Sayonara 2008

Sayonara, Sayonara......I still remember this Japanese song. Sayonara 2008!

What a day, I nearly forgotten today is the last day of the year, until I receive many sms coming to my phone today. Thanks to all my friends and supporters. I wish you well and I wish you have a better and more prosperous new year ahead, sincerely.

I knew many of you may face uncertainty due to the current economy downturn, retrenchment, unemployment etc...there is always ups and downs in life. I encourage everyone to take it easy and control your spending during the bad days. And if you are one of the unfortunate one, be positive as I always believe, when there is a threat, there is an opportunity.

Take for example the new business that I am interested in: Herbalife. When every industry is down, Herbalife is one of the industries that is growing: Health and fast food products, which is almost recession proof. If you are a full time employed person, as I have said earlier in my posting, look for a passive income stream. Active income stream and a single source of income is the history, you are outdated if you still think like any employed person on the streets.

Wish you the Best of Luck! Have a Great Great Great 2009!!!

Blog Counter

Looks like I still have a problem to monitor my blog hit counter. I do not know why such a simple thing would bothering me for weeks. Perhaps some of the bloggers/readers could help me? Note: I have problem to include the html shortcut to blog as well...

Herbalife

I have a tendency to look into more passive income than active income nowadays. I think this is a good direction in life. I tend to think more like walet.twins although I have not retired like him yet. Retire Young and Retire Rich!! (a book written by Robert Kiyosaki)

Recently, by chance, I came to know of this business called Herbalife. It suited my bill especially my wife. For a good reason: it bring health to the world. And for another reason: it is giving a good passive income stream if we were successful. We spent our last one week in KL witness some of the shops and met number of people who are passionate in this line. Finally, we are convinced that this a business worth our investment for our future. I wonder if anyone have gone into this line, perhaps you can share your thoughts. Frankly, there are many success story, I would encourage my readers to explore this new MLM business, it is a game of leveraging. This are some of the ways to get rich as mentioned by most of the investment gurus including Robert Allen, Robert Kiyosaki etc.

Roving Area

Farm design is a science as well as an art. There are many school of thoughts, there is no absolutely right or wrong. Just for an example, the size of a roving area.. Some says it has to be as big as possible, some says it should be smaller so that we do not waste the nesting space. I heard some farms without a roving room get good results but those with big roving, as big as a shop floor space is doing well too.. I tend to like a bigger roving room. It is more like a playground to our children, or young birds in this case. I read it some where someone one was saying the ratio should be 2:1 for roving vs nesting area. Well, I doubt that many follow this rule, but instead the reverse more from what I have seen many farms so far.

Taking a break

I still remember when I was new(although I am still new in this business today), I tend to visit my farm frequently, like weekly! Not patient to urge my consultant to turn on the sound once the farm was built, not patient to visit my farm on regular basis, not patient to wait for the results, not patient in getting new things implemented etc...This is the problem of being new..I believe all newbies have the same problem too...It generally taking months for a bird to familiar with a farm and build their first nest when they feel the place they chosen is secured and safe for their next generation. We would frighten the bird if we tend to visit our farm too frequently. A suggestion is maximum once a month, and choosing the right time, like from time 1000 to 1500. When the farm is new, we tend to see a lot of problems with our farm especially the farm was not design or the control gadget was not installed well. There are numerous problems I found in my early visit of my farm. Floor was wet, water was overflowed from my water pond, humidifier was not working well, croaches problem etc...you name it, we need to fix them as soon as possible. Hence, this is why we need to get this micro-habitat monitored and confirmed okay before we turn-on our sound system. When the farm is stabilize, we should reduce our frequency in visiting, hopefully, the birds has a peace of mind......Truly, Take a break, have a Kitkat!

Newbie

I came to know a few newbie in the farming business. One started farming few years ago, the farm is in a swiftlet central area, near to the seaside and padi field. He knew not much about the trade, but yet successful. In fact a lot of people was laughing at him and teasing him that how can he be successful in luring the wild birds but turning on the chirping sound years ago.



And recently, I met my friend and he told me that a few of his friends started farming with no experience in this industry as well. Obviously, people started to know how lucrative is this business, but their are generally not computer savy and know nothing much about the business. Hence, it is natural that all of them engaged a contractor or consultant to start their first farm. I met numerous consultant/contractors since I started to know more about this trade. Everyone of them have their own style. In average, they do not know much but copying from each other's design.



How many of the newbies read books? Attending seminars? Visit as many farms as they could? I doubt so..All learn from the world of hard knock...I was even surprised one day as one of the consultants was asking me what are the styrofoam on the plank for? I presume this consultant has built more than 30 farms already! And I suppose no many of them know how to edit sound track as they are generally not computer savy..of course they are some new generation consultants able to do so...When there are so many newbies and new consultants emerging, I am not surprised that the % of fail farms are still at a very high level today. I am seriously thinking that we do not have so much books and seminars in Malaysia as compared to Indonesia. We should have more books written in multiple languages in the market in the near future.

A trip to SP

I visited SP the day before yesterday, I had an appointment with Mr. C, the deputy chairman for the Kedah Swiftlet Association(not too use if the name called out correctly). This is the second time I met him, the first time was at Genting conference. Although it is a short talk, merely half an hour, I guess this is a good start. He expressed to me again, that the association would like to reach out to more farmers in the state, hence, the joining fee would be reduced from $1.5k to couple of hundreds. I think it is a very good move to unite the farmers, and we know that with a bigger support from the members, the Association can be more convincing when they deal with the local authorities. In fact, I would think that Kedah state is one of the most cooperative states in the country where birdhouse is allowed to build on the top floor(s) of a commercial building, thanks to Dato B. This is widely practiced in towns especially SP. However, Mr. C pointed out a few valid points that we as a farmer should not be too aggressive to build our farms immediate next to a residential area, and also some restricted areas like high-tech park in Kulim. Building farms next to residential area is asking for trouble and the Association would not be able to help when the people and local authorities have a concern. He also shared one important point about swiftlet farming: it is not a sure success for all pro, even the pro may only have half their farm as considered as successful. It is true, learning about bird behaviours is a challenging task. We need to be able to continue to learn the technique and continue to improve...Will meet him again in the near future.

An odd mix?

I read this wonderful message from walet.twins, another blogger of my favourite. I would like to share his message here. I hope he does not mind....Enjoy reading it..This is a new way of life...life without a boss...


An Odd Mix?
Passing through Singapore offers opportunity to catch up with old mates each time.Well, what's new this time?I told a uni-mate I got into Forex trading & Bird Nest farming as retirement activities.. "Huh! What an odd mix", he quipped.He is correct.. it is an unusual combination indeed, even sounds weird!Looking back, my first premise was to look for activities that suit a carefree lifestyle. Much of our working life was to fit into what the market needs and opportunities it offers.To have a freedom of choice doing something in leisure is a dream. I started out with the notion of a little resort, but soon as I gained insights into bird nest farming... it is obvious which is a better choice!When I first came to know Dr. Chris, a kidney specialist in KL, with his bird farms few hundred KMs away; visits them only fortnightly or perhaps monthly. It rang a bell in me the viability as a hobby farm.The pluses:No staff hiring and keeping them headaches,No worry about seasonal variation of visitors,No day to day operational issues involved.. etc.Swiftlets takes care of themselves; they fly off at each day break to feed and return timely each night!All that is needed is to ensure a conducive & safe environment for them to nest and breed.No workers needed! No bills for feed mills!I can spend as much time I like on the farm or as little as I choose.I have the freedom to be away anytime too.How convenient!Down side is the capital outlay involved and a gestation period of no income.Forex trading share many similar attributes.. complete freedom!Freedom to trade any where, any time;Freedom when to trade or not to trade!Forex offers opportunity of regular income, provide one trades more profitably.As my friend CK once put it across to me:One is production based.. once up and running, it is a source of passive income. Little on going efforts involved.The other is activity based; no trading - no income (besides trading risks); period!They do compliment each other well.Well, I have this simple graphic to illustrate:Two different pictures: A headset & a circle painted yellow ....Combine them creatively forms another new image, isn't it?A smiley face, NO.. I am not smiling to the bank yet!
Posted by Walet.twins at 4:14 AM 0 comments

Against Another Blogger? A definition of Friendship

Personally, I do not against any people or blogers in particular. I do think that the readers are intelligent and can see with their own eyes who is right and who is wrong, and who is con and who is pro. I believe everyone need to feed their stomach and their family, the end of the story is that we must be ethical to do anything we think is right. The cantonese said: Doi tat ju ji kei n friends. Someone could make a mistake, but let's forgive him or her, as everyone could make a mistake, including ourselves. In the end, we can be friend again... :-), let's us stay together to protect this industry as much as possible. The worst enemy can be our best friend too..

The best way to control temp and humidity

This is my personal opinion, other sifu or consultant may have their own opinion. I believe the best way to control the temp and humidity is by insulating your farm from the outside world as much as possible. Temp is the number one enemy to humidity control, hence, this parameter must be controlled first before the later. When temp increase by one degree, it is a harder task to maintain the same level of relative humidity the temp one degree lower. We may not aware that the most heat generated in a standard shop lot is from the roof itself, then, only came the sides of the building, so, the logical way is to insulate your top as much as possible. There are many ways to do it, or many ways to skin a cat, from building double roofing to putting all kind of insulating materials in between your roof and top floor ceiling. And you may need to think about future security feature when you do your roofing and insulation. Think carefully what is your goal before you start your farm construction, it would be too troublesome to renovate again when your farm is already successful...

What a horrible experience!!

http://www.chinapress.com.my/content_new.asp?dt=2008-12-17&sec=malaysia&art=1217mb30.txt

A Trip to Alor Setar

Went to Alor Setar today with a few missions. Number one is meet up a friend, Mr O. I met Mr. O in Jakarta seminar and he was my roommate too, nothing more than roommate, ok...:-). We had a nice Hokkien mee in town before going to a potential site for a birdcall test. The result is marvellous, within a min, easily more than a few hundreds birds at about noon time! Not bad at all. He said that he did the same in the afternoon, the number is easily more than 500. Good idea to make a proposal to the land owner and set up a JV farm. We probably would propose to sign a contract with the owner to own the royalty of the said land for the next 30 years, and the owner cannot sell nor have the right to set up another farm without our permission etc..to protect our interest. The return to the owner could be like 15% of the revenue from harvesting and this return should be much better than pajak the land to the padi field operator. A typical double storey 20'x60' should cost like $150k. Let's see how it goes.


I have uploaded the birdcall test result for your viewing...Comments are welcome again. Do not hold your thoughts okay?

I made an appointment with Mr. T, a consultant as well. He is very helpful to bring me around AS and Jitra to show me some of his work and new farms. Jitra is still consider new in swiftlet farming and the bird population is not as great yet although there are plenty of party fields as well. But he is positive that the bird population will grow in the near future as the food source is plenty...

I did some personal marketing on my way back too..overall a very fruitful trip indeed.

Tomorrow, I am going to have an appointment with one of the key Kedah Swiftlet Association exco in SP.

New Farm

What is your comment about this farm design?

Bird Call Test 2

bird Call Test

Farm Design

A farm design seems to be one of the most important factors of all. A good farm design should not be total darkness. And a good farm design should have an easy flying path for the birds to come and go when they are in danger. A good farm design should have excellent micro habitat, e.g. temperature, humidity, brightness, and ventilation. Consultants in the market are mostly copying one after another, and there remains to be many school of thoughts, as the birds are the one who know the best they want. A newbie normally have to learn through lessons by paying the learning fees. There is no easy way to learn except you have a good sifu, who have learn through years' of experience and also owning successful farms. And there is always new way to swiftlet ranching as the old way may also not applicable as the competition becomes keener. I would encourage everyone learn as much as you can from your network, from the forums and read as many books as possible. In the end, there is more science than myth in anything we do. The rest, we leave it to God, or some says the X-factor. You need some luck too, may God bless you and happy learning...! After all, success belongs to those who never say die...

A topic a day

Writing a blog is more like a writing a diary for me..it is a good practice I have never practice it and have the persistence since younger day. What do write is not a problem I guess as we can write what we thought for the day and express it with our own experience and feeling. I am sure there is many things we encountered and interesting people we meet everyday. Hence, I would encourage people to start blogging if you are interested to share. Who knows we may need each other someday, and we can network and build more friendships.

I always thought creating a blog or a website is difficult. But after done it, I do not think so completely. Again, thanks to Google, and I am sure many such softwares are coming and available to the public. I am still learning how to do more stuff within a blog and hopefully the sifu bloggers can help me. One example is how to monitor the number of visitors and where they are located..

Learning is a never ending process...This is my diary about swiftlet ranching..

Bird Call gadget

Spend my afternoon today to make my first bird call gadget. It is pretty simple as you can see from the photo. It is made of two big 7.5" and three 3" motorola tweeters which I newly bought from Jakarta. The said tweeters are just secured using taping screws onto a standard packaging foam I got from an electric shop. Tested it with Stress sound track this evening. The result is simply marvellous, I did not even need to turn on the volume to full, easily 1000 birds immediately responded and circulated above my car on two tested sites within a minute. Unfortunately I did not bring my camera to capture the video clip. Hope to do that that in the future.

Location, Location, Location

I always think that location play a very important role in the success and failure of a birdnest farm. This is the same with running a business, like retail business. The very first factor in determining if you shop is going to be successful or not is the traffic flow of your retail shop. This is the reason why the front shop is more costly than the shop behind the main street. When the traffic flow is high, the chances of potential work-in customer(hit rate) is higher than those shops behind. For swiftlet ranching, we apply the same rule. I do not mean the front shop, but the shop or location with higher traffic flow of swiftlets. There are always three strategic locations, they are namely: swiftlet central, flying path and foraging area. There are always advantages and disadvantages of each area. Read more books related to swiflet ranching, especially from Indonesia, you will be more equipped to answer these questions.

Long Term Investment

Swiftlet Ranching is a long term investment. Having said that, you need to have the ability to hold and patiently wait for the results. It would take typically 3 to 5 years before you could comfortably harvesting your fruits. Similar to planting a durian tree...Of course throughout the duration, you need to see positive growth of nest building before you can conclude that you can be totally passive after 3-5 years. The growth of your nest is dependent on many factors..I will touch more in the future postings. In short, you are not an instant Millionaire yet!

Is success guaranteed?

Many of my friends do not believe in property investment, reason being: they got burnt once or twice. The question is: Is success guaranteed when someone said it is good? That is why a lot of investment guru said: if you do not know anything about a subject, anything is dangerous. Once you do your studies and learn from others' mistake, you become wiser and the risk of failure is relatively reduced. Same to Swiftlet farming, as it is equal to running a business, the success rate is as low as 20%. If the rate is low, is this a deterent for you to dive in? If you are an active income earner and solely dependent on single source of income, and you are the sole bread winner for your family, think twice during this economy down turn...

The morale of my story is: do your homework before you dive in. And think about a source of passive income, read books, e.g. Multiple Streams of Income from Robert Allen is one of the very good examples.

I always think, when there is a will, there is a way...Think like a Millionaire in order to be one - the Law of Attraction. If you would like to stay happy with where you are, the choice is yours...

Buy or Build?

Many newbies would have such doubts: Buy a ready property or build a standalone farm? Good question, and this is my expertise....hehehe.

Before becoming a farmer, property investment is my favourite "hobby". Property investment is a passive income stream, I love it the more I know about it. The theory is you use OPM(other people money) to invest. Why OPM? You only need to come out with 10-20% of the property price to own one, and your tenant pay for the rest of 80%...and by the end of 20 years after your instalment is fully settled by your tenant, your property should appreciate by double from your original price. Using 20% to hedge for a 200% gain! No wonder all rich and famous are property and real estate investors. And another added beauty of property investment after knowing about swiftlet ranching is you can use your untenanted second or first floor for swiftlet ranching! You never wasted a single inch of your property! This is always my first choice.

However, here come the trouble of using a commercial shop lot for agricultural purpose....hmm, this is why the trouble with Penang and Melaka ranchers now. Building a standalone farm on an agri land becomes the new trend in Malaysia. However, building a standalone farm requires hard cash, 100% on your own. Perhaps the most viable way is to JV with someone you know, like your friends and relatives. Look for a good location and work on it!

Happy farming!

A typical Standalone Farm

A Standalone farm on a piece of agri land is the ideal choice to get away from the legal authorities and disturbance to your neighbours.

A typical investment for a standalone farm can be ranging from RM100k to RM 1M, dependent on the farm size and the method used to make them.

Why people willing to spend such a high investment outlay for a structure? A strategically located standalone farm can appreciate a few times within a short 5 years. It is not surprising to get a 40% return a year for such investment after the initiate start-up period. This return rate of investment is easily surplus the greatest return from the second richest investor in the world - Warren Buffet, who merely made averagely 24% return for the past 40 years...

We can be the next richest man in the world soon....

Cheers! Kan Pei!

Flying High

Flying high, no worries.

Birds was said flying high as they could be lighter and easy for them to glide. They normally love to fly high after fooding time.

And they also fly high when we need the speed to be back home to feed the baby birds.

A passive income

Althougth I do not have the figure, I think majority of us work for money, always. We trade money with our time without knowing it. This is why some HR personnel came up with the term of "Compensation Plan" when you work for a company. A lot of us did not realize that we only get paid when we work, and not get paid when we stop working. Even a Doctor or Lawyer only get paid as they work, we are all working for money. When you are sick, you do not get paid. When you are fired, you do not get paid. When you are no longer needed, you are fired!
You may ask: can I get paid when I am not working? Where got such thing in the world? You must be joking!
I can tell you: There is. This is where smart people make their smart money without much efforts, and they live a rich and famous life.
There are many passive income streams in this world- a new paradigm shift! It is true, you work passively, you still will get paid.
We only need to work once or commiting to minimal work after to get a continuous and lucrative income streams. Just to quote a few: investing in stocks, writting a book, ebook, insurance agent, giving a seminar, internet marketing, MLM and lastly Swiftlet Ranching...

The interesting part about Swiftlet Ranching is where my blog idea started....

Waletkedah

My Brand New Blog Page

I have finally have the time and ready to create my very first blog, it is truly exciting.

Frankly, it is amazingly easy to start one, thanks to Google. No wonder they are one of the most wonderful companies in the dot.com world today.

I decided to share something worth for my readers based on my love, experience and time I spent in this marvellous source of passive income. To my readers, the journey has just begun! Enjoy the journey!

Cheers,
Waletkedah