IMHO, I think what we all really want is an aroma that'll attract birds even if the conditions are not perfect.

There is no telling whether an aroma is doing anything when it is used in an already successful birdhouse or a section of an already well populated BH. It can be concluded that since a BH is already doing well, regardless of aroma the birds would eventually populate the NP anyway.

If an aroma works in a proven failed BH then it is the miracle cure. I'll offer Rm10k for that.

I'm sure everyone notes the caveat that all the aroma vendors claim that the conditions must be right before the aroma will work. Logically if the conditions are right, why then would we require any aroma ?

I have tried several aromas, side by side, in a section of my house that has no birds, so far, in 3 months, still no shit. So what does that prove ? Somehow the conditions are not right so aroma does not work ? If the conditions are right would I need to look into using an aroma ?

In a new BH, we have to "fool" the visiting birds that they are within a thriving swiftlet community, so sound, darkness, temperature, humidity and basically security are very important. For a thriving community, there must be lots and lots of shit so I'm sure we already know what we need.

So, I'll let everyone in on a secret ! In my dusun BH, I bought 300 sacks of fresh chicken dung and kept it all around the perimeter of the BH. Inside I had 100kgs. of swiftlet dung plus 100kgs of ammonium bicarbonate. The aroma around the BH was absolute shit, birdshit to be exact. From day 1 as soon as I turned the sound on, the birds circled and entered almost all day long. As soon as my neighbour saw the birds , he too built a BH. In 1 year, I had over 8 standalone BHs build within 300m of mine.

Can anyone offer me a miracle cure to populate my now unvisited and therefore unpopulated nesting area I'll may be prepared to pay your price.

[quote=htqueck,Dec 26 2010, 11:53 PM]

PM me your location, I'll look at your BH from the outside and perhaps later call you if I need to look inside. Please let me know your builder's or consultant's name and maybe I'll have an idea what had been done.

Thanks.

I think almost all of us are in this business for the money with the exception of WW who advocates a swiftlet sanctuary and in return perhaps a by product from the ones WW is giving protection. Yes whoever denies that they are not in some way "greedy" for money is probably a hypocrite. Of course greed is relative.

Similarly, the production of Aroma and selling this product is mostly all because of the returns aka money. The profit margin from the manufacture and sale of aroma may be somewhat disproportionate when compared to owning a BH.

I have been given by many, several types of "Nesting Plank aromas" as well as made my own but cannot come to a conclusive result that these help or otherwise. It is extremely difficult to conclude as very many other factors may have caused the same results.

I personally would love to be in possession of a miracle cure and I'm sure most of us would too.

Coming from a very scientific background, I believe there is such an 'aroma' that will attract these birds but given so many claims around so very many products I need scientific evidence that any single product will work, not just testimonials and marketing ploys.

I have been extremely careful in applying artificial product around my BH and have conducted careful thought and scientific analysis before action to avoid any irreversible problems. As an example, swiftlet shit when mixed with water produces ammonia gas which is overwhelming and can be poisonous. At the correct humidity and temperature this gas is continuously produced until the source, in this case the shit, is exhausted. Other gasses produced in smaller quantities are methane, hydrogen sulphide, carbon dioxide etc. these contribute to the unique smell of wet swiftlet shit.

Ammonium bicarbonate releases ammonia gas and a little carbon dioxide as it decays due to heat and humidity. In my opinion this creates an overwhelming "cover" for the new cement smell and the fresh wood smell.

Having tonnes of chicken dung outside my BH gave the whole area the strong smell of ammonia, methane, hydrogen sulphide, which is similar to swiftlet dung, PLUS the added effect of lots of insects flying around the BH because of all that shit.

So, all that seemed to attract the new swiftlets with food, smell and security in numbers. That is the only "aroma" I used then.

Birds are known to preen themselves with oil produced from a gland just above their tail. I believe that this oil may be an answer to our dreams. To produce this oil may be against all that WW is advocating in swiftlet sancturies, therefore I will not elaborate.

May we all succeed in the quest for the swiftlet miracle.

BTW I only used chicken shit once at the start of the BH and never again. Also, Ammonia is a very powerful disinfectant but unfortunately as it wears off, the remaining shit becomes a breeding place for a lot of unwanted things. However, it fertilised my fruit trees.



This post has been edited by tuckfook: Dec 27 2010, 04:38 PM

Wow, this must be my Christmas present. Thank you. Very informative.

Firstly, I have access to civets, several species of civets. I will definitely look into that. I assume that my first candidate will be the 'Pandan' civet being the strongest smelling or the larger ring tailed civet which smells like a rubbish dump ; )

Smell imprinting has been used in the breeding of many types of animals and I use a similar method as I breed hunting dogs. This is of course why Salmon return to their place of hatching.

Yes, I do believe that with imprinting, the fledged swiftlets will likely return to the place of origin, which is also the reason why these birds initially return to roost next to their parents. I will have to ask Cranbrook when I have the chance.

We are of course discussing a smell that ATTRACTS A.Fuciphagus and if by imprinting with a certain smell which also attracts the A.Fuciphagus, we are definitely into a good thing. That makes sense! I will definitely make an unbiased report. Your representative is also welcome to inspect my location before and after for verification.

I am in South Kedah, who is your nearest representative ? I'll PM you my address.

I assume that you are a Vet. , that is very interesting. I had a vet friend who was with the Penang Turf Club who then moved to the National Stud Farm in Tg. Rambutan but since then lost contact.

Thank you again, this subject is moving forward at a very exciting pace !

A Happy New Year to everyone.

Yes, Dr. Ho B. C. used to go fishing with us when he was in Penang.

I still hunt alot, at least once a week, for wild boars. I use beagles and beagle crosses. Others might laugh at me but I always urinate near the pups soon after they are born as well as wipe them with a cloth that has remained in my kennels for several years. Beagles as you know, have good noses and follow their noses stubbornly, seemingly forever but with this treatment, they will always return to us.

I had tried pitbulls and pitbull x local x 3 generations and yet they retain their tenacity so much so they often get killed by the boars. Also tried Doberman x local which performs very well until they get gored as they tend to be more clumsy besides being brave.

Very interesting people we have in this forum. I'm only just getting to know a little of you guys.

Any chemical scent secreted by animal, insect or plant is a pheromone. All of us posses it and can detect it but sometimes in some species, as in man, the reaction to such is perhaps very much subdued.

In humans, though we may not consciously know realise it, a man can often detect a female human ovulating ! This happens all the time in the animal, insect and plant kingdom and is a principle form of communication.

Makers of perfumes use this knowledge to make their products effective, so if a man goes crazy after smelling a girl wearing a suitable perfume, blame it on the perfume manufacturer !

Perfume manufacturers us plant, animal and insect extracts to produce their highly secretive scents for humans and hopefully we can emulate their success with our relatively simple means to attract swiftlets.

I have always wondered how a particular swiftlet pair accurately finds it's own roost amongst so many corners of nesting planks which brings me to think perhaps that they find it from their own scent or their partners, left there from the first time. More observation and trials have to be done for a solid conclusion. This makes greater sense than the bird memorizing the location. Which brings me to the fact that all animals, including man can identify their offsprings from smell, other than sight.

This is a new train of thought for me but probably nothing new for all the other learned forumers.

A dog can smell a b**** on heat no less than 500m with no wind and of course much further downwind.

Moths apparently can detect it several miles away.

Used pads probably will only attract flies but panties from about 5 days later will have your BH surrounded by young virile males ! Now why would Jap men pay so much for such personal items ?

I'm going to work on the civet as that smell is so very overpowering, difficult to describe but much like 'pandan' yet animal musky and lingering. Detect it as soon as one walks by even some distance away. Some smells are specifically attractive to different animals and they may have hit the nail on the head.

To extract the oil from dropped feathers will entail a lot of feathers and much work washing the bird feces off, dissolving and then perhaps distilling the oils off. Makes sense as it'll immediately provide the whole BH with a genuine C. Fuciphagus scent. That would be much better than ammonia, wet droppings, etc.

I'm looking forward to a sleepless night dreaming of wonderful scents.

I wonder if civets are a natural enemies of AF as civets will never be able to up to these nests unless we provide them with the foot holds. I don't think BH swiftlets would come into any natural contact with civets. Besides, most civets feed on fruit only sometimes opportunistically on eggs and meat.

AF will always pluck their own feathers before they start making nests so these should be safe. Feathers from stressed birds or dead birds perhaps should be avoided as we do not yet understand the mechanism.

What difference would male or female feathers are to be used as those from males will attract the females and vice versa, if such an mechanism is true. I quite often see the birds preening themselves via cctv.

There are so very many different pheromones produced by an animal and we know very little about it. Pheromones are event specific and rats definitely produce a certain type under stressed death, others to mark their territory or even when they are ready to mate.

Some enterprising boar hunters use the urine and extract from the vagina of domestic pigs when in estrus to attract wild boars. This liquid when applied to tracks leading to a tree stand(hideout) is so successful that it is possible to bag more than 5 boars every night for several days. The horny males will come, even stepping around the carcass of their dead buddies, only to suffer the same fate.

I think the AF breeding season starts due to the prevailing weather conditions such as the onset of the ending of the monsoon season is a time when there will be plentiful food to feed their offsprings with. In the West coast of Pen Malaysia, there is no 'breeding season' eggs are laid as soon as the birds have flown, sometimes even with the young ones hanging on to the side. I've seen nest making 3 cycles in 12 months and so quick at it that I never had a chance to remove the nest.

I would encourage everyone to jump into this discussion as any little bit of information might be very useful. There is no question or opinion that can be considered irrelevant or silly for we are all here to learn.

Wishing Everyone a very Exciting and Prosperous New Year.


Forgot to add;

My heartfelt condolences to all in Penang who are being evicted from the Heritage zones. Start anew in an agricultural zone and be happy without such worries from town council.

All registered BHs in Georgetown Heritage zone will have to move in 3 years and all unregistered BHs will have to cease operations effective 1st Jan 2011.



This post has been edited by tuckfook: Dec 31 2010, 08:39 PM

In Dec. 2005 there was a registration exercise when all BH owners were asked to register their BHs with the local council. This registration was to allow temporary licenses to be considered provided the criteria of the first GP was being followed.

Many people registered but some did not as they did not want to be found.

From 2006 onwards, many people registered late(and were accepted) and submitted their applications for a license. Some people obtained temporary licenses whilst others are still pending.

Towards the end of 2008, everything was frozen awaiting the latest 1GP.

The first GP and the latest 1GP does not allow any BHs in a gazetted residential zone. So, people with BHs in residential zones could not be registered as they were already infringing on the first GP. Now the 1GP is more specific in specifying a minimum distance a BH has to be from any residential zone. Previously the problem was with a commercial building adjacent or within a residential zone.

As far as I know, Papers so far announced enforcement on BHs in the Heritage zones but nothing about residential zones yet.

What causes the birds to make nests with more or less feathers ? Temperature, humidity or other factors ?

Wow, I did not realise that this happens in the East Coast.. How cold does it get ?

I checked my BH last night and today, my lowest tempt. was 26 c. which got to a max. of 28.5 c in the afternoon. Humidity was lowest from the middle of the night till morning, so the humidifiers were running for quite awhile. You can have 2 sets of humidifiers, one controlled by tempt. and the other by humidity. You'll find the misting will warm up the whole house very quickly as well as the opposite.

To increase temperature in your BH, store your water to be used by the humidifier in the large black poly tanks. These tanks are to be placed on the roof top to allow for solar heating. The larger the tank the more stored heat you'll have. I use 2 x 100 gals. tanks.

To further increase the stored water tempt. use a whole coils of poly pipe exposed to the Sun for your inlet water to run through. You can increase your incoming water to over 40c. BTW heating the water also gets rid of the chlorine.

Insulate your water tanks with Rock wool or fibre wool or otherwise keep them in an area free from wind if necessary. Get your optimum conditions by trial and error.

It is the North East wind that is much cooler and causes the ambient tempt. to drop.

I'm sure glad we do not have this problem on the West coast. Not to that extent anyway !

Without going into exact scientific details,

When water is sucked into the humidifier and then expelled out in fine droplets, the energy to do that is provided by the motor and propeller. Similarly the ultrasonic humidifiers crystal vibrates the water into fine droplets and a fan blows this into the air as a fine mist. Both these systems actually causes the water droplet tempt. to rise and in this energised state, it readily vapourises when it comes in contact with air. As the water droplet vapourises partially, there will be a small drop in tempt. as this energy is used to convert liquid water to water vapour.

The higher the initial water tempt is the more energy there is available to vapourise the water.

When the feed water is significantly higher and has more than enough energy to vapourise all the water, the Rh will rise to 100% when the water can no longer vapourise and then the mist/droplets precipitates. All this excess energy then heats up the surrounding air.

This becomes a similar situation as in a steam bath or suana.

So, the higher the tempt. of the feed water is when compared to the ambient room tempt. the easier it will be to raise the humidity. Once the Rh reaches 100%, the warmer water heats up the surrounding air.

With proper circulation and control, we can always achieve Rh80% and 28C.

The Palm civet's glands are located under it's tail near the anus. They are therefore called the anal glands.

Maybe, try rubbing the anal glands of the palm civet onto a separate 2ft. long nesting plank and place this plank somewhere the birds will visit. Observe if the birds will hang on to this plank and better still make nests there. Report you findings here. Caveat : Try at your own risk !

I do not know if swiftlets have a "season" whereby they come on heat or produce 'smell' when they ovulate.

The idea of using the smell from the swiftlet feathers is primarily to trick the birds into thinking that they are in a well established swiftlet community. Any such community will have a successful breeding stock so obtaining the feathers during a specific season might not make much of a difference as it seems AFAIK that they can breed at any time.

However, If there is an area where the birds have a distinct breeding season then perhaps the feathers isolated from that period might be better at attracting more males. Should be very interesting to find out.

Whether it masks the new concrete smell, we don't even know if the birds dislike that smell, or the smell of wet shit is conducive to swiftlets, all we do know is that this smell of wet shit helps bring birds into the BH quicker.

It is logical that the smell of wet shit gives the impression that the BH is a well established colony. Newly built concrete houses will also have swiftlets entering and nesting within but it would take a little longer.

What we are now more interested in is a scent that will ATTRACT swiftlets. Like the smell of a b**** in estrus will attract a dog for miles.

Given the opportunity, I will rub the scent from the anal gland of a civet cat onto a small piece of nesting plank, then fix this in the roving room and scrutinize this for the next few days to see if indeed swiftlets will look at this.

I think everyone should try a different scent and perhaps we'll hit the goldmine.

Run the humidifier for about 30 mins before clearing up the BS. it'll make the BS denser and therefore not fly so high but without making it heavy with too much water. Fine dust will settle quickly so you'll breathe less of that. Also use a surgical mask if it'll make you feel better.

The best method will be using a petrol or diesel powered blower that is blowing though a gunny sack. Attach the suction side to 3" PVC pipe system for each floor. Connect suction hose at each floor to be cleaned. This is relatively expensive as the motor, blower and suction hoses are expensive. Gunny sacks are also difficult to find nowadays plus it needs 2 persons to operate as the sacks fill up very quickly. If using electric motor, you can use a remote control but someone still has to empty or change the sacks.

Styrofoam sandwich has been a problem with many BHs because it becomes a sealed box without natural ventilation through the walls. Many people listening to inexperienced " Sifus " suffered because of the lack of total understanding.

Yes, styrofoam is a very good insulator of heat. Yes it will prevent the BH from getting heat from the outside as well as losing heat to the inside. BUT it is like a plastic bag and will be waterproof !

Bricks especially clay bricks will absorb water as well as dry up to the air. Sand & cement brick will do so also but depends on how much cement was used in the manufacture. Similarly plaster does the same but depends on the amount of lime added.

Understanding RELATIVE HUMIDITY is another aspect which all BH owners should try to grasp. Though it is not easy to understand fully, thermodynamics, unless you have covered physics at A levels, let alone remember after all these years as is the case with me.

if my memory holds true;

Basically hot air holds more water than cold air. Note "relative" term being used

In other words the higher the temperature the more water can 'dissolve' in the air. Note that humidity is not MIST. Water dissolved in air is invisible. So letting air into your BH in the hottest part of the day at Rh80% could mean that when it cools down at night, the internal Rh goes to 100% at which point water droplets begin to form and get deposited on the sides of the walls.

Imagine that a BH only lets air in during the day then the air inside gets very humid at night and deposit the excess water on the walls. Again the next day the same happens, NOTE that the walls do not dry up because it is insulated from outside heat and water to evaporate needs heat, so more air laden with water is let into the BH. At night when it cools, more water deposits.

Repeated over a period of days the walls are dripping wet keeping the RH 100% all day and dripping wet at night, hot or cold.

That principle is also a proposal to recycle water in space.

The answer lies in WHEN to ventilate the BH. NOT just ventilation holes and ventilation only when the wind blows on the outside or from internal convection ! Which is why a modern BH MUST have electric ventilation fans.

Why waste time experimenting ; )

Use all natural materials that will kill the mould and their spores as well as preserve it for a long time.

Alcohol : methylated spirit, ethanol, methanol all easily available and will kill most fungi, mould & bacteria on contact. This also evaporates and will not therefore remain to poison the birds. Water also dissolves in alcohol and will also dry the wood.

Who knows, maybe Mabok birds might make randy birds ! Mabok humans are usually so !

Tannic acid is a natural preservative found in wood, it is red in colour and probably the ingredient that is giving red meranti it's colour.

Tannic acid will readily dissolve in alcohol.

Mix 100% meth. or ethanol with 5% max. tannic acid by weight. Apply with brush and it will do the job. Use hair dryer if you need the wood to dry faster.

Tannic acid may make the nests a red hue but you can be assured that it is safe because tannic acid is used in leather, wines, etc. certified safe by all food and drug authorities.

I should get paid for this !

Any company that wholesales chemicals and pharmaceuticals(medicines) will be able to sell you all you want but if you go to Pharmacies it'll cost you perhaps 10 times more.

A colouring, usually red, is added to Methanol(wood alcohol, methylated spirit) to identify it as well as make it unpalatable because if taken internally to make one mabok, it can turn the person blind.

Ethanol(colourless) is denatured to make it undrinkable for medical use but it is the same alcohol found in booze, sometimes sold as surgical spirit. Pure ethanol is taxed heavily according to percentage and volume which will make it very very expensive.

Either alcohol can be sold as surgical spirit but no colouring and denatured so that you cannot drink it. That is what I use.

Do not use Rubbing Alcohol as it contains oils and perfumes.

Tannic acid comes as a light brown powder. This you have to ask for small packaging as it comes in 20kgs. packs for industrial use.

In Penang, I purchase all chemicals from Liangtraco, Chulia street.

I don't think that there is any BH that cannot be broken into by a determined thief.

We can only try to make it more difficult for them but then they will go for somebody else's BH