Friday, September 28, 2012

Swiftlet Enemies

Swiftlet needs a safe and comfortable environment to make their nest. Let's think like this,
will you buy a house in a high criminality neighbourhood or in a very dirty neighbourhood?
Swiftlet also think like this.

They will not built their nest in a place where their natural enemies
can be found. So, for swiftlet's farmer, you better watch out if you met these animals in your swiftlet's house.

1) Rats

This type of enemies eat swiftlet eegs, their children even their nest. Not only that, rats also make noises that disturb swiftlet. Their pee and feces also made the environment uncomfortable for swiftlet.

To prevent this from happenning, you must do 3 thing:
- Close all holes you can find.
- Throw away all trash you can find and always keep it clean.
- Pay more attention to unused wood, never forget to throw it away because rats like to make their nest there.

2) Ants

Ants, especially fire ants will bit and try to eat swiftlet's children.
Not only that they will also disturb swiftlet when it laying their egg.
If you found ants in your swiftlet's house, you better kill it fast.
One of the method to do it is by using bait.

Use raw meat to attract the ants so that when the ants swarming the bait,
Pour hot water to the bait. It will kill all the ants. And for insurance,
you can try to find their nest and pour hot water to there too.

3) Cockroach

This type of insect can be found at almost every house. Even though in any house they
are quite harmless, in swiftlet's house they are quite a problem. Cockroach will eat
swiftlet's nest and make it damaged.

To solve this kind of problem, you better spray some insecticide and remember to
always cleaning your swiftlet's house. Throw away all the junk you have to make sure
that there are no hiding place in the house so that no cockroach can evade your insecticide.

4) Lizard and Gecko.

This animals not only eat swiftlet's egg but also their nest. Lizard can even eat
swiftlet's children. Not only that, their feces can polute the room and increase room
temperature and as a result disturb swiftlet tranquility.

For this type of enemies, you can only tried to capture every lizard and gecko you fidn
and throw them outside. After that make sure that there are a net on every drainage to
make sure that only water can get in or get out.

Cricle your swiftlet's house and close every
hole you can find that you didn't use. Also make sure the outside wall is slippery so no lizard
or gecko can climb their way in.

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Stewed Swiftlet's nest with American Ginseng


Ingredients
- 75 g soaked swiftlet's nest.
- 8 g sliced american ginseng.
- 1 tbsp rock sugar.
- 2 cups boiling water.

Method
1. Wash the american ginseng and put it into a steaming pot.
2. Crushed the rock sugar and add it with 2 cups of boiling water to the pot.
3. Stewed it for 50 minutes.
4. Add the swiftlet's nest and stewed it for another 10 minutes.
5. Refrigerate it before serving.


Monday, September 17, 2012

3 Type of Harvest



If you have a swiftlet's house and it's near harvest time. You will be smiling and
said in your heart "Yay!! Almost harvest time". Or if you don't have a swiftlet's house,
thinks as if you're about to get your salary. It's a very good feeling right?

Okay, get to serious. There are certain condition for swiftlet's farmer to harvest their
nest. If you make a mistake, there is a chance the swiftlet will leave your house and
find another place to make a nest. To prevent such thing to happen, the farmer need to know certain
technique or pattern and time to harvest. Now, there are 3 type of harvesting based on
your needs:

1) Plundering
This type of harvesting is executed after the nest is finished but the swiftlet haven't
lay any eggs yet. This way, you can get good quality of nest because of less unwanted material
and shorter time between harvest. This way of harvest give you more production in a year than
any other way. But there are several weakness of this type of harvest, there are no new egg means
no new swiftlet's in your house and this way you can make the swiftlet became sick because they didn't
get any rest and must make new nest immediately. Not only that, it can make the next nest became small
and thin because the swiftlet became exhausted. Use this type of harvest if you are in need of money or
there are too much swiftlet in your house.

2) Harvesting with throwing away the eggs
This type of harvest is executed after the swiftlet made their nest and lays two of their eggs.
You take the eggs and throw it, after that you can take the nest. This way of harvest have one advantage
than the previous that is you can harvest 4 times a year and you can get good quality in all of harvest
because there are sufficient time for swiftlet to replenish their strength before built a new nest.
But since you throw away their eggs, it means there are no new swiftlet in you house.

3) Harvesting after Incubation
This type of harvest is executed after swiftlet's eggs hatched and could fly on their own.
Even though this is the best way for harvesting but this way the nest quality became low because
the nest already contaminated from swiftlet's  children feces and feather. On the bright side,
the swiftlets can breed peacefully and increase the population. Use this way if
you need to increase your swiftlet population in your house.

Friday, September 14, 2012

Swiftlet's Nest and It's Shape


Very few people know that swiftlet's nest have another shape besides the bowl type, this happens
because it is the most common one. So not every store can supply you with another shape besides bowl type.
There are 4 types of swiftlet's nest: bowl, triangle, strips and powder. Some people claim that difference shape means difference in nutrition and difference in taste. They said the bowl type is the most nutritious and delicious.
I never taste them all, so I can't comment on it. But if any of you have, please let me know.

1. Bowl shape
 This is the most usual shape of swiftlet nest.
The bowl shape came because the swiftlet build their nest on the beams in a swiftlet house.






2. Triangle shape

There are only a few triangle shape because the nest is built in the corner of two adjacent walls.
Because of it's shape, the bottom one have the most the highest concentration of swiflet saliva especially
because their triangle shape that help focused their saliva. Higher concentration of saliva also means
higher density. Because of this, they require longer soaking time (six to eight hours) and bird's nest corners are normally separated from whole piece bird's nests and soaked separately.  The bird's nest corners are usually torn into smaller pieces prior to soaking so that they expand more easily. They expand more compared to whole piece bird's nests and are more crispy.

3. Strips shape
Usually happen because the bowl type get damaged during transportation or during harvest. Although they are not attractive, but they have the same taste as the bowl type. Very few people said, they tastes less delicious than the bowl type. Still, only a few one can distinguish it. Personally, I can't taste the difference. You can prepare it the same as the bowl type.


4. Broken shape
Broken shape swiftlet's nest are also a broken of a bowl shape nest. But because it's broken too badly,
There are no more spesific shape. Usually a broken shape swiftlet's nest will be grinding to powder and combined with another product. For example, it can be made to a biscuit or used at a beauty product.

Stewed Swiftlet's Nest with Dried Yam


Ingredients:
- 113g soaked swiftlet's nest
- 38 dried yam
- 1 tbsp medlar
- 113 g rock sugar
- 3 cups water

Method:
1. Drain swiftlet's nest.
2. Wash dried yam and soak for 30 minutes.
3. Wash medlar.
4. Pour 3 cups of water to the boil.
5. Add rock sugar and cook until the sugar has dissolved.
6. Pour the syrup into the steaming pot.
7. Add dried yam and medlar.
8. Stewed it for 90 minutes.
9. Add swiftlet's nest and stewed it for another 5 minutes.


Wednesday, September 5, 2012

The Significance of Swiftlet's Nest Color


There are many ways to differentiate swiftlet's nest but the most easy and the most basic one is by color.
Different color means different taste and price. There are 3 group of color : yellow, white and red.
The difference in color happenned because of the place where the swiftlet make their nest.


Yellow Swiftlet Bird's Nest

Cultivated from a cave with high hummidity. Swiftlet's farmer will go to a cave and harvest their nest.
It all happen naturally. You can find swiftlet nest in a cave with high air hummidity.  Because of the
environment where there are many dust or mineral, the nest absorbed it and that's why it color became
beige or near brown color.




White Swiftlet Bird's Nest

White nest or usually called Noble Bird's Nest means the swiftlet build it nest in the house. Swiftlet's farmer built a house and set the
house condition like the cave to make the swiftlet build their nest in the house. Of course house is cleaner
than cave and it also means less dust. A cleaner environment make the nest more white because of less
impurities absorbed by the nest.



Red Swiftlet Bird's Nest

Red nest or usually called Blood nest. Before a scientific explanation can be made, people believe the nest
became red is because the mother swiftlet has to built their house several times until their saliva became blood.
As a result, their blood combined with their saliva make the nest red hence it's nickname Blood Nest.

Recently, the scientist found that the nest became red is because of chemical reaction among
oxygen, iron and hummidity which result in rust. Humidity also stimulates the rust to be absorbed into the nest making them reddish brown.
Of course the red nest is safe to consume. In fact, before scientific explanation can be made,
many people rated the red nest as the supreme delicacy of all bird's nest which make it the most
expensive of all.

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Stewed Bird’s Nest with Maize, Carrot and Pig’s Tail




Ingredients:

- 10g  bird's nest (soaked, cleanse and expanded)
- 500g pig's tail bone (cleansed with hot water)
- 3 maize
- 2 carrots
- 10 pieces of red dates
- suitable amount of salt.

Method: 

1. Boil 500g of pig's tail bone,3 maize, 2 carrots, 10 pieces of red dates.
2. Add salt and wait for 2 hours.
3. Add in bird's nest.
4. Wait for another 15 minutes.

Monday, September 3, 2012

Stewed Bird’s Nest with Lotus Seeds and Lily Bulb

Ingredients: 

-  10g bird’s nest
-  10 lotus seeds
-  suitable amount of rock sugar
-  8 pieces of lily bulb
-  5 pieces of longan pulp.

Method: 

1. Soak bird’s nest for 45 minutes, remove any foreign matter and cleanse before use.
2. Cook 10 lotus seeds together with a suitable amount of rock sugar over slow fire for 2 hours.
3. Add 8 pieces of lily bulb together with 5 pieces of longan pulp into pot and stew for half an hour before adding in bird’s   nest.
4. Stew it for another 15 minutes.