Chickens detect light not only through the retinal cone receptors in their eyes, but also via extra retinal photoreceptors in the Pineal gland and the Hypothalamic gland.
The response to light controls the circadian rhythm, a 24-hour cycle in the bird’s hormonal and behavioral aspects.
Humans are trichromatic and have retinal cones that can determine red, green and blue. Chickens are tetrachromatic, with an additional double cone whose function may be related to tracking movement.
In poultry, the red spectrum of light is vital for stimulating sexual maturity and egg production.
Birds exposed to this spectrum of red light versus blue, green or white light consistently have higher egg production than the other color groups.
Red spectrum light is able to penetrate the skull to stimulate the extra retinal photoreceptors.
Red spectrum light penetrates the skull and brain (hypothalamus) more efficiently than blue, green and yellow-orange light.
The hypothalamus is important in regulating the production of hormones especially for egg production.
The standard level of light for maximum production is between15 to16 hours.
The ChickenMaster PRO uses a feature called Daylight Length Requirement (DLR)
This feature uses your geographic location and calculates how much actual Daylight is occurring and then adds the use of Artificial Light to achieve the programmed Daylight Length Requirement.
This feature promotes the ultimate egg laying environment for your hens.
Laying hens should have lights with a sufficient red spectrum between 2700 to 3000 Kelvins.
LED Lights of around 10 Watts with a WARM colour spectrum are ideal.
Avoid using COOL LED lights with a spectrum of 5000 Kelvins.
The amount of LED Lights depend on the size of the area they are being used in, as a general rule a 10 meter long caravan/trailer would use a total of 60 Watts of lighting.
So three 10 watt WARM LED's per side, six in total.
FarmTronics 10 Watt LED Lights
100 Fox Drive,
Dandenong South. Victoria. 3175
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FarmTronics Australia ABN: 92 439 728 821