- Jun 15, 2008
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I don't know..... do you sleep better with a light on, and how do you know a light is on if you are sleeping? My guess is that the girls don't either.
Actually whether your eyes are open or closed the pituitary gland senses the light and releases different hormones based on day or night. That's why you get tired when it's bed time. Your brain knows it's dark and lessens serotonin while increasing melatonin. The reverse happens when your eyes are exposed to light. Some people are more sensitive than others and so less light will be required to make their sleep less productive or wake them up. The general rule when altering an animal's schedule is to provide enough light to comfortable read a newspaper by. That will cause their brain to register it as being day.
The narrower the spectrum of light the less the brain interprets it. Light at the extremes of the spectrum like red and blue have the least impact so should be the least likely to interrupt the sleep cycle and most likely to make the brain think it's night. Therefore it will produce the chemicals or hormones for sleep instead of for being awake and active. The broader the spectrum of light (called full spectrum or daylight spectrum) the less it takes to have an effect.
I suffer from extreme insomnia so light and day/night cycles are something I'm very familiar with. I also ran some filterless fully planted fish tanks that were basically mini ecosystems as well as a saltwater nano and mimicking the effects of the sun was very important.
If you buy a lamp especially for it they come with tons of warnings about staying under blacklights for too long. You can get the equivalent of a sunburn. I'm not sure the cheap incandescent version has the same risks but I would not use one around animals. It caused the death of many fish when people bought those glofish in stores that reacted under blacklights and then left lights on for extended periods of time. They'd show up on the fish forum I frequented asking why their fish were sick or dying.
Actually whether your eyes are open or closed the pituitary gland senses the light and releases different hormones based on day or night. That's why you get tired when it's bed time. Your brain knows it's dark and lessens serotonin while increasing melatonin. The reverse happens when your eyes are exposed to light. Some people are more sensitive than others and so less light will be required to make their sleep less productive or wake them up. The general rule when altering an animal's schedule is to provide enough light to comfortable read a newspaper by. That will cause their brain to register it as being day.
The narrower the spectrum of light the less the brain interprets it. Light at the extremes of the spectrum like red and blue have the least impact so should be the least likely to interrupt the sleep cycle and most likely to make the brain think it's night. Therefore it will produce the chemicals or hormones for sleep instead of for being awake and active. The broader the spectrum of light (called full spectrum or daylight spectrum) the less it takes to have an effect.
I suffer from extreme insomnia so light and day/night cycles are something I'm very familiar with. I also ran some filterless fully planted fish tanks that were basically mini ecosystems as well as a saltwater nano and mimicking the effects of the sun was very important.
If you buy a lamp especially for it they come with tons of warnings about staying under blacklights for too long. You can get the equivalent of a sunburn. I'm not sure the cheap incandescent version has the same risks but I would not use one around animals. It caused the death of many fish when people bought those glofish in stores that reacted under blacklights and then left lights on for extended periods of time. They'd show up on the fish forum I frequented asking why their fish were sick or dying.
