Artificial Lighting Question

I'm wondering if anybody here has some solid information as to whether or not the light from red heat lamps would have an influence on hens laying in winter? I do not want to artificially stimulate egg laying in my hens anymore because I want to work on natural winter egg laying in the flock but I do want to provide a tiny bit of supplemental heating on those -30C nights we get sometimes, and a few heat lamps would be easiest.

I was recently flipping through Genetics of the Fowl, and Hutt suggested that red light does influence laying, but didn't specify on intensity or anything.

I am exactly where you are. I want to add a little heat, but not push the girls to lay when nature says they should be taking a break.

I do run a red heat lamp all winter, but I hang it low to the ground. It is not overhead at ceiling height, but maybe 3 feet off the ground. This provides some heat without direct glare in their eyes, since they mostly roost above that height. I also do not hang it directly above the roost, don't want to roast anyone unexpectedly. IT's off to the side a little and low. That's the happy medium I strive for to add heat without a blast of direct light.

They lay through the winter, but at a reduced rate. That's fine with me.

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I have always wondered about this too. I have heard you can get a bit of increased feather picking with the red heat lamps so they much impact them to some extent.

I say a gazebo heater in Costco that could be hung from the ceiling of a gazebo or covered area. I made a mental note to have a closer look at them and didn't see them last time I was there. I should make more of an effort, they are probably just moved. It was a bit expensive, but no bulbs to replace and I would expect the chance of fire to be less as well.

I don't usually heat through the winter but I am thinking about it this year in one coop that will have a single combed breed in it. I am interested to hear others thoughts about the red lights.

coopslave wrote:I have always wondered about this too. I have heard you can get a bit of increased feather picking with the red heat lamps so they much impact them to some extent.

Under red light everthing looks red. I think the red light "camoflages" the bloody area that chickens love to pick.

Lights is a very interesting on how it affect everything. There has been studies done with different types of lighting with animals and children in schools. We did studies with the affect of different types of lights with Air Traffic Controllers. The best light of course is natural sunlight. If you want animals and people to not lose any quantity of life you must reproduce sunlight which is known as full spectrum light. Many normal florescent lighting do not come close to this. If you use florescent lights as a source of light for your reproduction you must buy the full spectrum light; the normal cool white and soft white will not work. Your fertility and egg production will be low. In egg production place they use mercury vapor type of light that has a full spectrum rating.

So, will red lights affect egg production? Answer is yes, it affect it in a negative way. It will not produce proper lighting to stimulate egg production. Sue is correct the it will make everything look red so that is to prevent them from picking at each other.

If you want an eye opener to know how cheap cool white or soft white florescent affect students in their study's and behavior, it is amazing. Most class rooms have natural sunlight coming in through the windows which is a must. The Edmonton Journal did a big study on this years years ago.

What about hanging a ceramic heater? I thought I read about someone doing that for extra heat. I used a 100 watt bulb on a timer last year. I dont think it gave off much heat but too the edge off in our really cold snap. I timed it so it came on when it was the coldest part of the night, 4am it was on again until 8 pm I think so it mimicked a 14 hour day. Seemed to work. I had a small amount of frost bite but it was probably because they were outside ( except for the snap I locked them in). keep in mind we dont get quite as cold as you!

Most incandescent bulbs are full Spectrum so they will stimulate egg production. Ceramic heaters would be alright.

i use oil filled ceramic heaters, they are safe, birtds cat sit on top of them, knock them over they wont start a fire, hubby put them on a thermostat so they are not running unless the coop drops below zero i keep the coop at +2, i just dont like to have frozen water, combs, my coops insulated well as well. but i realy like them , they are cheap/ safe and cheaper to run that heat lamp i think! esp on a thermostat.

I have also used a small heater, don't know if it's a ceramic heater, don't think so. Just one of those 1500 watt little black boxes from Canadian Tire.

It cycles on or off, but over time it puts a bite in the hydro bill! It's like running a blowdryer most of the time for weeks on end.

With the heater, which we hang from some very sturdy wire, I worry about fire. It sucks in A LOT of dust and has coils inside that get red hot....seems to me a risky thing to do. Every day I blow it out, but it really needs an air compressor to get it really cleaned out. I have visions of one, red hot dust lump drifting down to the cedar shavings on the floor. Yikes!

Despite 24/7 red heat lamp AND a heater, still get frozen combs on my Australorp roos (never a hen). My theory is that as they eat out of the metal feeders and their combs brush that freezing steel, it makes frostbite worse. Plus they tend to hang outdoos, crowing and carrying on, and freezing their heads as they do!

The best thing I could have done, and didn't do, to keep my birds warm was insulate the floor....but didn't. Hen house is up on skids and despite shavings, cold creep up. Good thing they roost and don't sleep on the floor!

I really worry about those little black box heaters - we used them during winter construction and they do suck in dust and shavings like crazy - and get really really hot. I never have them on when I'm not there.

I have a really well insulated coop but let my chickens out every day, however cold. At least I open the pop door and all the chickens pour out for at least a few hours.

Some winters I've put a red light on a timer, or on one of those thermocubes, but last winter I don't think I used one at all. Most of the time I get a decent supply of eggs daily but don't sell many in winter so am happy for the reduced amount.

I had such trouble with combs that I gave up on them - try to keep to minimally combed breeds, made for the cold.

I've given up on combs too, so I'm not worried in that respect. I was only going to have two heat lamps per pen this year, one for the water dish and one to hang near the laying boxes to slow down the freezing (we do still have a pretty huge demand for eggs all winter so it's nice to have unfrozen eggs to sell).

I could probably put the ones in front of the nest boxes on a timer and never mind the watered one. Do you really figure only having water once or twice a day doesn't impact their laying?

With the move to the new farm, I decided to go with open front coops, (except for Anna's pet bantams) hence pea comb genetics only and wanting to go lower tech overall. Maybe I'm asking for too much to have good winter production in a mostly unheated system, but that's part of the reason we've settled on chantecler and Brahmas, known for egg production in winter before heated coops and lighting schedules were common.

I wonder about water and egg production too - chickens are put away at night - they learn to go through the pop door when the dog shows up - I close and lock the pop door for the night. There is no water in the chicken house, only outside, all year round, partly due to humidity issues inside but also because it gets spilled and/or mucky in the house. In the morning I knock the ice out of the rubber tubs outside and fill them with new water open the pop door and the chickens all rush out for a drink. When there is lots of snow many of them prefer snow to water. If it is really cold I will refresh the water after lunch time too. Egg production doesn't seem to suffer from the hens not having water all night in summer, but I haven't given them any alternative.

Having tried a variety of things I'm going low tech and minimal work, and just accept the consequences if that means fewer eggs.

I was in Canadian tire to buy red bulbs today. Expensive! So I bought cheap 100 watt bulbs and a can of red spray paint. I will let you know how it turns out.

You might want to check out Princess Auto for heat lamps.
http://www.princessauto.com/pal/category/1200-380-120-105-125/Heat-Lamps-%26-Bulbs
Their price is $7.99 for a red lamp and you can buy one at a time instead of a pair. I used a space heater for a period of time last winter, but if I can clean out the dust in the fan motor I'll use it in a safer location this winter.

I have one of these:

http://www.leevalley.com/en/wood/page.aspx?p=44590&cat=1,43456,43465,44590

It rocks!

Schipperkesue wrote:I was in Canadian tire to buy red bulbs today. Expensive! So I bought cheap 100 watt bulbs and a can of red spray paint. I will let you know how it turns out.

Sounds like something that would burn out or explode...paint is opaque.

A thin coat is translucent. Those little red bulbs you can purchase are basically a coat of paint on a regular bulb. Besides, I don't want light, I want heat. Don't worry, I will test it out first.

The paint does come off I find, the best are the red glass ones,
I have had good luck buying those 75 or 100 watt colored floodlights, i use red and yellow ones and soemtimes clear ones at a sale where I want the chicks to look their proper colors.
They are a lot cheaper than heat lamp bulbs but maybe ot as durable.

Don't say that! I find they aren't very durable. I've moved to the halogen ones - two heat levels and they seem to last a very long time.

I read somewhere where a blue light will not affect egg production. I will go through my site info and try to find a link.

I use submersible water de-icers like this one. I think our local feed store has them for forty-some dollars.



Berry Hill also has a variety of options.

http://www.berryhill.ca/SearchResults.asp?Cat=1911

Light is light so it well affect the laying. Blue light is the closet to real sunlight we can get (if i remeber, it's been a few years senice i looked at light spectrums and their effects)

Schipperkesue wrote:I was in Canadian tire to buy red bulbs today. Expensive! So I bought cheap 100 watt bulbs and a can of red spray paint. I will let you know how it turns out.

sue we buy ours at princess auto as they are cheaper there
Canadian tire here they are 12.99 I think and at Princess Auto they are 7.99
they have clear and red also check the boxes as they have been switched but they exchange them. Also they always seem to have them in the back if there are non on the shelf just ask and they seem to always find them

coopslave wrote:I have always wondered about this too. I have heard you can get a bit of increased feather picking with the red heat lamps so they much impact them to some extent.

I say a gazebo heater in Costco that could be hung from the ceiling of a gazebo or covered area. I made a mental note to have a closer look at them and didn't see them last time I was there. I should make more of an effort, they are probably just moved. It was a bit expensive, but no bulbs to replace and I would expect the chance of fire to be less as well.

I don't usually heat through the winter but I am thinking about it this year in one coop that will have a single combed breed in it. I am interested to hear others thoughts about the red lights.

I used red lamps every winter especially in SK, I've never had a feather picking problem. The red lamp is supposed to prevent picking.