Birdie in the Wild Series 8

Just back from CNY holidays Got to snap some new species in Ipoh

The first one are Swiftlets .......swallows if you like. they are agile insects eaters. Their plummage is just silky smooth. If they are not hunting during dawn and dusk they will be hanging around building edges and TNB lines. Nowadays swiftlets rearing is big business everywhere U can buy mating call recordings to entice nestling in abandoned converted shophouses everywhere from Melaka to Penang

South East Asia swallow birds, or Swifts (Collocalia Family), are very unique birds. They have short bills, wide mouths, very small and weak feet, and long, crescent-shaped wings. They are about the same size as sparrows, but their wingspan is wider than that of a pigeon. Based on these specifications, they have a very strong ability and endurance to fly. In fact, they are the fastest fliers known, capable of a 40-hour non-stop flight. They never perch or rest except when they are sleeping, building their nests, or feeding their chicks. Their diet is insects, caught in flight. The monogamous parents lay 2 eggs, incubated by both parents for 21 to 29 days. The chicks remain inside the nest for 43 days, before they are fully independent from their parents. The average longevity of the bird is varies from 10 to 20 years.But the most exciting part about these swallow birds are their nests. Their nests look like a cupped hand, a hollow quarter-ball shape, with a 3-5" diameter. One side is stuck to a wall (a cave wall in wild nests, or a man-made wooden base in cultivated/house nests), and the other side of the nest is a place for them to perch. Found within the hollow nest are either their eggs or their chicks. But it is their nest material that sets them apart from all other birds in the world. Right after they are mated, they regurgitate long, thin gelatinous strands from their salivary glands under their tongues. These strands play an important role in making their nests.According to many classical Chinese books about health food, Swallow Nests were imported into China from the Southeast Asian region since the T'ang Dynasty (A.D. 618-907). Even Joseph Needham stated similarly in Book 3, Volume 4 of his famous Science and Civilisation in China. Chinese records on Swallow Nests consist mainly of several categories of historical documentations, including official history, notes of scholars, travel records, books on dining, books on health food and books on medical herbs. In all these categories of documents, the earliest trustworthy record of Swallow Nests can only be found in those written or compiled during the Ming Dynasty.Reviewing these documents reveals that the spread of Swallow Nests into Southern China and became well known by physicians, connoisseur, encyclopaedic scholars and traders began in early seventeenth century. During that time, many entries about Swallow Nests were recorded in the notes of scholars, books on medical herbs and books on dining. What remains unexplained is why such Swallow Nests remained little known for about two hundred years after they had been brought back by Zheng He before there were frequent mentions of them in documents written in the few decades around the late Ming and early Qing Dynasty. It seems possible that a large promotion campaign about Swallow Nests had been launched during that period; and Swallow Nests were consequently turned into a well-known and well-accepted precious health food.From those documents, it can be seen that there had been a progressive familiarity of the Swallow Nests through time. Finally, the records of around 1587 show that large amount of Swallow Nests were imported into China and that import duty was levied on them. In 1618, it was recorded that the amount imported had increased so much that a reduction of import duty was granted by the emperor of the Ming Dynasty. At that time, Swallow Nests were well accepted as precious food by residents of Guangdong and Fujian Province. From then on, records about Swallow Nests became more and more detail and covered even their places of origin.Hundreds of years after Swallow Nests had been accepted as a kind of precious food in China, they were further accepted by the Chinese to have medical and health enhancing effect. Descriptions of such effects were first found in the works of two famous practitioners of Chinese medicine in the Qing Dynasty. It can therefore be seen that the medical and health-enhancing effects of Swallow Nests were formally confirmed and accepted by Chinese medical practitioners only after about a century's observation and validation. From then on, more detailed and comprehensive description of these effects can be found in some of the subsequent works on Chinese medicine. Principally, Swallow Nests have been considered as a substance that slows down the aging process, a rejuvenating agent. Swallow Nests also act as a demulcent to the lungs and have been used in relieving phlegm and coughs.Based on modern researches, the protein contained in Swallow Nests is distinct in that it is mainly biologically active protein, which has revitalizing effects to human body. The researches reveal that Swallow Nests contains small amount of epidermal growth factor. Water extractant of Swallow Nests can also directly stimulate cell growth/regeneration and enhance the effectiveness of mitogen (the initiator in cell division). Also, this active protein in the nest makes it a very useful tonic for people with weak digestion system (e.g. elderly people), and for some that need a very rapid cell regeneration and development (e.g.: pregnant women, growing children). One of the most recent published researches is done by biochemist Dr. Kong Yun Cheong, at the Chinese University of Hong Kong ( www.cuhk.hk ). His research confirms the high content of water-soluble glyco-protein in Swallow Nests that promotes cell division within the immune system.

There are some white breasted ones but not here. Maybe in Taiping.


Edible-nest Swiftlet (Collocalia fuciphaga), also called Andaman Grey-rumped Swiftlet, is part of a group of birds called the Cave Swiftlets. Niah Cave and Mulu cave Sabah. 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. 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.