average 110-130 nests depended on how you manage your internal environment. So it would be 58kg per year. If the market value on average is about Rm 3300.00 per kg (of course high quality nests could fetch up to rm 4-5k per kg).
Then 58kg x Rm 3300.00 would be Rm 191 400.00 income per year.
Isn't that wonderful? Well it looks good on paper! Then why many still want to go and build farm that are 45x120 of 4 to 6 storeys? Human nature! Greedy!
Back to the basic, even if you can afford to build a huge farm if the technical and skill aspect are not in line with what the birds want, no matter how big is your farm it is still useless.
Money can not justify success in swiflet farming. You may have the best building material, best location, best gadget,etc somehow if the magical touch of creative good farm is not there be it your building and investment cost be Rm millions you would ended up fail.
One of the simile would be like cooking. " The world's renown Chef may give you his ingredient and recipe.He may even allocate the spices, cut the vege and choose the best meat himself,etc. Everything being prepared and ready on the kitchen table. All you need to do is just put them into the wok and cook it" What would be the taste of the dishes? Would the dishes you cooked similar or taste better than if the Best Chef cooked himself? I bet you have got the answer".
Swiftlet farming skill is an Art. Be it how how many seminars you attended, who you learned from if you do have that extra thing in you it is hard to have a successful farm. Definitely this is one of the investment that with big capital would not guarantee success!
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