Few days old chick without feather
( Beak with noticeable Nostril for smell but still unable to see)
After many years of helping peoples to become successful Swiftlet farmers I discovered that there are few key factors a Bh needs to have in order to standout among all. Thru my many years of research and observation the most important ingredients of a successful Bh is its ability to prevent young birds from migrating and at the same time attracting other Bhs’ young birds to stay and build nests.
No matter how many thousand nests and birds a Bh has if the said Bh is unable to make its young birds to stay then that is the beginning of the end of the Bhs. Perhaps it takes months and years to see the changes. Gradually the number of nests and birds population would decline to an extent where it could be seen easily by then in many cases it would be too late and it would take long time to turn it around.
This applied to all Bhs, immaterial big or small, successful or moderate, new or old all are alike.
Somehow the birds of all Bhs would migrate or attract by other Bhs. It is a matter of how severity of the changes. If this doesn’t happen then where do all those new nests and birds in your 3 months old Bh came from? It came from someone else’s Bh! Both Old and New Bhs have the ability to attract young birds at the same time they are losing some. The severity lies on the ratio of gaining compared to losing. If a Bh’s ratio shows losing birds is higher, then something must be done to address this problem.
There are thousands of Bhs coming up every year and all are getting bigger and bigger, 3,4,5,6...storey and all would have nests in them within the 1st and 2nd year of operation whether it is 2 ,20 or 30 nests, it is a matter of numbers. All these nests came from someone else’s Bh. It could be from your Bhs. So don’t think that only successful Bhs is a threat to your Bh but failed Bhs as well. The 10 nests from a 3 years old Bh across the road may came from your Bh.
Whether a Bh of 1 years with 20 nests or a Bh of 5 years with 1000 nests at the initial stage all these birds came from other people’s Bh. Gradually it builds up its population by maintain its nests and birds population at the same time attracting more young birds from other people’s Bh. So now you could see clearly someone is losing out while you are gaining or maybe the opposite way.
So the key factor is solely relied on the Bh ability to maintain its nests & population at the same time attracting other Bh’s birds.
If you have these two strengths in your Bh then you would see tremendous increase of nest & population in a short period time. Those very successful so called pioneer Bhs have all these strengths. They may lose few birds every month but attracting thousands from other Bhs coupled with their own young birds, that is why tens of kg of nests per month is common. While for those who don’t have these strengths struggling to achieve 10 nests per year is hard.
So how do you do that? Hypnotization, calling birds to your Bh with unique sound and hypnotize them while there are inside. 2 main components Sound & Aroma (bear in mind all the micros in a Bh has to be at an acceptable levels). Also make sure you use the right sound and right Aroma. Know the things you are doing, not all sounds and aromas are the same.
A good sound would pull in birds especially young birds. It is easier to attract Young birds. They are easily attracted by Sound and Aroma provided the sound played is correctly tuned to their frequency and the Aroma used is effective. The sound tempos and pitches of young birds are different from those of adult birds. If a sound played consist of mature birds then it won’t get young birds attentions. So the one who mixes & records the birds sound must understand the pitches in order to create a good and effective bird sound.
It is true “Old Dog Hard to Learn New Tricks” . It applied here too..it is harder to hypnotize old birds from other Bhs compared to young birds.
A simple arithmetic if a Bh has 1000 nests and averagely 80% of the nests have 2 eggs that is 1600 eggs. If 80% survived and become young birds that would be 1280 young birds per season.
So isn’t it worth to attract young birds that would give your Bh a better population for the future?
Secondly babies’ birds develop their senses of smell before their visions. They could smell before they could see. So aroma plays an important role in hypnotization process. Both Sound & Aroma coupled with the good Bh’s environment would speed up the hypnotization process.
Always spray aroma after every harvest and every visit to Bh to reduce stress on birds. When you are inside the Bh repairing something or harvesting, most old and adult birds would have left due to your presence except those that are sitting on the eggs. What left are the young birds that have just learned to fly and those that still clinching onto the nests. These young birds are exposed to your presence, your body odor (sweat), the noise, etc. They would remember it. These create fear and stress in their early life. If given a chance they would fly out from the Bh too but most are young birds that in their first week of learning to fly. Perhaps later if they have got a chance they would never return.
To prevent stress and fear it is recommended that you spray Aroma ( Love Potion) every time you visit your Bh. Don’t take it lightly , a small mistake you make would affect the future of your Bh.
Good Swiftlet Farming All.