Where do you come from? Where do you go? My lovely swiftlet

Where are they going everyday?

Where do they come from?

Where will they go during the last moment of their lives?

All these questions will remain mystery & unsolved to me, at least not for a while...

Their movement is so swift that we barely can observe & watch & "lock-on" them with our naked eyes, let alone tracking them without the aid of proper scientific equipment...

Aerodramus Fuciphagus, some say that they can travel as fast as 80 km/h and can travel as far as few hundreds km's radius away from their BH/cave/home in search of food...

They are very special living creature. They eat, rest and play in the sky. They will never touch the ground due to their thin legs. So what happen if one day they are sick? I presume they seldom fall sick and even so, they will stay inside the BH/cave. They will fly and fly until their last breath where they will drop down free-fall from the sky...

That's why the chance is very slim, close to zero for them to spread over any contagious disease due to this special nature.

Heard from some sifus that apart from a place for socialising, mixing, playing, gathering, mating, etc the swiftlets must also have a sacred place for them to rest in peace. Else, why can't we find any of their dead bodies? Definitely not in the BHs (except accident cases), not under the trees, not on the roads, not on the roof, and not within our visibility.

I believe that there must be a place they choose to go thru the last moment of life quietly...come quietly and leave unnoticeably....

However, we have never seen their burial ground before.

If it happened to be one, I think it should be perfectly research-worthy and also should be a place closest to the heaven....

After all, this is only my unsolicited guess. Is there anybody out there to enlighten me with the true facts?

You are most welcome coz I like to know.

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来来来 Swiftlet!

Aerodramus Fuchipagus Domesticus, they like to stay near to human population, especially the swiftlet lovers.

They are not scared of us once they get used to our environment and get to know that we are their good friends.

It’s amazing that the birds actually can understand our body language, granted, we give them enough exposure or training.

Have you tried this before?

Just climb up on your BH rooftop around 4-6 pm (but of course safety first, make sure your ladder is secured properly and if your BH can be accessed with a staircase it's better), wave your hand to one of them and say : "来来来" or come! come! come!

Then the swiftlet will fly to you, approach you and then fly away slowly.

You can also clap your hands, either way, it works.

Do this few times I believe this will make your day..

The exercise will help to increase your blood circulation..

Seeing it is believing, it's incredible but real. Seriously, I'm not joking.....

Try it yourself and enjoy it, you deserve it.

Good luck!

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About swiftlet - What we need to know? (Part 2)

Edible-nest Swiftlet (Aerodramus fuciphagus), also called Andaman Grey-rumped Swiftlet, is part of a group of birds called the Cave Swiftlets. They form the Collocaliini tribe within the Apodidae family. The group contains around thirty species mostly confined to southern Asia, south Pacific islands and north eastern Australia. Edible-nest Swiftlet is found in the Andaman and Nicobar islands of India. These birds are more common in Andaman as compared to the Nicobar islands and they inhabit rock caves near the shore. The Cave Swiftlets use a simple but effective form of echolocation to navigate in total darkness through the chasms and shafts of the caves they utilize for night time roosting and breeding.

Edible-nest Swiftlets are small, dark brown, slightly fork-tailed birds (size 12 cm). They are in many respects typical members of the Apodidae having narrow swallow-like wings for fast flight, with a wide gape and small reduced beak surrounded by bristles for hawking insects in flight. The breeding season is mainly March and April. The nests are white, opaque, 6 cm across and of the best commercial (edible) quality. During the breeding season, the salivary glands of this species expand to produce the special inspissated saliva for binding twigs and other detritus together for building the nest, which is a shallow cup stuck to the cave wall. Only those species whose nests are 'white' and made purely or almost purely of saliva are the most prized. The nests are harvested from cave walls.

Edible Nests

The Edible-nest Swiftlet is renowned for the fact that their nests are used for making bird's nest soup in Chinese cuisine. When cooked, the birds' nests have a gelatinous texture. In Chinese cuisine, high medicinal and aphrodisiac qualities are ascribed to these nests. Scientific investigations reveal these nests to be high in protein with about 7% lime. Many consumers of bird nest soup report significant improvement in appetite. However, some others noticed excessive secretion of gastric acid that may cause acid reflux symptoms.

There is some concern that over-harvesting is causing several species of cave swiftlets to become scarce. Bird nest merchants in southeast Asia (including Vietnam, Indonesia, Thailand etc.) have started to raise and breed the swiftlets in house-like structures. They build the shelters to attract wild swiftlets to build nests in them. The wrong kind of nests are then destroyed along with the eggs inside. Over time, the selection process only leaves behind a colony of swiftlets that produce the right kind of nest for the trade. "House nests" are priced much lower than the "cave nests" due to the level of risks involved in the harvesting process.

Guano from the Swiftlets and the many bats that inhabit the caves supports an array of specialized animals that feed on the dung. There are yet other creatures that have evolved to feed on these dung eaters as well as the bats and the swiftlets themselves including among others, snakes that can climb the sheer walls to snatch a passing meal and huge carnivorous crickets that prey on chicks and bat pups. This ecosystem is totally self sustaining, the only link being the birds and the bats that bring the nutrients into the caves in the first place.

Reference : www.birding.in/birds/Apodiformes/edible-nest_swiftlet.htm

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About Swiftlet – What we need to know? (Part 1)

Since I left my high school, I never have the chance to touch again anything related to biology. It’s kind of refreshing to revisit this subject and dig out all those technical terms to satisfy my interest in knowing more about the swiftlet.

I understand not everybody likes to know about these. Just pay attention to the words in red colour. Thanks.

Taxonomy and Nomenclature

Kingdom : Animalia

Taxonomic Rank : Species

Common Name : Edible-nest Swiftlet

Taxonomic Hierarchy

Cladus : Eukaryota

Supergroup : Opisthokonta

Kingdom : Animalia - Animal, animals, animaux

Phylum : Chordata - chordates, cordado, cordés

Subphylum : Vertebrata - vertebrado, vertebrates, vertebras

Infraphylum : Gnathostomata

Superclassis : Tetrapoda

Classis : Aves - Birds, oiseaux

Subclassis : Carinatae

Infraclassis : Neornithes

Parvclassis : Neognathae

Order : Apodiformes - Hummingbirds, Swifts

Familia : Apodidae - Swifts

Subfamilia : Apodinae

Tribus : Collocaliini

Genus : Aerodramus -Oberholser, 1906 - Edible-nest Swiftlets

Species:Aerodramus fuciphagus (Thunberg, 1812)-Edible-nest Swiftlet

Subspecies : Direct children: Aerodramus fuciphagus amechanus (Oberholser, 1912)

Aerodramus fuciphagus dammermani (Rensch, 1931)

Aerodramus fuchiphagus fuchiphagus (Thunberg, 1812)

Aerodramus fuciphagus germani (Oustalet, 1876)

Aerodramus fuciphagus inexpectatus (Hume, 1873)

Aerodramus fuciphagus micans (Stresemann, 1914)

Aerodramus fuciphagus perplexus (Riley, 1927)

Aerodramus fuciphagus vestitus (Lesson, 1843)

Aerodramus fuciphagus javensis

So now you know that Aerodramus fuciphagus subset to Aerodramus (swiftlets), and swiftlets subset to hummingbirds/swifts.

Sometimes the biologists also call them Collocalia fuciphaga. This is the tribe name and referring also as the edible-nest swiftlets.

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