LIGHTS ON OR OFF

Just wondering do you all put lights on when breeding and if so what time do they come on and off?

Never used lights at all

But do know of fanciers using lights for a few hour just so the youngsters on the nest are fed

well I have always thought, when they are in the nest from 6pm till 6 next morning 12 hours they are not fed. With lights on till 10 at night they will be fed at least till then and not go all night.

Martyn that is a good point of veiw and yes as long as the lights are on then the youngbirds can get feed

hi martyn, never bothered with lights apart from if its dark when i get home......i know ken used lights before pairing up to make the birds think it was spring so they would be keener to pair up, think it was something like this but im sure he will say if im wrong.....

I willo agree with you david about lights being used to bring the birds on for pairing

well I got to say its something I only thought about last year. Before then I had no lights. But I got to thinking if it gets dark at 6 pm which it does now and you have large babies in the nest you know who hungry they get. When the old birds feed they feed the babies, so a feed at 9.30 pm see,s them til the morning other wise as I said its 12 hours without food. You wouldnt let them do that in the day time, supose you feed them when you go to work at 8.00 am, that means no more food until 8pm that night..who would do that? any thoughts?

yes don, seems to have done the trick for ken.....all paired up easily and down on eggs well within 10 days i think.....

forgot to say my lights are on from 4 pm, and go off at 8.pm and I have no eggs hatched yet, so in 9 days when they hatch they will be used to the lights on. I do believe however that when they are on milk they get fed right through the night. the yougsters at that age say 1 week dont know day from night so get it all the time, but when they switch over to solids if the old birds havent got the food in the crop then feeding stops. I even leave the lights on til 10pm when the babies are 2 weeks on.

maybe thats why mine went down at 8 days old birds and 14 days yearlings no bother at all, could be the lights.

Martyn have you heard of the light system were the lights are on 23 hours??

This system is used for the youngbird instead of the darkness system

martyn, ive noticed its coming a bit lighter on an evening now and instead of being dark at 4 oclock its just after 5 oclock here, so when i have ybs in the nest ill feed in the morning and then again at around 4 0clock .........i give them a full pot of corn so they will have food left over night and can feed the ybs early in the morning before i get down to them, altho they do usually have food infront of them most of the day as i dont like to hear ybs squeeking because they are hungry......

There was a video produced on John Mcgee who used the light system on his youngbirds

birds store food in crop hen sitting on young can feed after dark

no lights here as well,tried the light system with the yb,s but seen no differance

no dont use lights here either

never used lights but now stock birds are down home, will be putting heater in loft to take nip out of air

Steve you going to use the tubular electric wall heater

yes Don stops water freezing and keeps hands warm

yes if only we had electric at allottments life would be so much easier

ray built a 2nd home on allotments, wife would never see me if i had same set up

tell you what if i could live there i would believe me,thats why i go home no electric there

thought you had electric ray for tv and microwave