lighting questions

[rancho2]

my cage is 35" high and 64" long. i have 4 featherlite 15W bulbs and 2 18" aquarium hoods with reflectors. can these hoods be placed directly on top of the cage or do they have to be a certain distance above it? and last, how many hours should the lights be on? thx.

[debbie276]

What species are you lighting, I think canary's are more specific then others.
I did a search and could not find "featherlite" but I'm sure it can be placed directly on the top of cage if that's what works better for you.

[rancho2]

sorry, featherbrite. 4 gouldians and 2 societies. and how many hours a day? glad to hear i can just set them on top, so much easier, thanks!

[Sally]

Several articles have talked about lighting, stating that lights should be 2' above the cage. That may work in some situations, but I have so many cages that they are either stacked or on shelves. I like to light each cage, so instead of having a central bank of lights in the ceiling, I lay light strips or shop lights on top of each cage. If I kept lights 2' above each cage, I would not be able to stack them. Also, I don't like how dark some cages are in a room with just a central bank of lights in the ceiling. Just a personal preference, but it doesn't seem to have caused my birds any problems.

As far as how many hours, that depends on what you are trying to do. If you are trying to breed, you would want the lights on longer, as daylength seems to trigger breeding. For some equatorial species, I don't know that daylength would be as much of a factor, since their native days would be pretty much the same all year round.

[debbie276]

When I had my gouldians in the basement bird room I had several fixtures down the middle of the room. I followed the natural daylight hours for my area (NJ). One light would turn on 30 minutes before the others and at the end of the day all would turn off except one, that would turn off 30 minutes later. Gouldians aren't triggered by longer hours of light for breeding like canary's are.

[rancho2]

thanks for the responses since i leave for work before the sun is up i'll set the lights on a timer.

[Bird_brain]

I use to breed canaries and now thinking of getting some finches. So I do have some knowladge on lighting.

First the light has to be fullspectrum and the best places to buy them are reptile department of petshops. The light can't be placed less than 2 feet from the cage because of the uva and uvb can give the birds dry skin or even sun burn. fixtures don't have to be near the cage, the birds just need to have the light enter their eyes. Zebra finches are from Australia so they shouldnt have less than 10 hours of light or more than 14 hours.

If you have a window that let's in natural light its a big help for ur lighting. The artificial lights won't have to stay on all day, so lets say in summer sun rises at 5am your lights can turn on around 9am and turn off at 5pm when the sun sets around 9pm. It gives the birds a wake up period and cool down time. I can get more in to it if needed.

[rancho2]

thanks for the info!

i also got a response from the featherbrite people and they said the lights can be 6"-30" above the cage so let's hope they're right

[debbie276]

Here's an article I thought you'd find helpful
http://confluence.mickaboo.org/download ... ummary.pdf

[rancho2]

the article also says to avoid avian bulbs. isn't that what the featherbrite full spectrum bulbs are? i have 2 hoods with 2 bulbs each over my cage. would it be better to only have 1 bulb on in each hood?

[debbie276]

the article also says to avoid avian bulbs.

I'm pretty sure it means reptile bulbs that exceed the avian light requirements

Our companion birds do best under the color temperature of the sun (as experienced on earth), which is 5000 K in the tropical latitudes. Color temperatures lower than this (more red) can lead to breeding
behavior, while higher color temperatures (more blue) have been shown to produce more stress and
feather destruction. For tropical birds, look for a light that has a temperature of at least 5000 K and not more than 5700 K.
Luckily, birds do not need much UV light to support their full vision. Natural sunlight has no more than 5% total UV content, of which only .1%—that is, 1/10 of 1 percent—is UV-B. Also, birds are not capable of seeing the powerful ultraviolet-B light, which is a high-energy, short wavelength of 280-315 nm. This light produces sunburn, skin cancer, and cataracts in humans and animals. Fortunately, in nature we are shielded from most UV-B, which is largely absorbed by the atmosphere. Thus, the UV-B that most reptile bulbs put out—and which have been repackaged as Avian lights—are not unnecessary to support your bird's vision and, in fact, can be dangerous.

Avoid Avian specialty bulbs for now. These are largely repackaged, reptile bulbs with a dangerously
high UV-B content for birds. The CRI is far too low, the temperature is far too blue, they degrade quickly, and the placement instructions are ridiculous and dangerous. Some brands to avoid are the Avian Sun compacts and the ReptiSun tubes. NEVER USE THESE!

think as long as they are within the recommended parameters you will be fine

[Bird_brain]

I use a shop lamp hanging from the cealing angeled at the cages. They have two 48 inch 32 watt t4 full spectrum, 91cri 6000k I think. They hang on the other side of the room about 10 feet away. Their not super brite just the right amount to make the room clear and white. For the first and last 2 hours of the day I have a regular light fixture that gives off the orange light that stimulates sur rise and sun set, all on digital timers.