₦airaland Forum

Fadphils:
To end it all, the expected tonnage was 20tonnes but right now as I am saying I have not gotten up to 1ton, the chaff gotten during the winnowing is as much as the grains gotten.

With all these I nearly reached the height of frustration and depresion after leaving everything behind for months to pursue a vision in a no man's land.

All the experience and problems encountered doesn't really sound technical but I will tell you it was a challenge having to do what you've never done before with any guidance or help from any expertise, and also been enclosed in an environment closed to information and people seeking out for your failure. It was disheartening and discouraging. But haven looked at the journey so far, I never regret ever taking the step for the problems caused me to seek for solutions and during the finding of solution it opened me up to a greater platform of connections and informtion. I found out million dollar opportunities laying fallow around and I see a future where my little loss is bringing great gains beyond borders.

My experience was a great one but am thankful for all the privileges, pains, pursuits, worries, suspense, connections and opportunities for they've all mode me and strengthen my mental strength for greater pursuits.


I choose not to write more about my friend uncle's deed because I can't tell what were hi true intentions though I found out alot of untruthfulness about the land and some suspicions about him having hand in the extortion but I can't validate my suspicions since I have no proof.

He came back during the harvest that he has been released and that he will like to continue with hi work, I told him his services were no longer needed.


Thanks for granting the privilege to share my little experience, I hope it helps someone who is going through the same and am also sorry for my grammar and typos.

Kindly enjoy the view of the rice gotten so far.

Thanks @Fadphils for sharing your experience with the level of details. Thank you also for the pictures.
Clearly, you and I made a lot of beginner errors, some of which are inexcusable. I like your positive disposition to the experience. I hope that you can make better success with your future farming endeavours borrowing from the learnings of this one.

Even though we place so much value on the knowledge and opportunities the mistakes led us to experience, as well as the discoveries that we made about people, places, and even about ourselves; other new entrants do not have to go through so much frustration or heart ache.

Prospective farmers, or entrepreneurs in general, should be able to approach new ventures systematically. ...conducting useful research, consulting widely, engaging in adequate risk analysis and management, developing a proper business plan etc. You and I are quite lucky to have 'lived' to tell the story; and even be in the position to still be considering proceeding with the venture.

I congratulate you. But I will be prouder if you can leverage the experience and networks to do greater and more successful things. And I am positive, you can. your grit is a good sign.

I hope when my farming story is told as well, that my 2017 experiences will be referenced as a bad start of a journey that became wonderfully successful.

To the question of whether, you should go back to Benue or not; I will say, you should go back. You have unfinished business there. It might take you 6 months or 2 years or 30 years to finish that story. Do not leave yet. Build on what you already have; but just make sure you do not repeat any of the mistakes.do not make any new mistakes that you could readily have avoided if you had been a little more careful.Above all have fun while at it.

While you are having that fun in Benue, you can still be open to opportunities in other parts of the country, South West inclusive. You can gradually infiltrate those other areas. The future is open....grab it with both hands

Cheers

spinna:
Very interesting to learn that the Mavic, the dream of filmmakers is being used to scare birds in a farm, a cheaper drone should hve been use i think, i mean you don't really need the expensive camera and gimbal if all you need the drone for is scaring birds.

But based on reading i would advise either netting or falcons..the falcons seem the best option and if one perfects it it becomes a service/product that can be sold to farmers.

Best of luck in your green endeavours, dont give up

Thank you for your kind wishes.

You probably know more about drones than the little I know.

Before selecting the Mavic Pro, I saw several of much cheaper ones...in fact so many of them.

I set up my selection criteria to include
1) big enough not be knocked out of flight easily if it flies into the legion of birds.... Thant knocked off many smaller drones
2) I wanted the battery life to be atbl ast 25minutes per charge

3) I wanted to be able to take quality aerial pictures and videos of my current and future farms without having to buy another drone down the line

3) I wanted a drone that had rave reviews...from a reputable drone manufacturer that consumers are generally happy with.

I thought with the Mavic I would have most of these criteria met....one or two other drones checked these boxes as well, but I just thought the Mavic was just cool

I have not explored the full capabilities of the drone yet....but I intend to soon

Thanks for your input

arthurshelly:
Sure..when are you start cropping again?

Soon. I am waiting for the land to dry up a bit. There should be some major activities starting in two or three weeks.

Fadphils:
@Op

I sincerely commend your effort to bring experience and rice farming journey so far to the reach of the people.
I also don't know if you will permit me to share my own journey and my rice farming experience with the house too, your experience shared has brought me a great relief I thought I was the only one going through the hell of rice farming.

Thanks for your comment.

Your experience is welcome here. It will enrich and broaden the discussion.

Please be generous with details.

Thanks.

saliubello:
Kindly put the last two descriptions (posts) down for National security reasons. Pleasee

I see your point. I'll follow up with another phone call to you.

Thanks

kagari:
Am I the only one seeing the business angle of this?

I mean the falcon business angle. I believe the pest issue its what is hindering local production.

If individuals can't handle the project, I believe state government can come in handy

I am now wondering what method the the LAKE rice project of Lagos and kebbi are using.

On my way to starting a falcon training school

Every problem is a business opportunity. There sure is a business angle to this. Let's see how quickly someone brings it to live

arthurshelly:
Your story is 100% true because I look at the farm from my house in ibaragu ...iys a pity you lose so much in that farm rice

Thanks for the validation.

I hope you can come around when we start cropping the land again soon.

fluentinfor:
If doing 1 ha to like 3 ha of rice, maybe it makes sense to start with net but if it is large acres or hectares like TangoAlpha's size of farm, net will be expensive. Therefore, using falcon or hawk will do the job better. However, I am sure it will be expensive to import a falconry service provider. In my opinion, farmers can form an association and implement it. They can also ask for governemnet assistant for the project. There are two or three services providers that I know in the US and also in South Africa. The objective should be training around 5 people to fly falcons for such purpose. And from there, the service can get better. The issue is that associations, cooperative societies, groups etc these days are all with negative issues these days. But it is do- able. It will be my delight to assist any of such cooperative society achieve this if I see the seriousness in the members.

An individual blessed with some extra cash can get a drone with accessories and batteries at the cost of $900 - $ 1,700. Thenafter, looks for where to buy crackers, fireworks and salutes which he will attach to it. At the initial stage, he may just ignite the cracker, (aka bangers) before taking off and moves straight to shoot the birds and then keeps threatening them till they are tired. Later, he may deploy additional electronic device which can trigger the banger automatically. So, if he loads like 20 rods, it can be programed or released at different intervals instead of everything blowing up at the same time. So your drone can cause serious harvoc. Let your drone have a perculiar sound like a siren and flashing light which make it unique and easily noticed from a far distance. When you bombard them for a week, no one will tell them to stay clear off your farm. You may even notice later that as soon as you blow siren similar to that of your drone when your drone is inactive, birds will "pick race" without even seeing your drone because they know what is about to befall them.

As for TangoAlpha, I believe what he needs now are:

1. Diffferent kinds of crackers and fireworks (the ones that travel far and then explode with terrible bomb sound, the ones that scatter terrible lighnings, the ones that splash round etc)
2. Powerful telescope to watch his drone far off
3. A control house on raised platform at the center of his farm so he can have a clear view of the whole of his farm.
4. His drone has a camera so, he needs to record some of the activities.
5. A Tracking Point’s computer-assisted weapons to hit targets accurately. Aim is not to kill them but to scare them off. But they better pray the drone pilot does not get over excited and he starts dropping them and they become meat in his pot. Nigerians eat anything. Lol.

This is what I call Aerial Star War. Seriously, I can sign up for such adventure. All I need is my iced drink and snacks beside me while I enjoy the show.

A beautiful mind at work. Kudos!

Let me bring up anew angle to the us of drones. The Nigerian FG came up with some guidelines last year or so for flying private drones in Nigerian airspace. Six months before hand, you are to seek approval from NSA and NCAA. You make some payments to get the initial license (900k); and renew license every two years or so at 500k.

I don't think the enforcement has started; neither do I think Nigerians have started obtaining the license. However, the detonation of firecrackers flown on drones is most likely going to draw attention o that farm.

The security concerns are valid. Unscrupulous elements could use similar techniques to wreck havoc. Secondly, Aviation safety concerns are also valid. There has to be some regulation so that people do not accidentally fly drone into the path of airplanes. Food security is also a front burner.

My guess is that when push turns to shove, it's the food security that will have o suffer in the mix. Leading to the government discouraging the use of drones with firecrackers. So as interesting and realistic as these suggestions are, they must be considered against security and safety concerns external to agriculture.

fluentinfor:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zg1ZDPlsptE
Bird Abatement Program.

Amazing how 1 bird chases thousands of quelea birds. Just one. It seems this is the best solution so far. Orchads are guarded in the United States with these powerful birds.

Real professionals engage in falconry. In countries where you find them, there are strict laws guiding the act. Also, it takes some years and some examinations to pass in order to get qualified as a flyer.

Transmitter are attached to the birds so they can be traced when lost. I had to dig out this info to really understand how the business works. I think it will be a tough project for an individual in Nigeria to deploy this option by himself without getting real help from a provider of such service which might not come cheap at the initial stage. It is like telling a professional to move to your farm to set you up or you go to him to teach you which might take some months or most likely years. I am still trying to see how an individual can launch himself to the game in Nigeria. Real training is needed. I think only a goal achiever who is passionate with rice farming with access to fund can achieve this. Afterwards, it gets extremely cheap for him.

I forsee a situation where we knock down trees on 10,000 acres of swarmpy land, turned it to rice farm village and employ the service of a falconry provider to chase away queleas. We do not even need to know the birds spiecie or whatsoever they are. As long as they are tiny birds causing harvoc, they can be dealt with perfectly.

Personally, I will not waste my time cultivating rice if I cannot cultivate massive hectares of swarmpy land and I will be glad to deploy this option.

Since I know I must be a lone ranger because operating in joint effort organisations is a suicide mission in the community I find myself, I opted for cultivating small land area, harvest huge with little or no powered equipment. But I wish I can get into this kind of farming soon. It is so interesting. Very interesting.

The use of a predator like the falcon is an interesting prospect. It should be doable with clusters of rice farmers. This option should be given serious consideration.

I will add it to my list for further investigation.

fluentinfor:
Yeah. Bikes can make one move faster to chase these birds. In one of the links I posted above, farmers in Botswana had implemented using tractors before trying falconry.

Today, I had a chat with one of the experts in the Ministry of Ogun State and he told me that people shouting, throwing or shoting stones with catapaults to scare away birds is still very common. Lol.

I did not realise people believe so much in using juju. One farmer told me today while i was making calls that juju works but the conditions attached to it might not be easily fulfilled these days. Like, a woman who is menstrating must not near the farm, any woman must not urinate near the farm, no shouting near the farm, no cutting of trees and many other conditions. My first thought was, women don suffer in this Africa. Lol.

You have no idea how many people believe in juju and so passionately too.

I cannot count the number of people who gave their strong recommendations for me to implement juju. Some even sent some my closet people to me. They told me to implement well before it started to flower. They claimed that one need to implement well in advance of the stage where the birds attack.

The version of the juju that they conjure uses a type of leaf (whose name I have forgotten). They said this leaf was known to make hunter get lost in the bush during hunting trips. When a lone hunter gets into the wild and sights this leaf, they claim, the hunter is unable to find his way back home.

So this leaf, which I have no idea how they can truly get if it makes you lose your way in the thick forest, is a major component of the juju used for the bird control. When the Quelea flies close to a rice farm which is under the protection of this juju, the birds fail to see the farm. They fly past the rice and never attack.

Some other rice farmers in the neighborhood of my farm claimed they adopted the juju for their rice and it worked. I didn't speak with them directly. I didn't visit their farms. I just wasn't interested. So I can not verify or validate their claims.

I can imagine what all these people were thinking after their saw the massive loss I recorded from the bird attacks. I guess their commiseration would have been soaked in mockery.

I just wouldn't do what I wouldn't do.

dragon2:
If your farm is well mapped out with pathways.You can always use Okada(bike), without an exhaust, to chase the birds,revving as you go. However, you will have to be in a relatively remote area.

Great idea.

But might not be for me. My farm is swampy during the rainy season, which is the only period I currently intend to do rice.

I am sure it would be apt for some other people who have different realities.

fluentinfor:
Check these links:

http://allafrica.com/stories/201602040218.html

Pandamatenga, Botswana— Quelea birds have turned out to be Pandamatenga farmers' worst enemy.

In 2013, the birds reportedly caused between 60-90 per cent damage to fields in the area; however, they arrested the situation using falcons.

https://thevoicebw.com/bird-bird/
In an endeavor to reduce the use of toxic chemicals to control the destructive effects of migratory pests such as the red billed quelea bird, the department of crop production has adopted the use of the falcon bird.

Acting Deputy Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) Dr Kgoseitsile Phillemon Motsu says falcons are one of the best control methods of controlling the destructive quelea birds as they are safe to the environment.

The MoA which is collaborating with a company from the United States of America on this project has successfully conducted a demonstration on four commercial farms in Pandamatenga.

“Last year four falcons were used to scare the quelea birds on a sorghum field of 1 250 hectares.

The predator was able to protect the crop from the attack by the birds.

A lanner and peregrine would fly multiple flights in the morning and the remaining two would be flown in the afternoon,” Motsu said.

During the demonstration period, Dr Motsu said, the trial farms sustained a damage of less than three percent, while other farms which did not use the falcons to control the mass destructive pest birds, sustained damage varying between 10 and 80 per cent.

I was flabbergasted to read that just 4 falcons managed 1,250 hectares ( this translates to 3,125 acres or 26,909 plots of 100ft × 50 ft). Amazing!

I got to know that such skill can be learned from South Africa. One can import the trained falcons too. Amazing. Also, there are associations and organisation where one can enrol and learn the act. This means if one learns this, there is no need to deploy any drone. Quelea are greatly terrified by Falcons and hawlks.

Well, I think it may be too cumbersome for an individual to pick this up. And the hope of such individual to be contracted to manage rice farms might be frustrated. Is it not Nigeria we are in? Lol. You will be shocked what these farmers will want to pay for such service. Many will even plead to pay deposit and then balance after which they will never do. Is it not Nigeria we are in?

The solution is that such individual should learn the act, import the birds and manage is personal farm. However, such farm must be big enough to cover the cost of maintaining the farm and feeding the birds. I read that frozen Quelea birds are used to feed the falcons so as to discourage them from killing quelea birds (apparently, animal right organisation frown against killing them). But will any individual want to spend addition cost of feeding his falcons when there are free meat in the sky in Nigeria and there may not be any animal rights organisation to rebuke him/her? Lol

This is interesting. It is a kind of solution I would love to deploy. Anyone that has idea on how to make contact with the relevant service providers should kindly reach out to me.

We sure are making progress.

So far:

1) We have identified the possible use of locally available inexpensive, small mesh nets as a viable solution. We have reports that it's already in use by some farmers in Kwara and elsewhere.

2) In another thread where this Sam issue is being discussed, the use of fire crackers gained traction (deployed with or without bird detector systems that trigger the fire crackers)

3) The use of real live trained predators birds like falcons or hawks (the nearest support might be in South Africa)

There are other solutions that could still be improvised

1) the use of drones...but the size of drones need to match the number of drones. Plan this solution to account for the limited battery lives of drones....have spare batteries and a means to recharge batteries on the farm.

2) using drones to deploy other solutions...like firecrackers

3) Using recordings of the bird/distress calls of the quelea and their predators...hawks falcons...etc

Let's keep the ideas flowing....but let's remember that whatever we eventually settle for should be economically viable for the specific situation or reality of the farm

saliubello:
I'm with you on this too.

Yes o!

Your thread on your Ofada rice experience encouraged me to start my own thread and share my story. I had only been a read and go member of Nairaland until your thread forced me out into public space.

It'd be a great pleasure if these discussions could turn out into real life actionable ideas leading to desired results.

fluentinfor:
I reached out to my contacts and I realised using nets on rice farms is not new in Nigeria. It is exactly the same principle as covering earthen fish pond. So, this issue to me is solved.

Like I always tell people, reaching out to local farmers is a powerful way to excel in farming. Internet farmers are noise makers. Lol.

And yes, my curiosity about identifying the specie of birds where the farm is located is very vital so you get the right mesh of net you should use. I was told that farmers in Kwara and Lafiagi adopt 1.5 inches mesh. Farmers in Ibadan in the document that showed us one of the right measures used 0.9inch mesh. I believe 1 inch can still work there. And the net is very affordable. Very affordable.

The question OP must ask himself is what is the right mesh size for the kind of Quelea on the farm?

@TangoAlpha, do you plan returning to your farm to cultivate rice again? Can you do one acre pilot?

Ok, yes...I am still curious to know what our guy who is asking about cats, rats and insects around the farm is trying to do. Lol!

Thank you so much for this extra work. I sincerely appreciate you even more.

I intend going back to the farm for rice if my issues (quelea birds being the greatest) are resolved satisfactorily.

I'm not too surprised that the nets are already being used by rice farmers in Nigeria given that field tests were done over ten years ago. The question is what particular type are they using? Where are the nets sourced from? What's the cost? What dimensions do they come in? In their experience, what's the average lifespan of the nets?

Like the Oliver Twist that I am, could you kindly assist me further by asking your contacts these questions.
The feedback will provide valuable inputs into my viability assessments; which will inturn sanction my going back to crop rice.

One inch mesh should shut out Quelea quelea, even though the mesh size of the nets I have considered so far in my research is 3/4 square inches.

These efforts of yours confirms that we have made significant progress on this thread with our quelea control quest.

Thank you sir.

I am encouraged by the prospect of the nets being very very affordable.

I can explore the prospect of a one acre irrigated and net covered pilot during this dry season.

Let the details of this net come in first...lol

I am also curious about the information @iedide is about to share with us....

Cheers

Stylz69:
Perhaps I can chip in on the use of drones. I use this but for a different purpose. I just completed a topological survey of 78 hectares of farmland using a hexacopter. I have a mavic Pro as well and I think this may serve the purpose of scaring of the birds without too much piloting skills required. Get an app installed on your android or iOS device such as Drone Deploy or Litchi. Input the boundaries of your land into it and your drone can fly in the pre-programmed route with no controls. It will take off, move around the field and return to launch all by itself. The mavic is pretty noisy as well so it will surely scare them off.

I sure will follow up on this. Many drone companies charge arm and leg for software that allow preprogrammed flights. This tip from you is invaluable.

Thanks a bunch.

kolokolobi:
I was thinking the falcons or hawks will operate from pre built elevated posts within and around the farm. Like I said I'm no expert in this just thinking if it could be scaled and used along maybe the drone model. Increasing the number of predatory birds around particular farms could also ward off potential bird attacks. Im thinking.

I have heard of hawks trained by security agencies in the US to 'arrest' nuisance/illegally flown drones in restricted areas. The hawks will capture any such unauthorized drones and take hand them over to the authorities.

I do agree that opportunity exists for us to explore this option. Unfortunately, it might end up being financially unaccessible to most f us if the required expertise to train and manage such predator birds is not yet ready available in Nigeria.

I am in sync with you on this.

Thank you for this.

Cheers

kingofthenorth:
Permit me to deviate a bit from the earlier topic, can we create a what app group for rice farmers and intending rice farmers, am a great admirer of rice farming and have been looking for a thread that discuss how intending rice farmers can go about establishing their own farms and challenges practicing farmers face like the one been discussed. fluentinfor and Tangoalpha pls can u guys make this happen?

Thank you for your suggestion.
I am a bit wary of such groups. @fluentinfor has mentioned some of the issues with them. A good way to achieve the end you have in mind is to identify the people you would like to network with, and have a personal business relationship with them. You can engage them privately towards that end. You can have as many of such separate arrangements.

Then sometimes later, you can decide details to initiate pooling all those contacts together and connecting them.

Otherwise you will be saddled with an unwieldy groups of people with different levels of seriousness, disparate visions, passions or motivations.

If your a rice farming enthusiast, you can proceed by reaching out to one or two clearly valuable contacts across the various rice threads on nairaland.... let's see where that takes you.

...for instance, @fluentinfor is someone I have pencilled down for further networking.

I would be glad to meet other guys you too have shortlisted.

Cheers

kolokolobi:
I am aware falcons have been used on the aviation industry to curb bird strike. I do not know if this could be scaled to solve this problem in agriculture apart from the sound mimicking.... It however provides an opportunity that can be explored as an alternative to solving this problem.

I would be very much interested in a solution like this. It is a promising option. Do you know if this is in use by the Nigerian Aviation? Perhaps one should contact NCAA... Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority.

iedide:
@TangoAlpha: Once again thank you for having a lot of patience with me.

Do you think that this birds were in anyway afraid of human presence(even if this humans were not necessarily trying to scare them), and at what range in meters did you observe the were afraid to come near humans?

At some point we resorted to manual scaring after all other options we had tried failed us. Yes, the birds respond to human presence or proximity. However, they do not leave the farm just because humans are close. If you chase them away from a spot, they can fly above your head to another spot behind you and stay there until you dislodge them again.

In terms of distance, I cannot really give a figure. I think their response to humans appeared normal, else it might have caught our attention.

I know that there was a time we tried to take closeup pictures, our intention wasn't to scare them; but the birds never allowed us to get close enough to snap the shots. So it's a little of both. They would take off when humans approach them; but the human proximity doesn't drive them from the farm, it only makes them relocation to other point close buy whhere

fluentinfor:
Now, it makes sense to me that knowing the specie(s) of birds is one of the factors to put into consideration when solving the problem.

So, instead of looking for a general solution like using nets, drones, or throwing stones, there may be unique ways of eradicating each specie.

This gets me to ponder on the option of spraying avicide. You bought from Jubaili and imported from the US. Does it mean the avicide brands you bought cannot kill the specie on your farm? This got me thinking.

But then, I noticed someone asked about cats, rats or whatsoever around your farm.

I am patiently waiting for him to return online. Looks like he is trying to draw out some clues to solve this issue.

How the human mind works is magnificient. Really, it is.

I am curious too

kolokolobi:
I'm a novice but was just interested reading thread. Is the use of predatory birds like trained falcons or hawks any help in warding off these birds

Thank you for that input. The presence of the predatory birds could work. But from what I have read, predators find it difficult to attack them inflight because they quelea travels in tens of thousands or more. They can knock-off predators from the skies.

I understand that predators find it easier to attack the nests.

If the predators are trained, hey should probably work. In my search for solutions I was in communication with a bird control company that deploys a device with pre recorded bird calls of the target birds and those of their predators.

Apparently, the target birds ar device into thinking their predators are in the vicinity and they hear the distress calls of their own kind. They assume danger is imminent and they fly away. This has been said t work 100% for many species.

This company claimed not to have the bird calls of the quelea quelea (remember the birds are denizen of African countries) and those of their predators. They wanted me to go obtain those recordings. That was where our communication ended. I was only able to obtain low quality recordings of the quelea; I couldn't get the ones for the predators.

Perhaps if I put in more effort in getting the calls for the falcon and hawks, I could find someone who already has th recordings. However, I felt this American bird control company wanted me to do the field work for them, get bird call recordings that they didn't have ; and they would still go ahead to charge me a huge sum for their device, while they can subsequently make a killing selling that product across Africa.

Anyway, back to your point; there should be a way to carefully deploy actual predators to driving the birds away. Whether one bird would be sufficient at every point would be determined by the experts in that field. Do we have such trained falcons or hawks in Nigeria?

feran15:
When you say processing would make the venture more profitable, wont the cost of processing still move further the payback date?

Processing cost should not necessarily push the payback time further by much. To start with, the farmer might not need to spend on setting up a processing facility. The farmer could start by leasing such facility....take his/her paddy to a mill...without owning a mill....(I know there are processing steps that precede milling; but the logic of lease can apply to them too)

If rice farmer that has a cropping arm and a processing arm use the margins from the processing to cushion the stretch s/he is getting from the cropping angle; without much impact on overall payback time.

fluentinfor:
- - - MY SUGGESTIONS - - -

1. The main challenge is combating birds. Let us look at the various options we have apart from this net option. For example:
a) using birds chasers, not effective.
b) using drones only. What capacity do we need? How many hectares to 1 drone? How many pilots? And what is the cost of training pilots and managing the system (how to manage the drones and rhe pilots)?
c) using drones which can spray chemicals into the air. What does it entail?
d) using a drone that will not only move in the air but can release lightings, terrible sounds, can shoot fireworks that will make a single drone cover many more hectares. For example, fireworks sent to 500 meters distance and gradual delaying/releasing of the fireworks after releasing the mini rocket can be really effective and it can cover a very larger circumference. This will be super. Perhaps, a single drone can manage 20 hectares farm. Who knows?


2. We can develop a pilot program to test 1 or 2 of the listed options we feel are afordable and effective.

3. We develop a financial plan for it.

4. If possible, we implement it.

5. We have a drone already. So, let us capture the video of the pilot project and post it here.

6. Can we really teach these dead research institutes how real researches should be done? Can we show them how to find solutions to challenges and not just find ways of embezzling funds?

Can this be done? I guess we can only know ONLY after brainstorming it. Anyway, if we cannot do it, someone might pick up our analysis someday. I just feel like doing something good.

Thank you for all these ideas you are bouncing at us. Combining drone operation with firecrackers is worth examining further. it sure can extend the range of the drones exponentially.

feran15:
i found a research done on the feasibility of using nets as a from of protection on farms as compared to bird scaring and without any form of protection. I must admit that the research is old being performed in 2007. But what interests me is that they used local nets and it seemed to be cheap at the time(but of course it would probably be more expensive now). i'd like if you guys could check it out and discuss what you think.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=9&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjpkPTfk__WAhUEmBoKHby4CVQQFghDMAg&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.propcommaikarfi.org%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2013%2F08%2F35-Demonstration-and-financial-Feasibility-of-the-use-of-nets-to-prevent-bird-damage-12-07-1.pdf&usg=AOvVaw2zqG2T5q6UbRB8A72PuN1M

Thank you for bringing this up. I must confess that I did see this document very early on before my rice came under attack. I wasn't keen netting as an option at that time; so I didn't pursue the netting idea further at that point. Perhaps I was over confident in the capability of my drone. I had test-flown it for a few minutes on sections of my neighbours farm when I newly took delivery of the drone. I saw how it effectively drove the birds. I think I went to sleep after that trial flight-forgetting that my rice was much more than my neighbour's;and that I would need to fly it for through the day and not for just a few minutes.


Second point I would like us to consider when we start throwing different permutations up for analyses. Scenario one: The nets can be planned for semi-permanent installation (where it is not dissembled after harvest). The support structure would have to be more solid (therefore more expensive). the fact that there would not be any installation costs at the next season would be cost-saving

Scenario two: The net and structures are removed at harvest. Structures would not need to be expensive; but installation costs will be incurred every season.

iedide:
Thank you very much Sir, i appreciate your efforts.

Just to add, so you can reply both at the same time: Did you notice any presence of locust or snails, maybe rats or any other pest of any sort, and about what size for each pest noticed?

Thank you very much Sir, i appreciate your efforts.

Just to add, so you can reply both at the same time: Did you notice any presence of locust or snails, maybe rats or any other pest of any sort, and about what size for each pest noticed?[/quote]Alright. I was on the road all day; visiting some vegetable farms in Epe. I am sorry I couldn't give prompt responses.

I checked my phones and didn't find any pictures of the birds. I asked my people and they reminded me that we were unable to capture any close up pictures. Unfortunately, we were also unable to capture anyone of them dead or alive. What I did was to research online about the birds. I viewed pictures online and compared with what we had seen. They were basically the same.

Like i said earlier, Áfrican Village weavers" Quelea quelea and just Quelea were names used interchangeably in some literature; while other literature appeared to see them as different birds but belonging to the same family. My interest in clearing the ambiguity ended here. I guess I was more interested in the solution than in precisely distinguishing the birds.

I can add that we had two prominently different birds. One was brightly coloured with multiple colours. We didn't observe this eat/suck the rice. But we realised that the brightly colored version seemed to be the spy for the other ones. A few minutes after you see the brightly colored ones at a spot; you will see thousands of the rest on that same spot feasting. We concluded that the brightly coloured one was the one sent out to locate newly available rice.

The other type, the one that came in tens of thousands; the one you should be worried about, is greyish. See someattached pictures culled from the web.

You may also check the following link to get a fuller exposure to these birds

https://www.daf.qld.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0011/57845/IPA-Red-Billed-Quelea-Risk-Assessment.pdf


To your other questions:

Apart from monkeys that attacked the maize at some point; we didn't have any noticeable attacks from any pests. No locusts (to the best of my knowledge) . Snails; yes. The farms was water logged. i don't recall the population being so much to attract attention.

I was informed though that rats (or perhaps grass cutters) were seen at my next door neighbour's rice farm. We didn't notice them on my own section. We went with the explanation that the reason we didn't see signs of grass cutter was because my farm had become waterlogged at the time the grasscutters should have attacked.

iedide:
Do you have any picture of this birds? Just want to be sure that this birds are Quelea quelea.

I am sorry I do not have the picture on my current phone. I should have the picture available tomorrow.

We didn't get to take many close up shots because they would not allow us. We had two types on our farm. I had to go online to try to identify the birds.

I noticed they were called different names. From African weavers to weavers to quelea to Quelea quelea. And some literature just generalize that family of birds with the Quelea quelea name.

I'll be interested in knowing of these my birds actually aren't Quelea quelea. But then if they aren't, it would mean they share many characteristics of the quelea.

Give me some time to get the picture.

iedide:
@ TangoAlpha, you said that your maize had matured 2mths before it was attacked by this birds. Can you kindly give me the exact month(including the week of the month) you first noticed the presence of quelea in your farm?

Secondly, what stage of production was your rice paddy at the time you first noticed quelea?

Lastly for now, How did you ascertain for a fact that the pest that attacked your farm the most where birds and that the birds where Quelea quelea for sure?

Thanks for your anticipated answers.

Let me respond to your post first.

The birds were already on my farm at the time of planting. A farmer I share boundary with had planted his rice over two months ahead of my rice. The birds had started attacking his rice when I was planting.

By this time my maize was already about a month old.
When the birds were done with my neighbor's rice, instead of leaving for where they usually come from daily, they made Thier home at the boundaries of my farm. Apparently they realised that they was plenty food about to be available to them. They waited patiently for my rice.

When I noticed this, I decided to destroy Their nests; thinking it would give them to migrate. They did migrate, but they moved to the section where my maiz was. At this point my maize was ready for fresh harvest; but I decided to leave it to dry out a bit before harvest. The birds upon discovering that their was Maize and given that rice wasn't ready yet, pounced on the maize.

If they had discovered the maize earlier perhaps they would have attacked it even before it matured. Secondly, it wasn't my rice that attracted them to my farm. My rice encouraged them not to return to where the came from. Even right now they are still on my farm , over a month after the last rice grain was harvested. Intact they now live on my farm; they go out in the morning in search of food, and retire on my farm at the close of a busy day.

saliubello:
Reducing the human interface as much as possible to me is a wise decision. However expensive this might be, I will give it a try God willing.

I was reviewing these conversations with my people today, then one said, to make this a success any tech product bought for bird chasing will have to be secured by a paid guard on the field, else the challenge of being stolen from the field.

I will definitely give this a shot

I personally also favor minimizing human inputs as much as is practicable. I merely put the manual option out there so that potential farmers who find the fully automated option financially out of reach can still adapt it to suit their pockets.

I wish you great success with your next attempt.

Cheers

obiageIi:
The bolded is a fact, I had to pull out of my rice farming project few week into harvest to save myself form hypertension

Well that is the sad reality. Many of us found out the hard way.

T

fluentinfor:
24 pieces + 20% = $50,400



24 pieces + 20% = $50,112



3 pieces + 20% = $14,022



2 pieces + 20% = $6,228


Note: 20% = 15% accessories + 5% shipping


I think China can offer better prices with the same quality.
I am not sure 15% includes the cost of poles for the nethouse. It is better and cheaper to import even galvanised poles. This will be crazily expensive too. Here is a very rough guess:
Dimension: 100m × 100m
Lets say you have 5m btw poles
You will have 21 rows and 21 poles in each row. Total = 441 poles.
Galvanised pipes are in 18fts which is approx. 5.4m. If you divide one into two, by the time you bury 1 ft, you will have around 2.5m height. So, you will need 221 full length poles. Can 1 inch pipe diameter be situation for this job? Maybe 1.5 inches or 2 inches. Get the cost of each amd multiply by 221. Lets say the one you choose per unit is N2,500, you are spending N552,500.
Then add installation prices: cost of cutting the poles, cost of cement to make the poles fit inside the soil firmly, cost of adding flat tops to the poles, perhaps you need to weld some parts too etc. Finally, the cost of logistics (transportation) and labor should be added.
Now look at this price and see what it is if you are doing 20 hectares.

Note, the quantity of net for the sides ( perimeter) will be lesser. You can not just translate my projections above and multiply by 20. It will be lesser. However, multiplying by the number of hectares is a very rough good guess.
Best of luck everyone.

Thank you @fluentinfor for taking time out to crunch the numbers. It would be a valuable guide for many of us going forward.

I expect the prices from China to be less; but I doubt if it will be a significant difference.

You can readily see that the HDPE are not viable even without detailed analysis.

For the HDPE, at $50,000 per hectare @ 365 naira per $; the net costs over NGN 18 million (let's even assume that is all the cost; which it isn't)

Paddy sells for say NGN 130,000 per ton
You record a yield of 4 tons per hectare. (Ofada). Farro44 could give up to twice that yield.

Also assume you plant rice 3 times a year

3 * 4tons * 10 years * 130,000 naira (3 * 8tons* 10 years * 130,000)

After 10 years you have

15.6 million (31.2 million)

Break even (or is it payback time) is somewhere in the 6th year (not considering time value of money or other costs incurred) if yields are up to 8tons per hectare. The farmer is not likely to break even (or payback) within the ten year lifespan of the HPE nets if the yield is less than 5tons per hectare.

On the bright side; if the rice is not sold as paddy, but processsed further before sale, the payback time becomes shorter.

From the top of my head, I can say the the premium polypropylene nets with the five year life span has potential of being the optimal of the options. That is the option I will most like drill down on.

Thank you once again for your invaluable inputs.

saliubello:
I think this is what I need. The mechanism of operation is quite adequate to serve it's intended purpose. On the flip side, will this be able to serve a large field? If yes, how large can the field be??

Anyone with links to procure this can reach me on any of 08050323434, 08028873809, 08099066646 or saliubello2003@yahoo.com so we can liase how I can get this.

I do not have an idea of what this might cost, but I can guess that it won't be cheap; as FarmTech already hinted. I do think that it would be quite effective. The suddenness of the explosive noise from firecrackers will always startle the birds. They are not likely to adapt to it easily.

The electronic detection will be rated by range in terms of distance of reach. That should answer your question of size of farm it can cover. You will determine the number you need based on the rated range versus size of farm and the number of boundaries your farm has. If the detector revolves while scanning then the area protected will be measured using the radius/diameter of reach. If it's a stationary detector, then expect to have it on all four (if four) boundaries of your farm. Another advantage of this system is that it does not rely heavily on continued human inputs. I imagine that it would be supported by solar power.


A less techy version is to deploy firecrackers manually and without an electronic detector. So human labor will manually trigger the fire crackers on sighting the birds. This might make the cost less prohibitive, but will its determined on the commitment of the workforce.

Cheers

fluentinfor:
For the benefit of readers, let me make a short net analysis per hectare (2.5 acres) of a rice farm.

The top cover is approx. 10,000 sqm. Then you need to have net round it. (Perimeter). The shortest height will be 2m. I think 3m is more appropriate. Anyway, let us use 2.5m height. For one hectare, one possible area of net can be: 2.5m multiplied by the perimeter of your hectare. I can only make a rough estimate as perimeters of farms differ. A good guess is using 100m by 100m dimension (just for calculation purpose). So that the total side area needed for the net is 1,000sqm.

For my plot estimation, total net will be 11,000sqm plus extra just to a good setup will be around 11,100sqm.

Let us do something. Please, kindly give us the estimated cost of net per square meter of
1. The one which can last 10 years
2. The one which can last 5 years
3 The one which can last just 1 year.

In addition, let us get the cost of poles which must be erected to install the net. What about the cost of sowing the nets together or accessories one must buy to join pieces of net together or attach them to the poles?

And then, let us put these figures with other input cost against the so called N6,000/bag FG says they will make rice cost to be. Seriously, i do not know who give these leaders figures they use. No wonder they fail year in, year out.

Bro, let us do this and show readers the point you made earlier that deploying net is almost not possible to make reasonable profit. And bringing farmers together in a place or building farm villages with amenities and providing stand-by market for farm products should be the business of governent and not providing fertilizer subsidy they embezzle with.

I was saving discussions about the bird netting for last (especially because my research is still far from finished on it). But let me share what i have so far. This can form basis of preliminary viability analyses. it can also provide a basis for comparison with locally available options; in terms of cost and durability.

The nettings are made from Polyethylene (High Density Polyethylene HDPE) or Polypropylene. The nettings made from HDPE are the longest lasting ones.
• The HDPE that are made to last for a minimum of ten years cost as much as $1,750 (or more) for 50 ft by 100 ft. (excluding accessories delivery costs from the USA)
• The HDPE that are made to last up to five years cost about $1,740 (or more) for 50 ft by 100 ft. (excluding accessories delivery costs from the USA)
• They don’t usually make the HDPE larger sizes than 50 ft by 100 ft because of they are heavy. I guess this weight would also make them tougher to install.
• The Polypropylene nettings are cheaper, and in two categories; regular and premium. The premium option is rated to last up to five years. The regular option is rated to last for 6 seasons (which is about 1 year 6 months)
• Premium Polypropylene cost $3,895 for 14ft by 3,000ft (excluding accessories and delivery to Nigeria)
• The regular Polypropylene cost $2,595 for 17ft by 5,000f. (excluding accessories and delivery to Nigeria)
• You estimate the accessories at about 15% of the cost of the netting; as well as an additional 5% for delivery to Nigeria
• These are the prices from one the more reasonable sources in the USA. I am yet to get verifiable estimates from China. However, my preliminary search suggests that prices from China are not much cheaper. The China search is still on-going