Full Spectrum, natural daylight, indoor sunshine, etc.

[cooleydd]

First of all let it be known that these may or may not mean the same and may be different with different brands. So it raises the question - define the kind of lighting you want. But this is beside the point of this post.

We frequently see that owners are going out of their way to get "full spectrum" lighting for their birds. In doing so they pay an additional cost and may get little to no benefits.

If you want lighting to increase the daylight hours for breeding - I would guess any light would work. I use to work with horses and increased their "daylight" time by just plain old fluorescent tubes (about $1 a 4 foot tube. I have seen bird breeders say they use the same. Certainly before these lights were "invented" many use tubes or incandescent or other bulbs.

If you want to get "sunlight" to your birds to produce vitamin D, I am not sure that a bird competely covered with feathers is going to be helped. We know humans that spend time in the sun do not get the benefits if their body is completely covered by clothes. Besides do we even know that a bird needs this vitamin. They may not even need the sunlight but do need light for their circadian cycles.

I do not believe it is the "color" of light but just the fact of light that looks like daytime to the animals. Certainly "Daylight" fluorescent meets this requirement.

I tthink this is pretty much verified by the following at least in humans and I doubt there is any real scientific studies for birds:

The non-profit, Lighting Research Center, a group of utility companies, experts and government agencies, established the National Lighting Product Information Program (NLPIP) to provide objective information about the effectiveness of different lighting systems. According to the NLPIP, full-spectrum light does not provide any improved benefits over similar light systems:

“Full-spectrum light sources will not provide better health than most other electric light sources. Recent research has shown that human daily activities are strongly influenced by the solar light/dark cycle. The most notable of these daily, or circadian, cycles is the sleep/wake cycle; but other activities including mental awareness, mood, and perhaps even the effectiveness of the immune system go through regular daily patterns. Light is the most important environmental stimulus for regulating these circadian cycles and synchronizing them to the solar day. Short wavelength (blue) light is particularly effective at regulating the circadian system; long wavelength (red) light is apparently inconsequential to the circadian system. Thus, to maximize efficiency in affecting the circadian system, a light source should not mimic a full spectrum, but instead should maximize only short wavelengths. Even if a full-spectrum light source includes short wavelength light in its spectrum, it will not necessarily ensure proper circadian regulation because, in addition, the proper intensity, timing and duration of the light exposure are all equally important for satisfactory circadian regulation (Rea et. al, 2002).

[NaOH55]

So I recently spent a week or two mulling over what sort of lighting to go with, and it does seem there is a lot of fluff when it comes to full spectrum lighting, especially when dealing with the pet supply industry. What worked best for my setup was compact-fluorescent bulbs. If you run a search on the phrase "full spectrum cf" at amazon you'll see there are a lot of these at reasonable prices (5-8 bucks) as opposed to the 10-15 dollar super-dooper pet lights. I did go ahead and opt for a day-glo basking bulb because they do balance out the sterile fluorescense and give a much more natural appearance, and of course provide some warmth. So whether or not you're a believer in full spectrum, maybe one could deal with twenty bucks invested in good lighting even if the benefits are scant.

Personally, I think its worth it even from an aesthetics standpoint. Also, I'm a little weary of the idea that feathers may nullify the whole vitamin-d production effect. After all, a feather coating is quite porous when you're dealing with photons, and there's a lot less surface area to cover on a little bird.

So at this point I think i'm just trying to justify my own expenditures, so I'll stick with "It looks pretty and it doesn't have to cost a fortune."

[cooleydd]

I would agree that different spectrum of light may enhance the colors of the birds. If that is important to your eyes than by all means buy the bulb that looks the best to your eyes. And then use a power in the egg mix to get Vitamin D3 into your birds.

In the design entry it is not uncommon for the lighting of the designers be as close to the sun as possible to make their choice of colors, in the sun, to show their best.

As for Vitamin D I would suggest you not depend on the lighting but on a supplement of Vitamin D3 made especially for birds. There may be a calcium consideration when feeding D3 or any other Vitamin D. You also have to be careful of how much Vitamin is already in the foods that you are feeding. I would guess that it would not want to be used if you are feeding pellets and perhaps enriched seeds.

Overdose of Vitamin D can be very dangerous to your bird. Plain Vitamin D can not be used by birds. The one you want to use is Vitamin D3 which is found primarily in animal products, eggs, insects, milk and liver. vitamin D3 is important in the absorption of calcium. This will make healthy eggs and perhaps more of them to a clutch and healthier chicks.

There will be some absorbing of sunlight (or proper lighting) by the birds through their legs and around the eyes. I do not believe that the "full spectrum" lights will produce enough of the short wavelengths that are required. These low wave lengths will not penetrate glass and therefore would not produce any vitamin D3 formation.

The best thing to do is to mix a Vitamin D3 powder with your egg mixture and feed daily. Do not overfeed Vitamin D3. In addition different species of birds may need Vitamin D3 in different amounts.

Google "birds and vitamin D" without the quotes.

[EmilyHurd]

They have some very inexpensive full spectrum lighting fixtures at Wal Mart, in the lighting section. On the box it says it is just for animals/birds. I like the full spectrum lighting and it really does bring out great colours in my finches! I use two fixtures on my big flights, and one fixture on each small cage. Plus my finches seem to love them. They are on timers, so if I decide to sleep in, they still turn on at the same time, and if I work late, they turn off at the same time.

On top of my lighting, I also have them in a room that has full access to sunlight. So my birds are quite happy with their lighting.

[cooleydd]

Emily

I agree that different spectrum of lights will enhance the bird colors. However that enhancement may or may not be the proper light for the bird. Are the lights set to come on at the same time everyday or are they set to come on and off at different times depending on the season.

As I quoted before "Recent research has shown that human daily activities are strongly influenced by the solar light/dark cycle. The most notable of these daily, or circadian, cycles is the sleep/wake cycle; but other activities including mental awareness, mood, and perhaps even the effectiveness of the immune system go through regular daily patterns. Light is the most important environmental stimulus for regulating these circadian cycles and synchronizing them to the solar day." This requires the short wavelength type of light. Long wave lengths (red) light is not involved in this.

Again "to maximize efficiency in affecting the circadian system, a light source should not mimic a full spectrum, but instead should maximize only short wavelengths. Even if a full-spectrum light source includes short wavelength light in its spectrum, it will not necessarily ensure proper circadian regulation because, in addition, the proper intensity, timing and duration of the light exposure are all equally important for satisfactory circadian regulation"

Now you have two light sources - one from the lights which we really don't know if it includes short wave length lighting and the sun which I assume is covered and filtered through glass if inside the house. Thus cutting down some of the most valuable part of the light.

And then perhaps we ought to consider the environmental cost of the electricity to keep the birds in a light - that is just for our eyes.

I am glad to here that you know your birds are happy. But do you know they are any more or any less happy if you did not use the lights.

Now if you are in the business and selling your birds then you would use lights that came on earlier and stay on later to manipulate the circadian system of the birds to start breeding earlier and produce more eggs than what might otherwise be done in nature. The question here might be at what cost to the birds.

[Sally]

I use full-spectrum lights in my breeding room. They are 4' fluorescent shop lights, the bulbs are about $6 at Home Depot. They are on a timer, so they come on before dawn and stay on long after sunset. I am not trying to manipulate the circadian cycle to get more eggs, I'm just trying to work with birds that want to breed during our winter. I used to use plain lights, and I didn't like the way they affected the color of the birds. One of the reasons I have finches is that I enjoy watching them. Natural daylight bulbs bring out the colors and make them prettier--selfish of me, perhaps, but it is also selfish just to have the birds in the first place, another whole ethical question. It will be anyone's guess as to whether these lights are helping with breeding, since I have changed my entire breeding setup and feeding program this year.

[Shadowfax]

Glad this topic is here.
I do not breed my birds but I do light them. This is recent for me and I am trying to learn about proper lighting for them. I am actually using the hood light from my fish tank as it fits the top of their cage nicely. The bulbs as I recall are average fluorescent full spectrum lights. The do not give of heat at all. Which for me was a concern. Would not want them to be too warm during the day only to have the lights go off and them get chilled in my cool house during the night.

Why do I use a light?
1) it is getting colder outdoors so I no longer put them out to sunbathe every day and I have moved them away from their window.
2) my LR does not get a lot of natural light having only one small window. Once the sun crosses to the west side of the house no more light.
3) so I can look at them of course.

I think they have been much more cheerful since I started using the lights. Singing a lot more. More active.
I do use a timer and for now it is set to come on at about sunrise and go off about an hour or two after sunset here. Approx. 11 hours total I think.

[rottielover]

I sold off all my saltwater fish tanks to fund my birds (Gouldian's), so I come from a hobby where lighting is nearly everything (when your growing coral in a tank, you better have good lights!)...

So I came from the world of PAR values and Metal Halide lighting systems (I had a 1000 watt system for my big coral tank)...

Currently I have a large aviary flight type cage and 4 breeder cages on one of those nice metal stands that stack them up.

I went to home depot and got four 18watt lights (the fixtures are plastic and were cheap, and were the PERFECT size for my breeding cages) and replaced the bulbs with "plant grow" bulbs. The flight cage is lighted with a "shop light" that has two 40 watt plant grow bulbs.

I feed my birds pellets (they contain a D3 suppliment), and the only reason I went with the plant bulbs is that the birds look better under them, and that's why I own these colorful birds in the first place.

We also own a Severe Macaw who really doesn't get any "natural" light at all except through the sliding glass door in the back, and on the occasions we take him outside on his "feather teather" leash.

IMO, the "full spectrum" lighting issue pretty much died a few years back when commercial seed and feed mixes started adding D3 and other vitiamins to the mixes.

Some large commercial breeders keep the lights on 20 hours a day (so I've read) which is *supposed* to increase egg production, but I've never seen any scientific evidence that it works.

I just went with a standard appliance timer, connected to a power strip that all the light fixtures connect to. I went with a 15 hour "day" cycle because that's what multiple sources said to use (Gouldian Book, my Avian Vet, and several internet sites) 7am till 10pm.

This lighting cycle never changes with the seasons, and the birds don't get any ill effects from it. Their breeding and molting seasons come and go as nature intended.

I'm not saying that lighting is completely unimportant, it can potentially be a very important issue depending on the diet you feed and other factors like species of bird etc. However, I don't think that lighting in the bird room is as big an issue as it was say 10 or 15 years ago.

When I was growing corals, lighting was of supreme importance, I was changing light bulbs on a timed schedule, tracking number of hours of burn on bulbs etc. Now I've changed over to a hobby that I don't have quite the number of equipment concerns

So my total costs for lighting equipment when WAY down ;)

If I were keeping only society finches for instance, I may have gone with just a normal, generic, run-of-the-mill tube, cheapest I could find, because I wasn't dealing with colors other than blacks, browns and whites. With the Gouldian's your dealing with the rainbow of colors, and I wanted cheap lights that would bring out the "wow" color's of my birds better, so I pony'd up a little extra money for the plant bulbs...

Keep in mind, that I purchased many different bulbs and placed the birds under them for a few mintues, and then ended up picking the plant grow bulbs because the looked the best under them.

Hope that helps someone!

[cooleydd]

Shadowfax

You might be surprised how much heat is made with fluorescent bulbs. I would suggest that you obtain a temperature gage (digital at Wallmart are cheap) and place it under the hood where the hood fits on the top of the cage. Once you have this temp you can place the gage at various levels to see what the effect is on the insides of a cage.

I have one cage with a 7 watt CFL on top of the cage with a metal clamp-on cover. If I place the gage under the hood the temp will climb toward 90 degrees but the cage bars never get hot to the touch. I do raise the temp a few degrees on the floor of the cage with this light. I try to keep the room around 70 degrees and the bottom of the cage will get up to 73 degrees. So there is heat generated.

This cage is in a otherwise dark room and I light it about the same times that you do. I would like to think the bird is happier but if it is I really can't tell and he isn't speaking!

But remember these birds have been raised in outdoor aviaries where temps vary from in the 20 degrees to 100 degrees - very successfully. The key is no drafts, keeping the floor dry and good food. With good pellets nothing much more is needed except clean (unfrozen) water.

[Shadowfax]

Wow thanks Collydd. I'll check that. I had noticed the bars did not get warm at all and thought that equaled no heat generated. I will certainly want to make sure they are not getting over heated. I watch them play during the day and they seem very happy so am guessing they are ok.

I know the Zebs an societies do well with cooler temps it is one reason I chose them. My house is kept at 60 during the winter months and at times gets down to 55. One reason I moved them for the winter was to make sure they are away from drafts.

Last winter I could not afford heating oil and I had no heat other than an electric space heater. The house got down to 39 a few times and the finches handled it just fine. Still taking their morning bath and everything.

Fortunately this year will be better. I got my oil last week so all will be more comfortable.