I have not been writing that often as I was tight-up with many things related to farming especially nests processing and export.
Some of you might be wondering what happens to James…MIA liow?
Don’t worry I will always be here. There is a saying “once a swiftlet farmer always is a swiftlet farmer.”
How could I stay away from Swiftlet farming, it is so addictive I don’t think that I could kick away this habit. It is so addictive that I can’t stop thinking about it every other hour.
Someone called me just a couple of minute ago. He wanted to know how much it cost to build a farm. He said he doesn’t see much of cost involved like what I had mentioned on my blog.
He said all it needs probably some ceiling board to close the window and ply woods to cut it into nesting planks.
I told him well very good go ahead you may have a successful farm in no time. Often I won’t iron out or reason out with people like this .It is a waste of time. Often I would ask them since you had decided then go ahead.
How could the farm not fail when one has so little knowledge about swiftlets farming?
Anyway this is what happened to the swiftlet farming industry. Another one was this reader asking about things regarding temperature of farms.
He keeps on asking is there anything that he could buy or to put in his farm so that the temperature will reduce.
Later thru the conversation he reveals that his farm is a 20x80, 2 storey standalone with zinc wall without any insulation. He claimed that during the hot day temperature rises to 42C. I asked him didn’t you know it will never worked in the first place? His reply was “James at that time I didn’t know Swiftlet can’t live in such hot condition”.
Over the years I received countless of emails and calls from readers and some I would laugh till I drop dead after reading them.
All sort of crazy ideas that don’t make sense. And most of the time it is the farmers themselves decided what the best for the birds based on their experiences and knowledge. If their knowledge is somewhat poor then the farms they build would be poor too.
One reader showed me his farm’s design and he is very proud of it. He asks me for my opinion. I asked him why are the walls here, why are you using such material and so on…..?
He replied the birds would like it and would fly there and so on….and tells me how the birds would fly and stay and later making nests. I asked him is this your assumption or that is what the bird had told you? (Of course it is his assumption).
He was muted for a while..I think he hated me for criticizing his works. How could I not criticizing a design that doesn’t work. Most instances Farmers themselves are building farm to what they think and to what they like .How many actually building farms to suit the birds?
Building a farm the way you wanted would definitely boost up your sense of achievement but in reality you would end up suffering when you see no nests in few years time.
Don’t forget the main objective here is to build farms for swiftlets .
Good farming All!
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