This is fascinating, Pip. Quick question. Are the chick's eyes affected even if they are under a white light by day and a red light by night? And will you please link your article here? This is all news to me. Thank you.The major difference beyond the quality of the equipment is that reptiles are not covered with highly flammable feathers that also produce awe-inspiring amounts of highly flammable dust as they grow, and they tend not to live in very dry brooders full of wood shavings or towels that also can be quite combustible. Reptiles also tend not to be as energetic as growing chicks, who love flying around their brooder like maniacs, colliding with anything in their path and spreading their dust as far and wide as they can. Brooder fires can easily be caused by a chick flying into the lamp and knocking it down or shattering the bulb and sending the hot shards from it down into their bedding, but they can also be caused by subtle things such as dust building up and combusting on the bulb, or the lamp simply being knocked aside so that it's up against a combustible surface like a wall or a cardboard edge of the brooder.
But I suspect the reason that person posted that is that, not too long before then, he had tried arguing with me about an article I wrote about alternative brooder heaters. I had mentioned how unhealthy heat lamps were as a reason to use those other heating methods, and he was not pleased to find that there actually is a lot of scientific data out there from decades of research about how unhealthy heat lamps are when very little if any data is available to say that they're perfectly fine and healthy for chicks. Rather like a petulant child, instead of acknowledging this and admitting he was wrong, he chose to ignore the science and later came here to make that post, clearly hoping to get a rise out of me or anyone else.
The fact of the matter is that, even if you're as careful as possible to prevent a fire, growing chicks simply should not be under continuous lighting for more than a few days at most. Continuous lighting impacts their vision for life because it changes how their eyes develop. Light stimulates glands in the brain to secrete hormones that cause the eye to grow, and this light is detected by birds whether their eyes are open or closed, so them sleeping through the continuous lighting is not enough to prevent this from happening. Without any break from that light, chicks' eyes are not receiving the rest period necessary for healthy eye development, and end up with various conditions such as near- or farsightedness, a condition called 'slant eye' from the eye growing too large too fast and becoming oversized for the socket, or, the most notable one from what I've researched, light-induced avian glaucoma. Now, many thousands of chicks are still reared under heat lamps and go on to live more or less normal lives, I will not disagree with that. But as a prey species that relies primarily on sight, it just stands to reason that you would not want to start them off by damaging their vision right from the beginning. At least, it would to my mind.
Anyway, long story short, the only myth in the post you quoted was the implication that heat lamps are perfectly healthy and safe for chicks when they are very clearly not.
Thanks so much for the clarifications & explanations! Definitely reptiles aren't as flammable! I used ceramic heat bulbs for darkness at night since everyone deserves some darkness so I hadn't considered using visible light all night. I'm using a heat plate for chicks so mine will be safeThe major difference beyond the quality of the equipment is that reptiles are not covered with highly flammable feathers that also produce awe-inspiring amounts of highly flammable dust as they grow, and they tend not to live in very dry brooders full of wood shavings or towels that also can be quite combustible. Reptiles also tend not to be as energetic as growing chicks, who love flying around their brooder like maniacs, colliding with anything in their path and spreading their dust as far and wide as they can. Brooder fires can easily be caused by a chick flying into the lamp and knocking it down or shattering the bulb and sending the hot shards from it down into their bedding, but they can also be caused by subtle things such as dust building up and combusting on the bulb, or the lamp simply being knocked aside so that it's up against a combustible surface like a wall or a cardboard edge of the brooder.
But I suspect the reason that person posted that is that, not too long before then, he had tried arguing with me about an article I wrote about alternative brooder heaters. I had mentioned how unhealthy heat lamps were as a reason to use those other heating methods, and he was not pleased to find that there actually is a lot of scientific data out there from decades of research about how unhealthy heat lamps are when very little if any data is available to say that they're perfectly fine and healthy for chicks. Rather like a petulant child, instead of acknowledging this and admitting he was wrong, he chose to ignore the science and later came here to make that post, clearly hoping to get a rise out of me or anyone else.
The fact of the matter is that, even if you're as careful as possible to prevent a fire, growing chicks simply should not be under continuous lighting for more than a few days at most. Continuous lighting impacts their vision for life because it changes how their eyes develop. Light stimulates glands in the brain to secrete hormones that cause the eye to grow, and this light is detected by birds whether their eyes are open or closed, so them sleeping through the continuous lighting is not enough to prevent this from happening. Without any break from that light, chicks' eyes are not receiving the rest period necessary for healthy eye development, and end up with various conditions such as near- or farsightedness, a condition called 'slant eye' from the eye growing too large too fast and becoming oversized for the socket, or, the most notable one from what I've researched, light-induced avian glaucoma. Now, many thousands of chicks are still reared under heat lamps and go on to live more or less normal lives, I will not disagree with that. But as a prey species that relies primarily on sight, it just stands to reason that you would not want to start them off by damaging their vision right from the beginning. At least, it would to my mind.
Anyway, long story short, the only myth in the post you quoted was the implication that heat lamps are perfectly healthy and safe for chicks when they are very clearly not.
