A Nice Dinner With Durian Tunggal BH Owner !!!

(I looked very tired. Yes I was

A very rare occasion when a BH owner offer a special treat for me and my two workers.

He took us to this special Ikan Bakar restaurant in Melaka.

I believed he saw how we work hard for him and decided to take us for a special meal.

"If you are closed with me I will make sure you eat the best food" he said.

I enjoyed it very much and my workers commented to him that they wanted another one once they completed his BH.

"No problem!!" was his reply.

We have the nasi lemak, ikan bakar red snapper, ikan bakar stingray,  ikan goreng red snapper, siput buluh, cuttle fish, a vegie and prawns.

All in with two jugs of tebu water 1, and watermelom 1 was only RM181:00

In total we have 6 people eating all.

Nothing was left behind since all those leftovers and the bones were taken home to feed those 7 dogs.

Yes highly cholesterol items but got to try out these plates.

The owner claimed that he can eat at least 10 bungkus of the nasi lemak.

He ended up eating about 6 bungkus I think while I was modest with 3 bungkus.

It was fresh, sweet and delicious.

You must visit this place with your family.

Just see the dishes and the name of the Ikan Bakar Restaurant:

You Should Avoid Dumping Those Leftovers !!!

(Never Store These Building Leftovers Around Your BH)

I am very concern about any BH that uses its surroundings as a dumping place.

A good example is this BH in Kepala Batas, Butterworth, Penang.

During my recent visit I saw these zinc roof materials plus those woods that were used as the roof supporting materials.

Upon checking with the owner he claimed that the roof, during a heavy thunderstorm, were lifted to the air in total and crashed on the ground.

That was about 10 months or one year ago.

A new roof was erected however those old roof materials were left on the ground breeding more often than not since it is in the middle of a paddy field, rats and maybe snakes.

Not to mention those crawlers and ants.

I would say that this is not a very good thing to do.

These rats, snakes, ants and crawlers are not welcome into your BH.

I need to get the owner to clear the items and perhaps burn all those woods at night.

You have a good look at what I saw and tell me if your are also doing simply the same thing.

A Wonderful View Of A Three Stories Elevated BH !!!

How nice to own a BH in the middle of a paddy field closed to a big river.

I took some time to look into the basic problems with this well designed BH.

The owner claimed that after more than 2,5 years into operation there were only 20 nests.

His investment outlay was RM 900,000 and returned of investment so far is zero or perhaps negative.

I walked around the BH and took some beautiful photos of the BH.

Just have a good look and try to notice any thing unusual.

I might want to list some for your to learn and understand how to look for any unusual things:

1) One very odd thing that I first stared at are those ventilation holes.  They are found only at the ends but not on the main walls.  This will create shortage of air to ventilate the BH properly.

2) The size of the monkey house looks a bit big.  However if you observe carefully only one window was opened.  It used to have three but two were shut down.  For such a large monkey house I feel two windows is not a bad idea.

3) One part of the zinc roof are tearing away.  I am not in favor of installing zinc roof above the monkey house.  Reason being I cannot utilize the roof areas to install those hexagonal tweeters and power tweeters.

4) The zinc roof extension was a bit too short.  I would prefer it to be extended by about 1 meter out to provide shadows to lessen the wall's exposure to direct sunlight.

5) There is no hexagonal tweeter on the monkey house.  I will usually declare that a BH with no hexagonal tweeter will usually have very poor result.  The hexagonal tweeter is a must and it must be precisely located nearest to the main entrance hole/window.

I will write something more when we come closer to the BH.

Let's Compete With Our Neighbor !!!

While taking a short break back in my hometown, I was enjoying myself with a couple of BH visits.

The one that make me very happy was at Bujang Valley Merbok.

The owner wanted me to do the necessary so that there will be more nests inside.

After a number of minutes looking at what to be done I initiated the rearrangement of the internal sound tweeters plus the installation of fake nests beside all that were realigned.

The first thing was to purchase an 11 steps aluminum ladder.

I was very curious why this BH owner don't have a suitable ladder to climb to check those nests?

Anyway what I did was to focus on the second floor and relocate all the tweeters and fixed at least two fake nests (styrofoam) beside them.

I applied the super pheromone liquid on all of them.

Change both the external and internal sounds and check on how those birds reacted.

They seems to like the new sounds and most were flying in and out.

I am not sure where most of them came from but there is a very strong possibility that they came from the next door BH.

The competitor uses this very restrictive window cover.

He uses those cross rails.

I am not sure why but who knows he might have been attacked by owls.

From the way it looks it will be a very challenging time to enter the BH during peak hours or heavy wind.

If I am those birds I will surely move to the next door BH with no grill windows to injure me if I was a bit careless that day.

I video tape their behavior and I am very sure that they prefer the one that I have just adjusted the tweeters.

A Frantic Call From Maran, Pahang !!!

I was having my lunch today, June 6th 2014, when my mobile phone rang.

The caller was this Dr. from Maran.

His BH stories I wrote can be found here:

1) http://swiftletfarming.blogspot.com/2013/08/maran-bh-test-run-just-before-full.html

2) http://swiftletfarming.blogspot.com/2013/08/what-i-did-inside-maran-bh.html

Hmm .... have not heard from him for sometime.  I remember handed over his BH in August 2013.

Now already 9 months into operation.

"Yes Doc how are U and what can I do for you?"  I asked.

"Pak Harry, I would like to inform you that my BH which was revamped by you is doing well now.  Last count was 40 fully formed nests and lots of markings."  he was trilled.

I remember when I was asked to revamp the BH was into operation for almost 1.5 years with only 3.5 nests.

Now the number of nests jump up to 40 within 9 months.

"The first think that came to my mind was to tell you the nests number and at the same time, I think there are owls visiting by BH top floor.  I can see lots of their shit and those vomit balls."  he explained.

I told him to activate a few methods to make them scared to come to his BH.

1) Activate or re install those electrical wires on those walls surrounding the entrance hole.

2) Try to put more of those clamp traps on the wall.  Minimum 2 but better 3.

3) To perhaps install those wires about 8-10 feet apart at the connecting door.

I am very glad with this news and I hope he will continue to take good care of his BH.

I hope to make a trip to check what other things he can do to push the number of nests higher.

You Can Easily Predict By Seeing From The Outside !!!

Your water pond is leaking.

That specific word was from me to the BH owner when I saw this signs on the external wall of a BH.

If the water can leaked to the outside I can guarantee you that it will also leak in the other directions.

Leaking of water from a pond can be due to a few reasons but from what we saw it was due to poor cementing works.

Those cement were not water proven and the leakage can be easily seen on the curbs erected to hold those water.

Once they seep out they will find their way down to the lower floors.

I can see a few ways that they flow down.

One way was via the LAL.

The second was via the cement roof.

It does not stop on one floor but it started to flow to the ground floor too.

I told the BH owner that the damage due to the excess water is greater as compared to having the pond inside the monkey house floor.

In the first place there is no need to have a pond inside.

Why?

His piece of land has a big water pond that measured closed to 100 feet by 50 feet.

Just about 50 meters away there is a big water catchment pond that stored lot of rain water.

So why do you need to have the pond?

Frankly I shut the tap and drained all the water inside the pond without asking for his permission.

Simply damaging and flooded all over the floors.

The best lesson here is try to avoid having water ponds inside or on the rooftop.

Once they leak you will destroy your expensive BH.

Call this number if you are facing just exactly what I described above.  017 7551318

Look At What I Did On The Monkey House Rooftop !!!

The first day of revamp operation was to focus on the monkey house rooftop areas.

I told my workers to relocate the hexagonal tweeter and install those power tweeters.

They did exactly how I wanted it to be.

The rooftop now looks much better and I can fully guarantee that the moment my sound collection are played there will be nothing less then 100 birds will be drawn to the rooftop.

(Prior to revamp operation)

Now look at what I did?

Tested with KPOP on those power tweeters and guess how many swiftlet responded.

More than 100 and I got to quickly shut off the sound since he have to proceed with the main entrance window makeover.

I have instructed my workers not to play those external sounds for the time being.

Once ready I wanted to surprise the BH owner.

Let see what happen when all the revamp operation are completed.

I just wanted to see the big smiles on both the father and son team.

If you are facing a more or less similar problem just call this number 017 7551318.

Durian Tunggal: Started Revamp Operation Two Days Ago !!!

(Look up and you see about 1000 birds responded to my sound testing)

Another BH that is nicely located and with a lot of birds flying around it however with only about 10 nests after 2 years plus into operation.

This BH owner met me about 6 months back and was not sure if I have the right experience to revamp his BH.

I skip dinner with my family just to meet him at a posh restaurant  "The Rooftop" somewhere at Utama, PJ.

After the 1st meeting he went into silence mode.

One day he called, about three weeks ago, and wanted to visit my revamp works at Rantau.

I told him to stop by and see what he wanted to see.

Soon after he wanted me to take a short drive to his BH that was not doing well.

I thought it was just a few kilometers away but he took almost 45 minutes to reach the location.

After some inspection work I submitted a short report and he told me that he did have someone else who can do the same.

I told him to go ahead with the other guy since it was far away from Kuala Lumpur.

The phone keep ringing and I know he wanted me to carry out the revamp operation.

One biggest advantage he has is the number of birds that responded during one of my sound test operation.

More than 1000 birds responded but how come the number of nests inside his BH was only about 10?

The real truth can be found inside the BH.

1)  The consultant tried to cut cost and the BH was erected with a single wall.  He charged the owner for double walls but erected a single wall.

2) The internal temperature recorded a high of 34.3*C and low of 23.2*C.  The walls, middle floor only, will be sealed with those bubble sheet mat and covered with cement boards.

3) The hexagonal tweeter was not properly located and was dead when my workers were trying to relocated it. Already replaced with a new hexagonal tweeter and located just above the main entrance hole.

4) The BH came with two set of LAL.  One was at the staircase and the second were on the opposite sides.  A shear waste of nesting space.

5) I believed the owner tried his best to revamp the BH however with very little knowledge he did very little to catch the birds attention.  He copied those cluster tweeters but was not well done.  The tweeters were tilted up facing the ceiling and poorly done.

6) The external sound tweeters positioning were not at the right positions.

7) The number of internal tweeters was on the low side.

8) The gap between the ceiling and nesting planks were too wide at some areas.  I will be plugging them by raising them up.

9) The water pond was leaking and the runaway water were seeping to the lower floors. I shut the pipe in total and drain all the remaining water inside the pond.  I suggested to the owner to perhaps used the dried up pond area to breed insect instead.

He should have met me 2 years ago and I am sure he will not be so much messed up with the BH. .

His father was not happy but something that went wrong need some correction.

As at today I have corrected the entrance window and monkey house areas.

I told the owner that within next week his BH will be back to its real operation mode.