The Top Most Floor Was Hitting Almost 36*C !!!

(From outside it looks very nice but what are inside, god knows)

 

A wrongly designed BH located somewhere in Lunut, Port Dickson.

I was recently invited to inspect this very large stand alone BH about 28'X100' and each floor was with 8' ceiling height.

The owner who was with very little knowledge did a terrible mistake.

If he should have attended my Swiftlet Farming Seminar he will not have allowed his contractor to erect the BH with a single wall.

To me a single wall is equivalent to a big disaster.

The heat from the BH external wall will easily creep to the internal wall and the BH will heated up and turn into a SPA.

The top most floor was the worst since the roof was also recording about 35*C.

The asbestos ceiling used must be to closed to the roof floors and maybe the air flow between the roof and the floor was too little.

I also believed that the ceiling floor was not thick enough.

Just imagine at about 3 pm the wall facing the East was registering 36.7*C, the wall to the West was about 34.6*C and the ceiling roof was also with 35.3*C.

If there is any remedies it will cost the owner a big budget.

My recommendation, it he wanted to reduce his revamp cost is to shut the top floor in total and concentrate on the 3rd and 2nd floor.

He can do this by erecting a closed walls at the LAL hole to make sure no birds will be allowed to enter the top most floor.

Another wrong thing with the BH was the ziz-zag LAL placement.

If a couple enter the BH the only way to reach to the bottom is to fly down to the 3rd floor and move to the opposite site to find the second LAL to the 2nd floor.

If they still wanted to reach the ground floor they need to fly to the other side for the LAL.

This stupid design is not recommended.

My frank opinion is to locate the LAL at an angle where those new couples can fly direct from the top most floor to the lowest.

For this BH I will recommend to open a new LAL hole on the 2nd floor.  The old LAL will be used only for its staircase.

The BH seems to have quite a number of visitors but nearly all those markings on the floor were dried.

Nearly 30-40% of those internal sound tweeters were actually hosted at least a couple for a period of time.

Once they feel uncomfortable, perhaps due to the high temperature, they left the house.

The total number of internal sound tweeters were low, maybe around 60-70 a floor.

I recommended about 1-1.5 pieces per square meter.

The top most floor were with the most number of markings but all were dried which indicates that the birds have left the BH.

Another very standard thing that I discovered in nearly all sick BHs was that they external sound were allowed to be installed at the main entrance hole and the LAL.

Very rare I saw those with proper or more external sound inside the VIP rooms are on the door frame.

My conclusion about this BH are as follows:

1) Due to lack of knowledge about swiftlet farming, the owner did little to get his BH with double walled.  If he should have been a bit knowledgeable he can save a lot of money.

2) The so called contractor cum consultant is not sincere.  He took advantage of the poor owner who did not argue or foresee what will happen when a single wall is used.

3) The walls were wrongly constructed.  It should be double layer with a gap in between to block direct heat entering the nesting rooms.

4) The roof ceiling was not thick enough. Usually the final ceiling of a BH is much thicker as compared to the other floors below.  Since this last ceiling floor will be exposed to outside environment it is advisable to have it thicker or double the thickness.

5) The roof erected above the ceiling floor must be either to closed of the air circulation were restricted.  When your roof is too closed to the ceiling floor there is this think we called head radiation.  The heat will still cause the floor to raise its temperature and slowly creep to the BH.

6) The LAL  holes were not proper.  Current location will prevent any new birds to find their was to the ground floor.  The ground floor is the most conducive, cooler and darker and this is where most wanted to stay if allowed to. Any BH which experienced a heavy population on the ground floor indicate to you that the BH is with properly located LAL holes.

7) Properly located LAL will help to birds to find their way out of the BH during dawn.  This is where I keep telling you all that those morning light is a must for these wild birds to find their way out of the house early in the morning.

8) The entrance hole chosen was the top entry type and one side of the hole was facing the east.  This seems to be the only correct thing about this BH.  If given a choice I would love to upgrade this house and change the top entrance type to a Monkey house entrance.

9) The external sound tweeters were not enough and nil inside the nesting room.  The only place with external sound tweeters were the entrance hole areas and the LAL.  This is the old way and no longer suitable.

10) The number of internal sound tweeters were too little.  My method is to use this rule of the thumb like 1 square meter per tweeter.   Better still to raised the figure to 1.5 tweeters per square meters.  The most important locations to put more tweeters will be inside the VIP rooms.

11) There were a couple of half walls inside the BH but they served very little purposes.  They lack adequate purposes to block the light and make a room which I normally named VIP room.  This simple idea is more like a must in any BH.  Each floor need to be revamp and VIP rooms should be created.

12) The external sound tweeters at the entrance hole areas were not adequate.  This lack of tweeters need some attention.

13) There were no special gadget inside the BH to lure those birds to be a permanent resident.  No fake nests and etc.

14) The BH was very dry and the contractor did very little to install those humidifiers or even water pipes.  A BH without any water supply I think is not right unless your BH is inside a jungle will not pipe water closed by.

I hope the above observations and comments are useful to all those who own BH(s).  Remember I am not trying to blame the owner or the BH contractors but what I am trying to highlight is the key issues that you should not do during your BH construction.

Do not give the contractor do everything without any input from you.

For the sake of your heavy investment try to gather as much knowledge as possible or else try to appoint an adviser to help you with the BH design before to let the contractor to start building your dream BH.

If you do not follow the above advise you dream BH will soon turn into a nightmare BH.

Call me at 017 7551318 for any help so that I can help you with your dream.

I can also be contacted at harryswiftlet@yahoo.com.