aviary lighting

[mangotango]

Iam looking for some advice on safe lighting for a small indoor aviary iam building. I was planning on something flourescent to be energy efficient. I also want to make sure it wont be too hot to burn the finches or start a fire. Is a regular flourescent base and bulb the right choice, or should i get a sun spectrum bulb made for a fish tank. I can either screw it into the top on a wood mount, on the interior. Or it could also sit on the top on the outside resting on the wire screen. Any help would be great. I am converting a large old armoire into the aviary, afted an idea i saw on pinterest.

[lou]

try this site www.1000bulbs.com
lou

[ac12]

I would use a "daylight" bulb, not for the birds, but because daylight bulb makes their colors look better.

If you can use straight flourescent tubes, I would go that way rather than CFL (the curly screw in flourescent lamp). CFL puts all the electronics into the base of the lamp, and I have checked some older CFLs and they are beginning to smell. I had one CFL go bad on me and it STUNK. I think whatever was in the strong smell killed a few of my gouldians.

Make sure the inside is painted. Some birds shoot poop sidewards, and you want to be able to clean their mess.

[Jeff McKee]

I just went through this in developing my new aviary. After comparing prices, fixtures and replacement bulbs, I chose regular light bulbs. I will get full spectrum bulbs.

- add heat to the room
- can be replaced in an emergency with a regular bulb
- less expensive for me to build my own fixture (eight covers, eight boxes, two boards, two plugs and some electrical wire) About $60 with tax.
- I'm set up for day lights and night lights
- timers cost about the same

I was looking for the ability to remove the fixtures at my convenience, day & night. I still have some experimenting to do with the light bulb size. I think I'll need to replace my fan with a slightly bigger model, as I'm going to be too warm in the room. I wonder that maybe I'll never need to have a heater, or maybe only at night. My room is only 3'x6'x6.5'tall.

[Danielle4849]

I used these lights (or something close) for my armoire aviary. They are great.
http://www.lowes.com/ProductDisplay?par ... &cId=PDIO1