Met Someone Who Is Active In Cross Fostering !!!

Hope all my blog readers read one of my old article about "cross fostering".

Cross fostering refers to using those Serinti birds to adopt AF chicks or eggs.

In many parts of Malaysia and Indonesia, you may find lots of Serinti birds. (Serinti is very similar to AF but they built their nest from casurina tree leaves or fern from tree barks plus 20% saliva). They eat the same food and have rather similar breeding pattern like AF.

The term cross fostering is actually defined as you remove those eggs or young chicks from these Serinti nests and replace them with AF eggs or babies. Need to do them when the birds are away and make sure the item placed are not with human smell.

Today I came across a person from Sabah, Malaysia who is pretty successful in doing this technique.

He started the Serinti farming by accident and after 7 years his house now have a total of 4,000 nests.

He started the cross fostering sometime back and stop about 2 years ago. After looking at the number of birds growing and his neighbors harvesting them he feel that the time have come to do this in a more serious manner.

He intent to install sound system, enclose those areas slowly and perhaps improve the temperature and humidity by stages.

The most effective method of cross fostering, according to him, is to go for chick replacement.

Import those eggs and incubate them. Once they are hatch, swap these babies with Serinti babies. Mark the nests that were replaced.

I am very happy to have met him and I am sure one day I might be able to stop by in Sabah and visit his unique BH.

Want to join my trip?

Call Harry at 017 755 1318

How To Start Your Aroma Application Experimenting !!!

Many people asked me on how to select the right aroma for their new BH.

There is no right answer for it but you might want to try experimenting yourself.

Main factor is that there is no one aroma that can be effective in all locations, as every body thought off.

I have experimented with a few and the results are not that encouranging until today.

It is quite similar to those external sound. They can be good in one
place but they might give very little effect to another location which
might be just a few blocks away.

So you cannot blame the fellow who sell you the aroma but you can do
something that can cut down your cost of experimenting.

My best recommendation is to try something that is cheap and if they
work then stick to them.

For example:

Why dont you read all those articles posted in the duck egg swiftlet
special and try to figure out what aroma can and will do to a BH. Go to http://groups.google.com/group/duck-egg-swiftlet-special/topics?hl=en&start=

After you have finish reading all of them, you might get the idea what
is the cheapest way to start with.

Yes, use the duck egg. Buy let say 5 eggs (about 70 sen a piece, get
the greenish colored shell), remove those yellow york and collect the
white in a container.

You can stir the white and get a brush to apply at one selected area
where you think the birds will be interested to built their nests.
Yes close to the tweeters and possibly near to those corners. Apply
the egg white by soaking the brush (1.5 inch wide) and make a swipe to
about a spot of about 1.5 inches by 4 inches length. Once you have
done one then you make another one. Finish all the 5 duck eggs
application and get some brown box paper and place below the nesting
plank where you have just applied those whites. If those birds
should occupy the area, there will be some signs (birdshits) below on
the brown paper.

Do the inspection every week.

If there are signs of birdshits, your experiment is working. You
should straight away go to the market and buy more duck eggs (make it
10 eggs this time). Repeat the application on the same spots and
extend a bit more.

Remember "do not be greedy". Do them phase by phase.

If there were no signs of any birdshits, then you need to look into
what is the next cheapest method to start a new experiment.

I suggest the birdnest soup.

Call your good friend who owned a BH and ask him for some broken
nests. Say that you want to experiment with bird soup.

Pay about 30 ringgit or so and start doing the boiling like what was
mentioned in the duck egg special.

After slow fire boiling for one hours with the feathers, you need to
pour into a container and cooled it in a fridge.

After that take to your BH and apply the soup similar to the above.

Follow the progress fo about three weeks.

If they works then you need to call your friend again and buy a bit
more for making a new batch of birdnest aroma soup.

Do the same and apply to those same spots and perhaps expand the area phase by phase. DON'T BE GREEDY.

If again this soup also failed, then you need to go a buy a new aroma.

This time you might want to start with your own formula or buy some products, ready made,on the market.

There are many and I am sure you know what I am saying.

If you are still blank, call me at 017 755 1318.

I sincerely hope you will find the right aroma that suits your
location and BH.

Happy trying and don't blame any one if it does not work. Keep trying
and I am sure one day you will find the right aroma......

Home Made Aroma

I was very adventurous in birdhouse farming.

One of the thing that I came across was making your own aroma. This might not be fullproof but nice to try.

U take a few broken nests that U plugged from your own birdhouse. Shred them and put into your kitchen shreeder machine. Mix with some water and shread them until they form a thick slimmy liquid.

Once the nests are shreaded and ready, place it in a clay mug or vast. Add about 3 to 4 liters of water. Let the mixture ferment for at least one month.

Note: It will be very smelly so keep it in your birdhouse store area if possible. Not in your house please.

Once fermented, for the one month, scoop about a liter of the water and test it by splashing it to a bush and observe what happen. If there are swiftlets they will be swaming the bush in no time.

If it does not work, add one liter of water to the vast and let it be fermented for another month.

Do the same test and see the result.

If the result is good then U might found the portion that U have been looking for.

For those who are free to try, add other liquid like fish oil, duck eggs and etc. Who know U might find the love portion.

A friend of mine from Trengganu was telling me that he did nearly the same but he use nest collected from a cave. The result was awfull. The swiftlets nearly raided is banana trees to pieces.

He is cock sure that it works.

No Pain No Gain !!!