Senegal at Home Alone While I'm at Work

[Wolf]

I think that as long as she is also exposed to the twilight that occurs at dusk in the evening that this could do fine for you. The wavelengths of light at this time are the ones that set her biological clock and are the most important.

[Macayla]

Yes, she will be. I will never make her go sleep before the sun has set completely. But I will do more research on this and find the best routine and sleep/awake schedule for her. Thank you for all your help.

[Pajarita]

OK, just a couple of comments. What you have read about the 12 hours awake and 12 hours of sleep is what's call the 12L/12D schedule and this was a huge improvement over the human light schedule we had them on before but tropical and semi-tropical birds breed on this schedule (they switched to food availability as their main trigger) so, although it helps a lot with amount of sleep which is important, it doesn't help at all with the sexual hormone problem.

And you don't have to make her go to sleep before sunset, just wait for her to fall asleep naturally. When you turn off the artificial lights when the sun is halfway down in the sky, you will be exposing her to the different spectrum that happens at dusk and, by the time night falls completely, she will be fast asleep on her own.

And, yes, keeping parrots at a solar schedule is almost impossible for people who work full time and why parrots are not good pets for everybody. I used to work full time and what I used to do is clean the birdroom and put out fresh food in the morning in the dark (I used night goggles so I could see) but the birds did not like it and neither did I because although my birds did not really need my company because they had each other, I couldn't check on their physical condition twice a day as everybody should.

Wolf, I've seen your comment about dusk been more important than dawn several times, do you have a link for this info? Because it seems to me that both need to be equally important as you need a beginning and an end in order to determine the number of hours in between the two (like a stop watch, no?).

[Wolf]

Actually I did and maybe still do. I am using a new computer and still switching things over from one to the other. Either way I will find it for you.

[Wolf]

Apparently , I didn't make a copy of it when I read it as I don't find it on my other computer. When I first started all of this I wasn't thinking of needing to verify things like it as I didn't realize at the time that I would be answering any questions. As a result I will refrain from saying it until I find it and can post it. I don't want to give incorrect information.

[Macayla]

This is the topic that is stressing me out the most. I have never heard about it until I joined this forum. It also confuses me.. My grandmother has a Budgie and a green Ringneck, they are kept on her under-cover patio (fully gated on one side so they get perfect natural lighting) - they probably wake up at sunrise as the light will obviously come through but I have noticed that they don't particularly go to sleep at sunset, sometimes they will be awake at night time. Yet they are getting the perfect natural light cycle. So it just doesn't make sense to me that my parrot shouldn't be awake at night? Although, she has started going to sleep earlier, she wakes up between 7-7:30 (she usually lets us know if she's awake before we've opened up her blanket. Then she goes to sleep just before 8pm. Sunset is around 7ish I think, I should actually take note tonight.

Should I rather open up her blanket a bit at 6am when the sun starts to rise and then leave her to wake up from the light coming in or sleep further? Would this help?

& then at night, when the sun starts to set, should I switch off all the lights and open the curtains completely for her to be properly exposed to that? I do leave her by the window during the day in natural light with all house lights off for the entire day, and when the weather permits it (only when I am home obviously) I put her outside to get some sun and fresh air. I do this in the afternoons and more on weekends as I'm home all day then (don't worry, I keep one half of the cage in the sun and the other half in shade, so she can choose where she wants to be), then most of the time I'll be sitting outside with her or I'll watch her from the window, depending what I'm doing. I am completely paranoid so I never let her out of my sight.

[Wolf]

Well, my birds are by windows and wake on their own shortly after dawn and go to sleep pretty close to full dark. During the remainder of the day it really doesn't matter if the light is either natural or artificial as it doesn't increase or decrease the length of the day or night. It is perfectly normal for birds to wake up off and on during the night, but they usually just look around and listen to the sounds and if all is good they go right back to sleep.
Let them wake up to natural light in the mornings and go to sleep under natural light in the evenings. This means no artificial lights for them after dark as this is what makes their body think that the days are longer than they are.

[Macayla]

The thing is, she won't just go to sleep out of her own. I have to cover her cage with a blanket in order for her to go sleep, otherwise she will stay up and do acrobats and just be silly in her cage to get our attention, no matter how tired she may be, she'll do that all night if we allow it. I can even leave her blanket half open and go to gym for an hour then when I get back, she's awake and excited and wants to come out. So I don't know how that's going to work.. I usually let her relax on my shoulder and when I see her getting sleepy then I put her back into her cage and cover it, then she goes straight to sleep.

[Pajarita]

What's going on is that there is light and noise and that's keeping her awake (I had that same problem with my tiels when I first moved back to the city -there is always light in the city). Also, go to your grandmother's patio at night and see if there is any light whatsoever aside from the moon and stars because birds are so sensitive to it that the merest sliver of light keeps them up and messes up their endocrine system. Mind you, this is not something we came up with, it's a scientific fact (research avian or birds photoperiodism and you will see). The reason why you hardly ever see it in other birdsites is that people don't do enough research, they just look or ask questions in birdsites and the answers they get are, usually, from people who don't do any research themselves and are just repeating what they have seen written in other birdsites.

[Wolf]

I don't have near as big of a problem with light at night as I live in a rural area and then live further out of town. The surrounding mtns. in my area help to keep the lights from town reaching to where we live, but the night is not as dark as it used to be.