Full spectrum lighting for your pet canary

In the wild flora and fauna of the Canary Islands, canary birds get all of their natural lighting needs from the sun.

Birds use the sun’s energy to produce vitamin D. Domestic canaries that live inside are not afforded that same opportunity. Household lamps and light form windows does not count as full spectrum lighting. Therefore full spectrum lighting cage lamps are a must for your pet canary. Once you’ve chosen your full spectrum lighting, the lights should be set on a schedule, unless you are home all day and all of the time. The amount of lighting a canary bird needs will depend on the season of the year.  Birds in the wild get more or less sunlight depending on the season. In the middle of the summer, in the Canary Islands, they would receive 14 – 15 hours of light, while in the winter they would receive 9 – 10. Timers should therefore be adjusted accordingly.

To keep things simple, you can follow the sunrise and sunset schedule of your geographic location. If you live in an area with frequent storms or power outages, manual timers would be preferred to electronic timers as they tend to reset back to their factory settings after a power outage. Canaries should also be covered at night with a light blanket. If your work or life schedule doesn’t permit you to cover and uncover your canaries at sunrise and sunset, then you can adjust this to fit your own personal schedule. For example, if you get up at 10 AM and sunrise is at 7 AM then you can uncover them at 10 AM and then cover them 3 hours after sunset. Full spectrum lighting doesn’t have to be on the whole time the cage is uncovered, but should be the majority of the time. Full spectrum lighting being turned on two hours after the cage is uncovered and two hours before the birds are covered would be acceptable.

The HappyBird Lighting Bird Cage Light with Chew Guard is a good option to start with as it is LED and would fit most flight cages.