JustCryptos:
@op, I am interested in knowing how much you leased your land and location. Thanks.

Farm is in Ibaragun Town close to Ijoko,close to Sango, Close to Agbado Crossing. Under Ifo Local Government, Ogun State. I paid NGN5,000 per acre per annum

A farmer right beside my farm had planted Ofada rice. He had planted his in March. I started planting the bulk of my (50-60 acres) rice in June (May 30, actually). I had planted about 5 acres mid May, though.

I think the Ofada planted by neighbour attracted the birds to our area. My farm and his had not been cultivated in decades. So my farm was not and shouldn't have been on the radar of the Quelea.

Anyway, my neighbor's rice brought the birds to our farms. He had planned to combat the birds using manual scaring. Manual scaring essentially involves people (sometimes called bird 'boys') chasing birds all across your farm; shouting and making as much noise as they could generate using different crude means. They use whistles, beat metallic objects... anything that will generate noise.

They also use catapults, sticks etc. They resume work in the morning before 6...and work till probably 7pm daily for the 3-5 weeks leading to harvest.

This method is very inefficient. It can be effective, though - if you only have one or two acres of rice and you have ten people chasing the birds. Some smaller scale farms pack all their children and wives and other relatives to the farm during the weeks leading to harvest. Many times they are able to effectively combat these menace of a bird. Such farmers get to effectively control the birds. They do not get to pay their wives or children directly for that service. So to them this is an inexpensive but effective means to control the birds. That's why this method will continue to be in use into the foreseeable future even though it's not efficient.

If you have 15 acres, like my neighbor, theoretically speaking, you might need 100 people physically scaring the birds 12-14 hours daily for 5 weeks for it to be effective. If you do not have enough people, the few you have will tire out easily because they will have a wider area they need to cover. The birds will keep flying to areas where there are no one as you pursue them all over the farm. No rest for the birds, no rest for the people chasing them.

The bird scarers are not cheap; understandably so. They are expected to be on their feet for hours in the sun without resting (if you actually believe that they don't rest) days on end. You will pay them alot of money and you still do not get the guarantee that you will have a reasonable harvest.

My neighbor was so disappointed with his harvest that he decided he would use his harvest as seeds which he would plant in the future. Imagine all that he went through only for him to make just about enough for seeds for his next planting. Unfortunately, my harvest was close to this outcome.

You the rice farmer buy Ofada seeds...which aren't cheap. You prepare your land. You plant. You control weed. You fertilize. You control deseases. You spend a fortune scaring birds. You harvest, pay harvesters....and then you realise that your harvest is only about the size of the seeds you planted....maybe only a few bags more...

Thanks @fluentifor once again.

All your comments are noted. I will reach out to you on vegetables shortly.

Let me try to pick up the story where I left it.

There are several angles to my rice farming experience. But I will try to focus more on the Quelea quelea birds in this thread.


The Quelea quelea birds (or just quelea) attack rice at two major stages of the rice development before harvest. Rice as we know it, is hard. But it starts off as a milky liquid. It then hardens as the plant matures towards harvest.

The Quelea sucks the milk so that the husk is empty at harvest. Even when you manage to escape the attack during the milky stage, your rice is vulnerable till you harvest. Unfortunately, you cannot harvest rice unless it is ready.

Birds attack maize. I had planted some maize. After all, I had cleared 85 acres of land; I had bought some maize seeds; and I was only going to do 50-60 acres of rice. So I had planted about 10 acres of maize. The maize journey is another story. But in addition to the various challenges I faced with the maize, the birds attacked my read-to-harvest maize.

The maize were ready to harvest about two months before the rice got to the stage milky stage that the birds could feed on. The birds, which were already in the vicinity of my farm at this point discovered the maize and started attacking it. Meanwhile, my maize was mature and ready for harvest but it was not yet as dry as I wanted it. When I noticed this attack on the maize, I had to order that we did an early harvest of the maize.

I guess the point I am trying to make is that you can harvest maize early if birds start attacking it. But you cannot do that to rice.

If your rice come under attack of these birds, and you are overwhelmed, you realise you are handicapped. You are helpless. You can only stand there and watch your potential harvest deplete ton by ton.

If you harvest rice prematurely, when it's being processed, instead of giving you the hardened grains, the paddy will give you powder.

That's how you will stand there watching your money get eaten away by these tiny birds.

FarmTech:

..
I once read somewhere that strips of reflective aluminum foil will scare birds away. Maybe u people shud try it.

Thanks for that input.

Yes you are right. They fall under the reflective tapes option for bird control. 'old cassette' tapes also fall under this category.
The principle is simple. When the wind blows, the tapes make crackling sounds that irritate or even scare the birds. Secondly, in bright sunlight, the tapes reflect light into the market eye of the birds. This also deters them.

Even though this bird control option use a two prong approach, it will only work when there is wind and or sunlight. You cannot guarantee that this will happen all day everyday for the one month that your rice become vulnerable to bird attack. Plus, these birds are adaptive, when they notice that the tapes pose no imminent danger, they start ignoring it.

Cheers

fluentinfor:
Your story is similar to many farmers in the game. It is the agricultural institute who should have worked with surveyors and geo- whatever they are called to know what kind of land is available. All we need to do is to check their data. So, that you went through the troubles and pains signify you are on the right path. So, you have data with you and you understand the area more than your first attempt; hence, you can easily improve your efficiency.

Soil test. I laugh so much at the tests around here in Nigeria. If Israel can grow on rocks, what is that telling us? My brother, be careful with the recommendations of these glorified research institutes, private companies or whichever organization that you consulted. Sit down again and analyse everything you have. Many times, these companies give recommendation based on salt level, ph level etc and they advise that certain crops will do well. Lol. Whereas, they were to tell you something like this: you can grow crop A on this land but if you want to grow crop B and C, you need to increase the ph level by adding ammendment X at this quantity per square foot. Is this not better than saying you can grow just crop A?

I will love to still read more of your story; however, you need not to do just 1 ha now. You should have an idea of the capacity of your drone. If its just one week to harvest you lost the crop, brother, i congratulate you.

What should you do? You mentioned that you need around 4 to 5 drones. So, i believe your drone can handle 5 to 10 hactares. So, go for it.

In additional, look at your nutrient management. Look again at the variety you have planted.

Something came to my mind. Check the pilot of your drone. How good is s(he)? Is there a special skill required to use the drone on larger hectares? You may need to learn how to fly your drone yourself.

Again, check the total weight your drone can lift in the air. Perhaps, you can use your drone to spray chemicals in the atmosphere that will chase away the birds. You know that drones are used to create artificial rain by spraying some chemicals in the cloud. Right?

Finally, rice is big investment which need very large area of land. I suggest you learn vegetables cultivation(cucumber, tomato, eggplant, local vegetables etc) and get one of these on one acre to serve as your running cost. If you get veggie right, it will be your risk management tool. Vegetable can make good profit on even just one acre but you need to be fully ready for it too. Please, look into it very well.

Seriously, the main problem with soil is diseases. And i doubt most laboratories do such tests. What they do is nutrient, salinity and ph which can be easily be manipulated. What you should be concerned with is if it is ecomomical reasonable to ammend such land. Even, diseases can be killed too but is it wise to do it?

Interesting.

You are very deep and grounded. It will be a pleasure to engage you more extensively.

Trivial....I taught myself to fly the drone before reaching my people. I didn't want anyone crashing $1,000+.

My drone isn't designed to deliver liquid payload. There actually are agricultural drones designed specifically for that function. They are much more expensive- upwards and/or multiples of $4,000. I could still explore the possibility of adapting my drone for such specialised agricultural use.

Even though I came to conclude that for the drone bird scaring option to be effective, one would need an appropriate number of drones for the size of the farm, each drone requires a dedicated pilot. So apart from the cost of acquiring the drone, one would still need to pay well trained pilots who would be required to work everyday for upto a month. This might challenge the economic viability of this bird control option. The success of this option is also contingent upon each drone pilot executing their beats effectively and conscientiously.

The bird control option that I currently favour above all others after careful considerations, is bird netting. I am currently researching options for the netting from the USA and China. The netting is widely considered to be the most effective solution against birds. It is also, unfortunately, the most expensive. There are categories of the bird netting that are rated to last at least 10 years; some are rated 5 years...while we also have those with one-year life span.

I intend to explore the option of locally available nets of appropriate mesh size for cost, and life spans.

My preliminary cost benefit analysis of bird netting isn't looking too fantastic. Not with repeated calls by our governments to get rice selling as low as possible. I don't think rice (the FARO varieties) will be profitable if they sell lower than NGN 15,000 per 50kg bag. There is a better chance for Ofada to be profitable because it commands a higher premium.

Unfortunately, Ofada itself is low yielding. I understand we don't have improved/high yielding Ofada rice yet.

I still have further analysis to do before making a go-no-go decision on cultivating rice again.

And to your suggestions about my going into vegetable. That's exactly what I am currently doing. I am talking to vegetable farmers. I have a private training on vegetable farming Thurs/Fri this week. And I have another for most of next week. I smiled when I read that portion where you mentioned vegetables. We are operating at frequencies not far apart.

Like I said, you are clearly someone I would love to engage more extensively beyond the walls of nairaland.

I appreciate you once again.

saliubello:
Thanks for the insight. This I guess is the cheapest of the options available in combination with other strategy.

Thanks greatly

Maybe you should mention the 'other strategy' you have in mind. I might just just have tried them already.

dragon2:
Hmm,what a tragic loss.I would suggest you do not expand on rice yet but rather shrink the land size till you have mastered the art of rice farming. Grow other crops you are sure of,while experimenting with rice so as to maintain some degree of financial strength.(Unless of course, you have serious financial muscle)
On the issue of birds,a few scarecrows combined with a wailing siren may work.

Just my 2 kobo.

The birds are intelligent and adaptive. The siren will work for a few days. When they notice that it's not harming them, they will start ignoring it.

One way to achieve relative success with the siren is to vary the type and pattern of noise coming from it. And not to make it continuous.

Scarecrows are the easiest for the birds to get used to. The birds are so 21st century.

The inflatable human effigy that you find at children's parties will probably work better than motionless scarecrows. Combining this with irregular high pitch noise can have relative success...provided the population of the birds in your locality is minimal.

Let me start my story from the beginning.

I am an accidental rice farmer. I was not interested in rice from the start. I thought rice was going to be too complicated. (I was right). Recommendation from my soil tests, and the history of that community favoured rice and maize.

I opted for maize.

I leased 100 acres. I started clearing in April. Got two bulldozers in. After 2-3 weeks of clearing, we had a downpour. The farm became water-logged. It was obvious maize was not going to do well. Apparently, we were late by two months if we were to plant maize.

I had spent money clearing. I had paid for the land for the year and the next. There was no going back. Plus I found out at about that point that the farm was in the flood plain of Ogun river. (Details were still sketchy at that point though). Whenever the Oyan dam on Ogun river was opened, every farm or community on its flood plain was submerged.

The information we had at that point suggested that the flood happened every 2-3 years. The last one was in 2016. So I thought there was a good chance there wouldn't be any in 2017; but that the chances for it to flood in 2018 was higher.

l was therefore determined to not waste 2017.

I recalibrated, reconsidered rice, and ended up a rice farmer.

I sought all the help I could get from different people. The cultivation, and related practices were taken care of. I got my self a DJI Mavic Pro drone after weeks of doing drone research. I got 3 spare batteries. Each battery was rated to give a flight time of upwards of 25minutes. I planned to make provision for charging the batteries on the farm.

I had everything covered. I mean, what else could go wrong?

Of course many things did go wrong.

fluentinfor:
I wish you had done a pilot on max of 2.5 acres (1 hectare) before going on 50. The main lesson I have learned is to perfect intensive cultivation on a smaller scale first. Why? In your case, if one sits down and use technology to double or triple yield on every plot, then, there will be less area to safe guard against attacks at the initial stage. By the time the whole 50 acres are utilized, there will be maximum efficiency output. I am very much interested in your story. I read some of your comments on the usage of some chemicals and how you flew a drone over your farm to scare away birds on another thread. Quite interesting.

What people like you are doing are what research institutes are suppose to have done. What are they doing? There should have been researches for your area that the agricultural department should not only recommend but guide you very well but they won't. They are after fertilizer, seeds and seedlings subsidy programs where they can embezzle millions. This Nigeria. Too bad!

Let us read your story.

Thank you for quality feedback.

I agree with you on the need to perfect a process (almost any process) small. Then scale it up using the learnings acquired.

In fact, many of my friends told me I shouldn't have done that much so early. That is a no-brainer.

However, I reply them by saying that I would not have appreciated the magnitude of the various challenges that I faced if had done say 1 hectare. This might sound like a weak defence, but I can substantiate it.

Much of the data I worked with was defective or just false in some instances.

I'lI try to focus on the bird issue out of all the issues I had to contend with.

If I had done 1 ha of the rice, my single drone would have been enough, I believe, to deal with the birds. But I was informed that some guy deployed a drone in a town in Cameroon or so to great success. The drone drove the birds away from that entire area to the benefit of all the rice farmers. I swallowed this testimony hook line and sinker.

It didn't even occur to me to question the limitations of the drone. All I thought about was that once I got the drone, I was good to go. The drone and accessories cost me over $1,500. If my drone can cover 50 acres, why cultivate 2.5 acres? As far as I knew, the other issues with the rice were handled. I thought I had everything covered.

I almost succeeded in spite of the odds. I think most of the attack happened a week or so to harvest. So last week I had close to 50 acres of rice harvest expected; this week it was all gone. I harvest less than a ton of rice where I expected 100tons.

Hello all,

I planted about 50 acres of Ofada rice earlier in 2017 and I had a severe attack of quelea quelea birds on the rice. And they destroyed what I think was over 90% of the harvest.

My farm is in Ibaragun town close to Ijoko under Ifo local government Ogun state

I shall chronicle what I did, including the good and bad moves that I made. I will also be discussing what I think I'll do differently in the future, if I attempt rice again.

Some estimates put the total population of Quelea quelea birds at upto 2 billion across the world. But more than 95% of that population is in Africa. Those birds can destroy hundreds of acres of rice fields in a week.

Some states up north deploy aerial spraying of chemicals to kill the birds using aeroplanes. They actually get the support of state government and in some cases the Federal government. This way, the birds are killed in thier millions. But they reproduce so quickly that they are not in anyway endangered; regardless of millions of them being killed across; several African countries yearly.


More details later...

arvinkz:
How effective is the use of Avicide?

For avicides. I can't say much. The one I bought from the US did not work. I guess it was not meant specifically for quelea quelea. I late found out that many of these products are species specific.

The one I got locally made by Jubailli didn't work. I would not rush to say it didn't work because it wasn't effective. The friend that recommended it cliam that it worked on his own farm. And we applied it at about the same time. It seemed to have worked well in driving the birds from my friend's Ofada rice farm but to didn't even show any sign of working on mine.

The only way I explained this discrepancy to myself was that I started applying this avicide late. The birds were already living on my farm. I had already tried a number of solutions that failed. By the time I got to trying the avicide, the birds had already found endless supply of food. The avicide must have failed as a result. Perhaps if I had applied the chemical before the rice were mature for bird attack, this solution might have had better outcomes.

The avicide or chemical that are deployed for aerial spraying in northern states actually kill the birds. The chemicals would probably be classified differently from the ones I mentioned earlier.

Cheers

feran15:


when you say drones, are the drones continuously flying over the farm? 24/7?

To answer your question directly; the drone will not need to be flown 24/7. The birds attack during the day only. So you only fly during the day. Do you fly all through the day? No. But you may need to fly for most of the day.

Let me break this down a bit more.

Quelea quelea attacks are greatest in the early mornings and early evenings. But they generally attack through the day.

When you use a drone, it's motion and noise drives the birds. If the farm is not so big....the drone can travel back and forth in a few seconds and will leave the birds no respite. The theory is that if you frustrate them so much they will take a break for upto 30-45minutes. If the drone activity continues, and the birds upon returning realise that they still don't have the opportunity to feed on your rice, Thier frustration increases. If you sustain this back to back. You are very likely going to make the birds migrate from the area.

There is a potential problem though. Many drones that qualify for this task have limited battery life. Typically battery life's are about 10-30 minutes. So you may need to have a number of spare batteries to be able to fly the drone footage hours.

The other challenge is if the area you need to fly the drone over is too large (my rice was on about 50 acres, and I had only one drone); the birds will feast on the rice before the drone gets to them and they will fly to other parts of the rice farm once the drone gets to them. Before the drone gets to the new spot, the birds would have done more damage...on and on..

So get as many spare batteries as you can. And plan the number of drones to match the size of you farm.

I used the DJI Mavic Pro. Unfortunately, it didn't help much. The size of the farm and the population of the birds overwhelmed it. I reckon that of I had 5-10 of that drone I may not have a list a single grain to the birds.

I made an attempt at Ofada rice farming this year as well. The birds ravaged the farm. I lost, probably more than 90% of the harvest to the birds. They are called Quelea quelea. They are a most destructive species of birds. They should never be underestimated. They are estimated to be about 1.5-2 billion in population globally; and probably 98% of that population is in Africa.

This was partly why I asked you if you have an estimate of the population that came to your farm.

I attempted a number of options.

1) Bird tapes
2) Laser generating torch
3) Drone
4) Chiili-Vinegar solution
4) Avicide from Jubailli
5) Avicide imported from the US
6) Manual scaring

I can give you details of the outcomes of each of these options. But let me fast forward to what I think might deliver better results:

1) Bird netting. This option is very expensive and may not be economically viable if the market value of the rice is low. Ofada is pricier than regular rice; so there is prospect for bird netting to be viable. From my little research however, there are no high yielding Ofada variety yet; so the viability of the netting option might be questioned.Further investigation needed.

2) I am aware (from newspaper reports) that the Nigerian Federal government (and some state governments in the north) assist rice farmers by deploying aerial spraying of rice farms with avicides to combat the Quelea quelea. Millions of the destructive birds are killed this way. This is probably why rice farmers from the northern are able to record better rice harvests. i am not aware of any such initiatives for rice farmers down south. (https://www.pressreader.com/nigeria/the-guardian-nigeria/20170528/282162176175888)

3) The use of juju. Many Ofada rice farmers believe that they can control these birds using juju. I have engaged many of them, directly and indirectly, and they all seem confident of the efficacyof the option. for the record, I do not share their belief. And even if they were to demonstrate that they are right, I still would not adopt this method. But then, I still have to mention it.

4) Drones should work if the number of drones is adequate for the size of the farm.

saliubello:
4. Birds.

They finished the rice. I was targeting to prevent theor invasion after the grains have formed. Unknown to me that they actually had started the damage long before I thought.

I later realized that the bird suck the juice / fluid that later solidify to make the rice grain. This became evident when I noticed that after processing, the quantity of chaff was enormous.

Once I did the floatation test, large volume of the chaff were floating. Then I realized the hard way that I had been "taken on a long ride".


How do you keep birds away from your fields?



I tried the old cassette method. .

I tried the scarecrow..

Can you please share more details on the success of the methods you used in the bird control? Can you estimate the population of the birds that attacked your rice? What additional methods, if any, are you considering going forward?