Artificial bird houses popular in Myeik

Yangon May 16

More people are breeding ediblenest swiftlets along the Strand Road in Myeik as the bird nest is fetching good prices on the market.

The use of artificial bird house is growing there. Farming of nests is performed in purpose-built structures or old empty houses with tweeters playing recordings of bird calls on the roof to attract swiftlets. 

“Previously, we had to find the bird nests in caves on the cliffs. And then bird nests started to fetch good prices. And the method of artificial houses has proved to be useful and it has become popular these days,” said U Ngwe Maung who himself owns artificial bird houses.

On the market, there are two types of bird nests—natural bird nests and bred bird nests and the prices are also different, according to the dealers.

“(Raw) bird nests of first class quality usually fetch around Ks- 2 million and average quality is Ks-1.6 million for a viss. The quality is determined depending on the amount of feather included,” said U Maung Maung Oo, a bird nest dealer in Myeik.

The refined bird nests from cliff caves fetch around Ks-6 million for ten ticals and the bird nests from artificial bird houses get around Ks-800,000 for ten ticals.

“We allow only three months in a year to collect bird nest. And we also banned collecting bird nests in two islands to prevent swiftlets from extinction,” said U Tin Thein, director of Forestry Department of Taninthayi Region.

The Myawady Daily