IsaanAussie

Thais dig containment pits for the sewage, usually concrete rings stacked vertically with an open bottom. When the hole becomes full of sediments they have it pumped out.

As far as seperation is concerned 30 meters is the recommended safe distance. One improvement you can make is to use EM in the sewage hole. This will limit the smell and if you get the right stuff it will help to decompose the sewage as well.

If you are more serious then build a simple septic tank from concrete rings with a concrete base a dividing wall inside and then install a soak away drain. I have posted pictures here before of such a tank, easy to build.

On a positive note, in the hands of a good chef our pigs look pretty good.

http://www.flamingostew.com/2012/03/25/this-little-piggy/

I spent some time thinking about that pile of teak wood chips. Firstly the operation looks full time so the amount of chips collected and heaped for a year must be massive. Man I look at my 6, 1 cub m compost boxes and think time to turn all of that again? Still, they have much bigger pitch forks I'll bet.

If you have a bit of "rubbish" to "just get rid of" then "just" burn it. The issues here are as diverse as carbon sequestering and greenhouse gas emissions.

I am no greenie, the Green Revolution was a complete failure. There are no blacks and whites in life. But the global climate has changed. I try to do what I can in my very small space and ask to do the same.

Practical clue if you burn down to wood ashes. Bag it up and use it 50-50 inlieu of cement in your next building works. Most ash contains silica which is one thing our rice crops deplete from the soil.

Enough for today, need sleep

Well done. Try a molasses and black pepper or honey and mustard cure for loin or back bacon. Really good.

This has me seriously very interested. I produce a lot of compost. Rice straw and husks contain lignin which is hard to breakdown, and I though maybe the shiny surface on the quill end of the feathers is sort of the same? Hard to break down the surface so the feathers can germinate.

Just a thought but worth a little experiment. So I got a feed bag and stuffed it with feathers. Then I added a little rice bran and EM so the feathers would ferment and hopefully the germinate. Normally this sort of Bokashi composting takes a few days so I waited and waited.

I looked in the bag and nothing had happened, so I waited some more. Looked again, still no change...

Finally I got tired and laid down for a snooze resting my head of the sweet smelling but non germinating bag of feathers. I give up, try to germinate feathers and end up with nothing more then..... a pillow.

You could cover the piles with soil or rice husk and burn by pyrolysis (low oxygen) which reduces the emissions and burns the gases. The result is charcoal rather than ash. This the locals use as cooking fuel. However this requires a lot of work pulling the heap apart and extinguishing the burning and breaking up the charcoal.

Alternate to burning is to get a shredder to mulch it all up and then use the mulch or compost it.

Hello All, for anybody in the CM area, great web site in ENG, for anybody

else to see what others are doing.

rice555

www.thai-organic-compost.com

WOW now that is one big compost pile. Prices look pretty reasonable, well worth a look, thanks Rice

Right now,we try a COLOSTRUM SUBSTITUTE to increase immune system and to get more healthy piglets (first 2 days). This is very important if u got a large group or sow got problem after farrowing. We also use milk that contains 50% lactose and 20% protein (10 days). We only use this milk as a supplement depending on sow condition after farrowing. More milk if sow r in bad condition. This will end up in a litter that has a uniform size at the weaning.

Weaning statistics for last two months:

February: 104 piglets on 8 sows = 13.0 piglets weaned.

Mars: 62 piglets on 5 sows = 12.4 piglets weaned.

April: Is going to be a terrible month with 2 dead sow at the farrowing and another 2 sow that lost all piglets within 3 days.

Jompa,

I am sorry to hear of your recent losses but as you know this business is fickled. I rely of averages across the herd. But to loose two sows at farrowing and two litters following that, that is a serious hit and it must be hard to swallow. Sincerely, I feel for you.

Console yourself with the fact that you are doing all you can. Sh1t happens to us all, such is life. If I can help please send me a PM and we can talk.

To the followers of this topic, the net effect is two valuable assets are dead. Even an average bred sow is worth over 10K, But the real impact is a net year of sow costs have vapourised. Each sow eats over 1 ton of feed per year and requires some medical invention so will cost 15 to 20k A YEAR. Another 25K in lost piglets. This is a serious loss in the current market where the cost of production is barely being recovered. If you just ripped up 60 to 70K then you can understand.

IsaanAussie

Guys,

Khowan, you would be a sad loss to this forum as Somo says. I ask you to reconsideras well.

I ask everyone to reread this entire thread, I believe that there has been some over reactions to what was actually written. Andy may have an abrasive aire at times but I see him as acting within his rights under his agreements. We, some or all, may not share that view or take such actions but it does not mean it is wrong, just perhaps harsh. We are not involved in his actions and do not know the backgrounds. I know if I had taken a stronger stance in many dealings throughout my life, I would be better off financially. My wife says I'm too soft, and that is saying something as she is the most kind hearted person I have ever met.

I am not agreeing with or defending Andy's methods or morals, but I will defend his right to do it his way. Lets get back to the topic and put personal differences of opinion to one side.

The whole issue of lending money under non-formal conditions is contestable under Thai law as it is and those labelled as doing so are generally frowned upon without any consideration if they are "good guys" or not. There have been attempts by the government to stop it and to replace it with formal bank loans. Yet like the local lotteries it persists as the only vehicle open to many people. Educated or not these people have all seen the best and the worst of outcomes of these loans. No-one is being taken advantage of here.

This topic has been reduced to opinions on whether a lender has the right to take action under a signed loan agreement or not. If you have no intention to act than why form an agreement including those terms? If you have enough money to be infinitely patient then good for you.

Hey, hold the phone here people. I could be cut loose from the forum for this but this is bullshit. I know or have read items from most of the players in this and things are way out of control here. If I had the money and the inclination, also informed the lender of the terms as he does, who are any of us to say Andy is wrong? Get a life guys, Thai banks may accept default loans for whatever reason but anyone out there tell me you could get away with this rubbish wherever you come from. Tell me phonetically in English what the Thai word for insolvent is. Tell me that the task of a bank or any financial institution isn't to make money. Banks grow money, I grow pigs.

If there is any "intervention" as a result of this thread, than let all know this, I will be standing at Andy's right arm. Bring it on! I am pissed off.

Sounds like another version of the village bank scheme of some years ago. I hope it works out but I am fearful that it will run into the same issue that BAAC has and every scheme before it. They just don't make the repayments. Any money is always spent of sanook activities and none is left for payments. I mean repaying a loan, what is the fun in that?

There are a few comments I would add here in light of some of the comments.

The farming community is declining and aging. Labour is getting harder to find and more expensive. Mechanisation and other input costs are rising faster than wholesale output prices.

The ASEAN economic community moves into gear in 2015 clearing many obstacles restricting free trade, Vietnam and others are cheaper and will have the advantage. Thailand is considered to be set to become a net food importer within 10 years.

Rice farming provides most families their food and a little spending money. I have returned between 4 to 5,000 baht a rai for the last 3 years, hardly the basis for a long term ROI.

Mono-cropping is a thing of the past. At best it yields boom and bust cycles. The worst of it is you are more dependant on external resources at retail prices. Integrated farming while many income streams smooth the bumps and byproducts replace purchased inputs is the way forward. This is poorly practiced here.

Thai people have a different outlook on life. You cannot assume that someone will do what is in your best interests as owner or employer, or even as family member. Unless you are present you will be well advised to let let things flow naturally. Trying to manage from a distance will drive you crazy.

Property investments always have a risk attached. Just look at the 2008 situation in the US, it isn't a Thailand specific issue. I retired in 2008 and took a massive smacking realising assets.

But for the risk takers here's something a little lighter.

You do not need a parachute to skydive! They only become necessary if your want to do it twice....

A bit slap on the back Slapout. A very well put position which I agree with entirely. Andy, my friend, more power to you. The old saying nice guys finish last may well be true. But this nice guy thinks like a golfer, your ball goes in the hole, life is a one up do it to yourself commodity not a race. I am definitely poorer than I could have been that much I concede.

The guy that walked away smiling had no way to satisfy the actual amount and what good would it have done me to turn his family out into the street?

Sid,

Forget it, its that simple, forget it. Invest the money for your kids in something you have an interest in and can control.

IA

As you well know, in my garden, at home, I practice what you preach.

We farm commercially several hundred rai, while we do not depend on it, we turn a profit every year using "Thai" methods mixed with some Farang ingenuity.

Come up with business plan that involves profitability, organic compost, cassava or sugar cane; I have a newly purchased 49 rai piece ready to try.

Your friend FFF saw it raw; last year I grew cassava, just planted again.

Best

Soidog,

You have a deal. I need a source of both crops. If you are seriously interested than we should take this offline. I am making organic fertiliser and looking to pelletise it.

Isaan Aussie

what do you mean " I need a source of both crops " ??

Check your messages.

As you well know, in my garden, at home, I practice what you preach.

We farm commercially several hundred rai, while we do not depend on it, we turn a profit every year using "Thai" methods mixed with some Farang ingenuity.

Come up with business plan that involves profitability, organic compost, cassava or sugar cane; I have a newly purchased 49 rai piece ready to try.

Your friend FFF saw it raw; last year I grew cassava, just planted again.

Best

Soidog,

You have a deal. I need a source of both crops. If you are seriously interested than we should take this offline. I am making organic fertiliser and looking to pelletise it.

Isaan Aussie

Ok guys, can I dodge the A's B's and add a C? Me! I lent 25,000 to a local farmer and lesser sums to others under the 3 baht scheme at the advise of the wifes family. Now this was some ten years ago so hardly current. We held chanotes, had police reports and contracts but it all went haywire when those same family members didnt try to collect the monthly interest payments. I pulled the plug and maximised the return.

Now the 25K loan was repaid but not the interest due to date which amounted to some 3K. A few weeks ago the borrower turned up and wanted to know how much he owed in interest so he could have his chanote back. I didnt even know we still had it! Anyway, 3,000 at 3% per month over 10 years runs up more than 100K in total. There was no way this guy had ever seen that much money so what do I do? I told the wife to ask him for 5000 baht. Which he paid and walked away smiling.

There you go guys rip into that.....

Thanks Mate. Look forward to seeing you at the next market.

Spoke to mutual friend Dylan today. I will get to one as soon as I can. Pig industry is not great at the moment. Perhaps I could bring the BBQ and we could make bacon and goats cheese sandwiches together.

I wonder if I should respond to this or wait until FEF climbs on board. I agree it is a tall order here in Thailand with the soil so degraded. Especially on rice paddy land where most of the microbes you so carefully give the soil, end up drowned. But Soidog, I love a challenge and from what I have seen your green thumb does to.

FEF has a ten year supply of sunhemp seed, and a mountain of biocharred bagasse so it will be interesting how his C and N figures improve with time.

I can give you an example however. I sold compost to a local farmer who used it instead of cow manure to grow vegetables. They prospered and people took note. Then he grew rice on the same patch and his yield was better than his adjacent paddies. This year he used my compost again and his vegetable yield was vastly improved. The effect accumulates even here in Thailand.

Difficult indeed, impossible no I disagree, it will just take a little longer and be a little harder work.

Thanks IA, The thinking behind this is my ozzie mate want to buy a farm vehicle, something like an Etan, which to all intents and purposes is a modified pick-up chassis with a Kubota engine, now i think they use the original gearbox, and i was wondering if the thresher drive pulleys and gearbox output shaft pulley could be played around with until it was right, which of course would be unknown till it starts work.

Ive seen and heard these truck mounted threshers working, plumes of chaff and dust 25ft high, not sure if the are putting to much rice stalks in at once cos the engine really digs in, Perhaps thats the normal thai thing, enough is ok, more is better?

Cheers, Lickey.

You got it in one, they play around with it until they get it to work. Drop the tailshaft on the truck and patch in the shaft to the thresher. And again you are correct, overload everything untils it jams or breaks is the normal Thai development process. How else do you know what the limit "used" to be? Now it is "old" already and will need to be replaced. How childishly simple is that?

Seriously, the threshers are run flat out as close to 24/7 as possible. Many people prefer to thresh their rice at night when things are cooler. The normal charge here is 3 bags of paddy per 100 bags threshed.

For those who want to get a better understanding of the impact of different fertilisation regimes, try reading this 2009 study.

http://www.mauialohaaina.org/documents/CUT_Compost.pdf

GF,

I have been hoping you would turn up here. I am told you have had a cheesy grin on your face on all three past markets. Just havent been able to get there yet. One day I will so please stay successful so it stays viable.

Isaanaussie

Most use the truck prop shaft to drive the input to the thresher and from there a series of belts to the individual component shafts. The trucks are usually revving at a speed close to max torque so I am assuming that the thresher under load would need more than 14HP. I have seen then run vis the PTO on a 35HP Kubota tractor though. Thought about getting a second hand pickup engine from the wreckers?