Once your Swiftlet farm has reached 100 nests and above it is easy to push this number to 300 nests within 6 months and to 1000 in a year. It is not impossible if you know how to do it. Many of my readers had achieved this.
I have seen many Swiftlet farms archiving this, all they did was putting extra efford in follow the changes of the internal and external environment. You can sit back and wait and hope that the growth would continue constantly every time every month but it would certainly not. Things change nothing remains constantly the same all the time.
The weather change, the wind directions change and so on which is out of our control. The only thing is within our control is the internal environment. That is why I had always emphasized on the importance of Micro.
Even when the number of nests in your Bh is growing steadily you can’t just sit down and wait and only response when the number of nests dropped. By this time you would have lost many nests and birds and most of them would have migrated to your neighbor‘s farm.
Most of those who had succeeded in achieving great increase in Nests from few hundred to above 1000 nests within a short period of time practices good Micro maintenance. What is good Micro maintenance?
Some of the things that you need to do and observe or change when you see it is necessary:
1) Good Harvesting practice (Plan a harvest schedule according to season)
2) Good continuous Aroma application (never says “I’ve got 1000 nests already so no need aroma” your birds will fly to your neighbors farms that has aroma). Have you heard people complaining about nests and birds population stagnant and reduce?
3) Constant stable temperature: 27-30C. It hard to maintain this as the bird’s population increase each birds generate heat from their body. Eventually it would push up the temperature of the Swiftlet farm. This is where the Vent hole comes into play
4) Humidity: can’t be too high or too low . Average 75-90%. This would also affected by the number of birds in farm. Think..Think...
5) Tweeters: Often people change Ext tweeters and couldn’t border about the Int tweeters. The Int tweeters are as important as the Ext tweeters. If the int tweeters are not good or not functioning properly bird won’t stay and make nests.
6) Sound: one of the most often asked question was “when should one change the EXT sound”. But rarely ask when they should change the INT sound. I think 90% focused on Ext sound. Both external & internal sounds are of same important. When there is no improvement over certain period of time then both EXT & INT sound should be changed. Why wait? Time is money.
7) Pest control: It is a must. It should be done periodically depended on the size of the birds population. From 1-3 months.
8) Clearing of Birds Droppings: As I had mentioned before never too clear nor too dirty. Also subjected to the population size of the birds in the farm.
9) Check you plank for termite and parasite (mold & Fungus). (If you had invested in good planks you don’t have to worry about this) Sad to say so there are still many people out there will tell you that all the planks are the same. I guess the only different is that later one has to use anti-fungus liquid.
10)……..and many more…
If you managed to get 50% of the above right and practiced in your swiftlet farm. Chances of nests and birds population increase are very high.
Good Swiftlet farming All!