December 24, 2008

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!

6 comments:

Pecks said...

me too .... but I was lucky, my BH very far away.. take 5 hours to get with 4X4 car...so I can not come and see the progress in weekly time...even with monthly for the new build BH the birds will be disturbed..

We need to prepare the micro habitat before we attract them with our sounds..

I strongly advise, we control to manage not to come into our BH for 3 months just after the first bird stay and survey our internal BH condition, but at the same time....we need to make sure there are not bird predator, all of your equipment and sound are running good, ... after they familiar with internal situation then we need to visit 1 month to check everything...if the collony getting bigger, stronger...more often than 1 month is no big deal.

The bird pioneer will stay and see, sleep for the day long...just to make sure that nothing happen during that period...fly outside just for hunt to get food....then fly back and meditation.....

Regards,
Pecks

K L said...

I used to spent about 1 or 2 hours on a weekly basis to do some improvement works to my slowed farm for the past 3 months or so.
The result still was not encouraging. Then I said to myself to take a break lar last month. Went into my BH yesterday after 1 & 1/2 months. More nests discovered and even the fake nests which did not show any result after 3 months installation have seen some fresh nest building up.
I totally shared your view now. I limit my so-called improvement works to a maximum of once a month.

Frank and my wife Doris said...

Hei Pak Peck sifu,
What an honour to get your comment!! Welcome to my Blog! Thanks for your valuable comment, I truly appreciate it.
Just knew that you have a Blog too..will try to visit yours soon. I shared the point with you, there is an advantage to have your farm away from where you leave. Good point.

Frank and my wife Doris said...

Sorry, wrong spelling, "where you live".

Unknown said...

Monitoring the growth of a new BH is not a simple affair.

1. If good growth, minimize the visit to once a month

2. If poor growth, visit more often for troubleshooting. Once or twice a week is not unreasonable.

Regards,

Waletandy

Frank and my wife Doris said...

Waletandy,
Thanks for your comment. I guess it depends on whether your farm is located at which area. If in KT, may be not a problem as swiftlet population is relatively more...Those low population area, we are even afraid of frightening a few birds...