Rembau BH: The Owner Finally Upgrade His BH With A Monkey House !!!

Yesterday saw a miss called and contacted the caller.

"Yes, what can I do for you?' I asked him.

"Harry this coming Monday I have a contractor to erect the monkey house as per your recommendation.  Can you be around to advise what to do?" he replied.

Good at least he listeedn to my advise.

His BH have been revamped and operated for almost 6 months.

The number of new nests were there but not that many.

During my last trip I discovered that his BH was under attack by owls.

The AC to DC  inverter install by him was not functioning.

There were owl shits and their vomit balls all over the floors.

I told him to fix the inverter or perhaps get a new set.

During this meeting with him I advised him that he should think of installing a monkey house.

A steel structure covered with those cladded zinc plates (with foam) will do a good thing to his BH.

Remember there are 26 more BHs around his area and they are fighting among each other.

All these BHs are with the same top entrance designed.

The only way to be different from the rest is to erect a Monkey house.

The entrance holes will be facing the east (one of them) while the other facing the flying path if we know which direction they fly home.

There are many advantages to have the monkey house.

One for sure is that those young birds prefer to play at the monkey house entrance hole and the same time like to circle the monkey house structure.

They love to play chasing each other when they get near the entrance hole.

One more thing to benefit from the Monkey house is the amount of light.

You have lesser light entering the main entrance hole areas especially below the monkey house.

With lesser light you have better environment inside your BH.

He seems to be happy with my recommendations.

I will be at Rembau this Monday.

If you are free please call me for a visit.

The Sound Frequencies Adjustments And Effects To Your Swiftlet !!!

There are more hidden things that are not being exposed by any those who owned a successful BH.

I remember writing about meeting a BH owner who claimed to discover a technique in pulling 20,000 birds into his empty BH by frequency manipulation.

Read this article.

This guy I met during last month at EBNIC pull me to a smoking area and told everything about his BH.

First about his employing a few consultants that were not useful.

However the best story ever heard from a BH owner is the method he used to lure those birds inside his BHs.

"Harry after being cheated nearly 3 times and lost almost 50,000 rm I make the decision to do my own investigation.  That was how I discovered this frequency manipulation.  No matter what sound I played I will get the same reaction by those birds." he said.

He might be right but he did not precisely told me what he actually did.

Could it be the three common knobs  found on most amplifiers (bass, treble and mid).

Or could it be those frequency buttons?

Well I can only guess.

The only way to know his skill is to pay a visit to his BH.

However I begin to experiment with the amplifiers at Kapar BH.

Yesterday visited this BH and observed the activities at the entrance hole.

The number of birds seems to decline badly and I told myself that the time have come to change the sound to a new set.

During the sound changed my mind was on that guy who said that he found a method to use the amplifiers to draw 20,000 birds into his BH without any problem.

I looked at the setting and begin a series of tests.

It was not that easy.

The birds response looks similar and I finally told myself that I need to make a short visit to this guy BH and perhaps discover his secrets.

Hope to call him this weekend and pay a visit by then.

Something Extra Ordinary On How To Fertilize My Orchard In Bujang !!!

I was told about this word symbiotic where nearly all tree roots have a kind of relationship with fungi.

The fungi help to gather more food and water and the tree roots provide the fungi with its favourite food Carbohydrates.

A very new thing which change my understanding about how a tree works.

All these while I thought those fungi are dangerous to any form of decaying wood or leaves.

Now this new relationship between the two (tree roots and fungi) make me wanting to try at Bujang orchard.

Managed to discover where to purchase the fungi spores in Kuala Lumpur and the seller have agreed to allow me to collect on Monday 15 December 2014.

It comes in a 25 kg bag and the spores are being mixed with soil and ready to apply.

My plan is to carry out some test and at the same time will try to cultivate the spores so that I can reapply on other trees in the orchard.

First thing to do is to effectively apply this fungus (mycorrhizal) to get them to the roots of all those trees in the orchard.

My method is to mix the fungi with water and pour them around the tree trunks.

The soil around the trunk base need to be poked with holes so that the fungi solution be able to be absorbed and easily reaching the roots.

Let see how the fungi will help to push the trees to grow at a much faster rates.

The next thing that I wanted to do is to multiply these fungi by using some of those grass.

The idea here is to cultivate the fungi in those plastic containers using those grass.

I will use about 10 plastic bags about 10" in diameter with a depth of about 1'.

Mix the soft soil with about 1/4 kg of the fungi laced with soil.

Put them into this plastic bag and plant those special grass.

The filled bags will be kept at a place where the sun are not too bright.

Once the grass grew well at least 2 months old, the grass top will be removed leaving only the roots.

These roots will have a lot of these fungi for use on those fruit trees.

Something new and I am looking forward to see how it will effect the fruit trees.

For more readings about mycorrhizal fungi please click here

Kuala Rompin BH: Waiting For Order To Proceed !!!

Just submitted my visit report and now let see if the owner accept my recommendations.

The report was about 11 pages complete with a list of recommendations, materials to purchase and various sketches.

My idea was to focus on two of the 4 floors.

This will cut the cost to renovate by 50%.

Once the two floors are running well he can look forward to convert the other two.

Use your income from the two converted floors to finance the second phase of conversion.

The top most floor will be shut down with a suitable wall directing those birds to the lower floors.

My plan is to erect a wall to prevent those birds from entering the nesting room on the 4th floor.

They will be forced to fly down to the lower floors via the LAL opening.

Next will be to cover the LAL on the 2nd floor in total.

They will not be allowed to enter the ground floor.

The number of nests if fully occupied inside the 3rd and 2nd floor is estimated to be about 8,960 or a total of 74 kilograms.

The amount is good enough for a monthly income of 24 kg a month (once the two floors are fully occupied).

This income can later be used to upgrade the BH for a larger nesting areas.

One very interesting recommendation to the owner is to engage a local steel fabricator to erect a monkey house above his top entry opening.

If he should carry out this recommendation, he will be the only unit with this kind of structure.

The additional structure will allow his BH external sound system to be installed higher then his neighbors.

Young swiftlet like those side entries more than the top entry type, I confirmed to the owner.

The monkey house will be with at least two entrance windows.

The main will be facing the flying path (in this case to the back) and the second towards the morning sun (to the front).

He might want to open one more window facing a BH with the most number of birds every evening i.e. to the side.

Maybe a mini bazooka facing the neighbor's rooftop will be great.

In my recommendation, I told him about the use of dual sounds both for the internal and external sounds.

The external will have two sounds and the internal with two different sounds.

What I need to do is to install those tweeters at the right location with two separate set of cables.

My mission is to make sure that his BH is the most attractive and more desirable.

Every bird that stays in this Eco-park (28 units)  will be lured into this unit for a tour.

Once they enter their chance to move in should be above 50%.

Beside dual sounds (the most attractive sounds) there will be a lot of 90* corners, lots of fake nests, lots of waste wood corners and lots of super pheromone smell.

I will make sure their nesting rooms will be dark (2 feet apart and you cannot see each other).

Each renovated floors will be installed with two chicken coop humidifiers activated using a set of humidistat humidity sensor.

I encouraged the owner to install a lightning auto starter.  Every time when the fuse box trip the auto starter will activate the current within 30 seconds.

Last but not the least is a set of owl protection unit.

An inverter with suitable bare wires will be installed to discourage those owls from entering the three windows.

The data room will be located on the second floor since he reported that the area was flooded once with water rising to almost one meter high.

Kuala Rompin BH: The Only Way Is To Be Different !!!

When you BH is in an area with 27 other BHs and competing to lure the same number of birds found around an area, I think you should try to be different.

You need to think of all the things that will be the most attractive to lure those wild birds into your BH.

You cannot be sympathetic to your neighbors when you are new.

Once your BH is full to the brim there will be a king of spill over.  Those new birds that have no where to erect their BH might move to those BHs nearby.

This spill overs will benefits your neighbors.

For the beginning you need to opt for something different from the rest.

For this Kuala Rompin BH I am pushing the owner to go with a monkey house construction.

There are a number of benefits and his BH might be the most preferred unit in the area.

1) Usually those young birds are attracted more to the monkey structure.
They love to play at those external sound tweeters and at the same time they like to circle the monkey house structure.  If you make a close observation you will find this very peculiar behavior where they will start to chase each other the moment they are closed to the external sound tweeters.  It might be due to territorial but it might be due to male chasing the female.

2) Young birds prefer the side entries more than the top entries.  This is my own statement or conclusion.  I might not be 100% right but this is what I kind of observed.  The side entry have this kind of environment when these young birds can play around the tweeters and latch onto them.

3) The monkey house allows the sound system to cover more areas.  If you monkey house is raised by 7 feet above the rest you can imagine how your sound will be transmitted.  I planned to install at least one hexagonal tweeter above the main entrance hole.  This will allows the external sound to cover 360 degrees angled.  The top entry without any hexagonal will only cover the space above the mouth of the hole.

4) The monkey house will have at least two entrance windows.  The most important will be the one facing bird's flying path while the second is towards the morning sun (East).  The one towards the flying path will be the main entrance hole.  There is a very strong possibility of opening a third hole facing the unit which is currently the most successful owned by the developer.

5) With the monkey house structure this BH will be the only unit using the elevated structure.  The rest are using the top entrance system.  The advantage will be the one with extra height.

The monkey house most probably will be using steel frames and covered with zinc (coated with foam) walls.

The owner wanted me to source around Kuala Rompin for a steel forming workshop company.

If you know one please call this number :0177551318.

Kuala Rompin Eco Park: Let Us Look At The Air Ventilation Holes !!!

Usually we have the air ventilation holes with 4 inches diameter PVC pipe installed with an elbow and extended with about 2 feet pipe.

You main aim in to allow those air to come it but not those bright light.

Well let me show you what kind of ventilation holes were installed on every floor of this Eco Park at Kuala Rompin.

From the outside

From the inside

The amount of light from these holes will make the BH very bright.

Remember when it is bright those wild birds will not be happy and will not make their nests.

A very basic thing and yet the designer or the architect cannot detect it.

This was why I mentioned to the owner that most of these so called Eco-Park are there because the developer wanted to make fast money without taking into any consideration of the investors.

The architect of this Eco-park might be good in building design for human but not for swiftlet.

This kind of simple mistake can be seen in almost all failed BHs.

From my point of view all swiftlet Ecopark must be first vetted by Jabatan Veterinar before getting approval of the local council.

But this is not happening.

Even if they vetted they are also ignorance of the basic requirements.

A very sad state of affair and no body wanted to do something about it.

Kuala Rompin: A Worth While Two Days Visit !!!

I am very pleased to inspect a BH owned by one of my blog reader from Singapore.

He wanted me to take a good look at his empty (building completed but yet to install those nesting planks and sound system) BH and advice him on what shall be done.

The trip was long and it took nearly 4.5 hours to reach from Kuala Lumpur.

The moment I arrived I called him and picked him up with the door keys.

We were there inspecting floor by floor.

I have the following good thing to say about his BH:

1) Kuala Rompin used to be called the Hot Spot for swiftlet farming in Peninsular Malaysia.  By having a BH in this location it will be a not so difficult task to populate a BH if properly designed and good sound selection.

2)The BH location is not bad since it was very closed to two big water catchment areas.  One is a natural lake while the other is a man made dam.

3) The BH location is along the road to the Endau Rompin Forest Reserve.  The forest have be gazetted as a restricted areas.  The thick virgin jungle will be a great source of insects.

3) He bought a unit sand witched in between a few other BHs in an Government approved swiftlet Eco park.  There were a few BHs that are showing signs of high numbers of nests.  The rooftop areas were with lots of birds flying nearly most of the time during my visit.

4) His BH is with the MCMC RFID tag.  This will be a big advantage when those nests are ready for harvesting and export to China.

5) His BH entrance hole (top entry) is facing the east (North-East).  Another advantage which will ensure that those birds can stay further away from the entrance hole areas.

On the negative side I have the following to say:

a) The BH design was not proper or by those architect who have very little ideas about swiftlet farming.  The layout was a bit unsatisfactory to my standard.

b) The BH with no light on were very bright.  Not one area passed my specification (2 feet apart you cannot see each other).

c) I was very disturbed to see how the ventilation holes were provided.  The architect used those bricks with holes (as many as 25 of them) which allows bright light to pollute all the nesting rooms.  I told the owner that we need to shut them with a layer of cement board but with a 1.5 inch gap.

d) All the 28 units were using the top entry type of openings.  I told the owner that he should opt for a monkey house if he wanted to be different from the rest.

e) If you want to enter the three floors above the ground floor you need to climb a staircase outside the building.  This is the first time I entered a BH where the owner have to opened four doors.

f) The highest floor is with two LAL (lubang antara lantai) holes and I think that is a bit excessive.  I told the owner that I need to shut one of the LAL hole.

g) There were more then one main entrance window/door into the nesting room.  One was a door about 4 feet wide by 10 feet high and a window about 2.5 feet by 2 feet.  The amount of light entering the third floor is unacceptable.  The main door size need to be reduced while the window to be totally shut down.

h) The BH was a bit short (70 feet long) by 20 feet wide.  The top floor after allocating about 15 feet for the top entry area and another 15 for the roving and LAL left the nesting room about 40 feet long.

i) The lower floors especially the third and the second looks more promising to start with.  My recommendation to him was to focus on the two floors and shut the other two (top and ground floors).

j) The ground floor was reported to be flooded up to about three feet high.  Just imagine if the amplifiers were place on the ground floor.

The above are just my observations and will make a bit more report about what I plan to do with this BH.

My hint: It have to be different from the rest.

Took these pictures just to share with you all.

If the owner give me the green light to proceed with the installation of wood and sound system, I would love to invite all of you to come and see what I will be doing inside.

Call me at 017 7551318 to set the date.

This Sunday Going To Visit a BH at Rompin, Pahang !!!

Been away from home for the last few days.

Anyway tomorrow December 7th 2014 I will be making a long journey to Rompin, Pahang.

Main objective is to view a BH located inside an Eco Park of 28 BHs.

The owner happened to meet me during the last EBNIC 2014 at the Marriott Hotel Putrajaya.

He bought a unit a few years back and left it ideal for all this while.

What he wanted me to do is to take a look at the empty unit plus the rest and recommend what will be the best options.

The moment he told me that his BH is among 27 others at the same spot, I warned him that the only way to be successful is to be the best among the rest.

It will be a very tough and only a very determined person can succeed.

I have been involved with a number of Swiftlet Eco Park before and my experiences tells me that to fight among so many other BHs around you is not easy.

The first and a very bad experience was at an Eco Park BH in Kuala Krai, Kelantan.

Renovated the BH and operated the BH for a couple of months.

Upon inspection, the third month, I discovered that the owner did not pay his utility bills.

No sounds thus the BH was left with nearly all dried bird shits all over the place especially below those cluster tweeters.

Once the sounds were dead, the BH is literary dead too.

Another Eco Park was at Rembau N9.

Due to too many BHs and little birds the response to get those birds inside is not easy.

Worst was when those owls began attacking the BH.

The owner went away for a few months and he did not visit his BH during the period.

The whole floors were littered with swiftlet feathers plus owl shits. 

I told the owner to clean up those markings and at the same time get an electrician to check on his inverter (for shock wires).

For the Rompin BH I am also concerned on the floor plans.

My frank opinion after review the floor plans is "no good".

The developer have very little concern over those poor buyers.

I am very sure this BH is bright and if continue as it was, there will be no birds staying inside.

Will give a big check on the whole building and see how to attract those birds into this particular BH.

An Interesting Story On How A BH Owner Was Scammed By His First SIFU !!!

(Two Blog Followers From Vietnam and Brunei)

This story was told to me by one of the participant who attended the recent EBNIC 2014 at the Marriott Putrajaya.

"Pak Harry, I met this so called consultant who can call those birds to come done and stick to his body.  At that time I was new and owned a number of BHs which were empty.  When I saw his special "gift" I quickly employed him.  I paid him a monthly salary of RM 5,000 a month and provided him with a 4X4 truck.  After 3 years plus he went missing and all my BHs remained empty."

When I heard his story I was a bit fascinated and keep asking myself how this gifted guy can get those wild birds to fly down and cling to his shirt.

"Pak Harry, do you want to know how he tricked me?" he asked.

Of course I was curios and wanted to know how he did that.

"What this conman did was to put those small tweeters below his shirt and connected to an iPod playing those powerful sound. He tricked me and I fell for it." we laughed loudly.

"The conman showed me by activating the iPod in a BH but I was asked to stay at a distance from him so that I cannot hear the sound."

"The moment I saw his so called special "gift" I officially signed a contract with him as my SIFU."

"I never realized that he tricked me and I feel foolish until now."

From that day he never ever believed in any "Consultant" anymore.

What he did after that bad experience was to find out by himself how to populate his BHs.

He spend days and nights inside his BHs to find out what can be wrong and how to correct his those mistakes.

During his study he discovered a few interesting things that help him to populate his birds population.

He found out that if you manipulate the sound amplifiers properly any sound can pull those birds into any BH.

Those birds will usually shoot in like an arrow into your BH.

They will also stay put inside however I cannot guarantee if they will populate your BH with their nests.

A strange person but along the way he discovered something new.

Most people will came across some kind of being cheated by a "consultant" but they did nothing to discover the tricks to populate their BH.

This special owner discover something and I can't wait to study his method.

A Very Strange Story By A BH Owner !!!

I accidentally met this BH owner while attending the recently organized EBNIC 2014 at The Marriott Putrajaya.

I was on my way to the toilet when this person stopped me for a short talk.

He invited me to the smoking corner of the building and started his puffing.

He related to me how he got involved with swiftlet farming and right now owned about 5 BHs.

"Pak Harry my main problem is not in getting those birds into my BH but how to get them build those nests.  I have this special ability to pull those birds inside but I cannot understand why they are not paying their rent?"

It seems that he have mastered the most interesting method on how to pull those birds in by using some kind of sound frequency adjustments and the moment they listen to any of his sound they will shoot inside like crazy.

I did not asked for more details but he promised to show his technique with a special trade in.

He wanted my expertise to force his tenants to pay their rental i.e. make their nests.

One of his BH now has almost 20,000 birds however the number of nests so far was 1,500 pieces.

Something must be wrong inside his BH.

From my past experiences these are the possible reasons:

1) The internal sound he played, especially at night, are not the right sound. When your internal sound is too attractive these birds will make love with your internal sound making tweeters.  If they are not courting with their own species they will not mate and erect their nest.

2) When your BH is too bright.  These birds are scared that if they start their family their young babies will be snatched away by predators.  For as long as the BH remained too bright these couples will stayed but will not start their nests building.

3) A BH with a lot of predators that consume the birds nests.  Just imagine the moment a young couple start to build their nests and during their daytime went out to search for food.  The moment they returned home their nests were consumed by these predators.  The most damaging will be those cockroaches and Tokek (Big lizards).

4) The BH with too high a temperature.  This might be another reason why they are not keen to start building their nests.  The nesting room high temperature will make them feel uncomfortable and scared to start their family.  Remember in this case the sound he played is very attractive but if there are some reasons to make these birds to feel uncomfortable, they will remain to be a non paying tenant.

5) Another possible reason that came to my mind are the condition of the BHs nesting planks.  If he uses a cheap and low quality nesting woods he might be facing fungus contaminated syndrome.  The high RH% in his house might have caused all his nesting planks to grow fungus.  Beside fungus the next possible problem might be contamination by bird shit smell.  This can happened when your workers accidentally splash those BH aroma with bird shit base water onto the nesting planks.  Another possible contamination might be due to some application of plank aroma that were not well like by those wild birds.

Well there might be many other reasons that can effect these birds.

My wish is to visit this BH and find out the possible reasons.

If I can identify and correct his BH problem I might learn from him about his special technique on how to pull all those birds into any BH using any sound.

He claimed to have found this special technique that was never told to any one before.

A very interesting person with a very special gift.

After 2 Long Months Its Still With A Lot Of Birds On The Rooftop !!!

The Segamat BH which was revamped and put into operation about 2 months ago seems to continuously have visitors above its roof top.

I have a very special attachment to this BH.

It was how the owner found me after making a deep praying at his Church.



He told me clearly that he could not find any one to help him with his BH.

One day he went to his Church and make a special prayer for some divine helps.

Within the same day he he found me on the net.

"I was looking for BH sounds and I punched in "Swiftlet Sound.  Suddenly your blog surfaced." he told me how he found me.

I spend many hours to read your many articles and at the same time came to know more about you.

At first he was reluctant to go ahead afraid of another scam"Consultant".

After reading more and more articles he realized that there was something unusual about me.

"You share your findings while others will never want to share them." he said.

"Many of your articles are precisely what my BH is facing and your ideas are unusual but useful."

That was how he called me and invited me to view his BH.

After viewing his BH I submitted to him my report.

Within one week he called asking me when can I start work.

Without any hesitation he remit the deposit for me to purchase those important items and find my way to send them to him.

This special event will be remembered for a very long time.

Today he send me a video clip that shows how his BH roof top was performing.

He wanted my advise if he can synchronize the hexagonal sound and the external sound be run on the same time.

I advised me that there is nothing wrong as long as those birds response and become his tenants.

Enjoy this clip:

BM Birdhouse Can Be Easily Populated By Following Some Design Alterations!!!

After the short inspection works inside a BH located somewhere in the middle of Bukit Mertajam town I have sketched how the BH layout was.

I told the owner that his BH should or can be with more nests if the BH configuration allows lesser light into the nesting room.

His external sound system was downed and there was no proper tweeters on the top entrance areas.

The number of internal sound tweeters were okay and well located.

He should have installed more fake nests since nearly 45-50% of the fake nests installed were with tenants.

What I came out with was how to minimize those light entering the nesting rooms.

First he need to reduce the size of the connecting door between the roving area and the nesting room.

He should also apply some black paint on a few walls.

As for the nesting rooms he should have install two partitions and create VIP rooms at the ends of the room.

One at the front and the other at the back.

Their doors must be facing each other in a straight line.

It should look something like this:

If he wanted to lure more tenants he should increase the number of fake nests.

Knowing where and how to install them will help a lot.

I also recommended him the NKS (nest kick start) method to secure all those birds that are currently erecting their new nests.

I saw a number of fresh markings on a number of places and he should give them a helping hand.

You can assist them to quickly erect their nests and lay their first egg.

The moment they laid one egg they will be yours forever (until they die).

Many BH owners leave everything to those birds and will not lift their finger to help these wild birds.

As for me always says that those wild birds needs our help and we should do our best to make them comfortable and built their nests as quick as possible.

Most of these new comers are very young with no previous experiences in building their nests.

Their saliva glands are not used to produce a lot of those white liquid.  

They need those fake nests to quickly start their nests and lay the eggs.

Show to them that you care and install those fake nests when you see those fresh markings on the nesting planks.

The moment you do that you will see the nests ready with eggs during your next visit.

Trust me on this advise.

Nangka Plants Around Bujang BH !!!

It must be the suitability of the soil.

After almost 3 months the plants planted on the piece of land around the Bujang BH seems to have multiple results.

The Nangka trees and Starfruit trees seems to grow well while the Soursop were with slow growth.



I think it must be the soil.

Maybe I should replaced all those poor growing trees with Nangka (Jack-fruits)?

I took the whole morning of November 20th 2014 to do some gardening.

It is terrible when you are not used to using those changkul to remove those grass around the base of the Nangka trees and loosen up the soil around the trunks.

Started with the idea of removing all those wild grass around the base of the Nangka trees at around 8:00 am.

By 11:30 am the heat was unbearable.


The little thing that I did was to remove and clean about 3 feet radius and loosen up the soil around the trunks.

Once done I dumped a pail of surface soil around it.

My garden adviser whatsapp to me to water the base with water mixed with a liquid fertilizer bough from him.

He assured me that the plants will grow faster and stronger.

Just 10 plants and I was exhausted to the bones.

Rested and drink a lot of water.

Body aching all over my body but I do enjoy looking at the new shoots on most of the Nangka trees.

The grass were cut but not in total.

Tomorrow need to call the grass cutter guy to complete the job.

Overall I enjoyed looking at the garden especially when you see those trees growing taller.

These Nangka madu trees were purchased from a farm located in Rawang Selangor.

It was about 2 feet high when purchased about 3 months ago.

Those young leaves are nice to look at and many new shoots are coming out.

I hope continue cleaning up the wild grass on every plant, I have 30-40 more to go.

A few died and I think I know why.

I must have used too much fertilizer.

The amount to be used and the time to apply must be proper.

Or else they will start to shed their leaves and some will soon be dead.

I might need to get a few new ones to replenished those that were dead.

Will place orders soon and at the same time wanted to plant a few citrus trees.