Thought y'all would be interested in the following info. - from Philips Lighting Company (which I am presenting to you in Bold print).

I had sent them an e-mail awhile back (few paragraphs long) trying to get them to explain to me why I should continue using their F32T8TL950 linear fluorescent Full Spectrum Lighting tubes for my indoor flock members.

I also mentioned to them Mr. Thrush's new tubes - being introduced & sold at Welcome to the Frontpage and linked them some info. from his site. I told them that I was considering purchasing his over theirs, unless they could tell me why theirs was better for my avian use.

They finally responded today with this:

"Philips Lighting answer:
Thank you for contacting Philips Lighting. We have do not test nor promote the general purpose lighting tube f32t8/tl950 for your application. Please contact your veterinary professional for their recommendation."


So I say to y'all: Go figure. .......


Note: I also still haven't personally heard from Patrick Thrush, (in simple laymens terms) after addressing him personally in a post here on this Board, why exactly his tubes are better than the Philips tubes and why specifically they are so very much more expensive.

Prolly what I may wind up doing is to just purchase 2 of his new tubes (as expensive as they are) and mount them over a pair or more birds in one indoor flight and then mount a fresh new set of 2 Philips tubes over another same sized flight with other same species birds (in the same room right next to each other) and see if I notice any differences in the two set-ups regarding health, behavior, vigor, happiness, etc. of both groups of birds.

Hmm, anxious to see how your experiment turns out.
I still have not replaced my lighting after our remodel.
Birds get lots of outside time but I still need new lighting.

lol nice response

i really would like to hear about your experiences, though. i am so stuck as to what to do with lighting for ivy. i understand that floor lamps are no good and that it's optimum to have a lighting hanging above the cage from the ceiling. however, her new cage is so big that it will come pretty close to the ceiling and i don't want her to be able to mess with the lights and hurt herself. do you have any suggestions?

We just put 6 recessed lights in the bird room. We used 6 GE 65 watt Reveal light bulbs. They have a blue cast but the colors in the room really pop now. Alex never looked so pink! All of the toys are so bright. It almost looks fluorescent. The electrician said this type of light is almost UV.

Hmmm...I definitely want to hear about your experiment Joel, if you end up doing it. Somehow I doubt Philips knew their response would be shared with so many bird people- maybe they would have been a bit more helpful. I really like the looks of Thrush's lighting setup, but I'm not quite ready to make a switch. Basically for money reasons.

Actually Camille, Philips knew that I would be sharing their response with my fellow bird keepers on the Internet because I told them so. Still that is the response I received, word for word. All the words I put in bold lettering were theirs, improper grammar and all.

Obviously no quality control in their P.R. Dept. (IMO) = LOL.


Will let y'all know the results of my experiment but it may take a yr. or two before all the results are in - or maybe at least the time it takes the 4 tubes to become ineffective. Now I just have to get myself to give Thrush the high amount of $$ he wants for two tubes. I normally wouldn't mind spending any amount of $$ on possibly improving any aspect of my birds lives, however, I'm hesitant on giving any money anymore to any private business or any Foundation that does not care about responding to their customers legitimate concerns & communications.

Please don't mind me going a little off topic.
~J~ I am so very pleased to see your post, This has to be a good sign, maybe today will be a good day for me.
Thanks ~J~.

Arty

I was counting on it being a long experiment. With having to move yet again for grad school, and then after that move onto a job somewhere else, I'm not prepared to buy any more lighting yet. Your very long experiment and my wanting to know the results will be my reasoning for not making a lighting decision anytime in the near future!

I agree.
I miss you, you know!

This certainly is an interesting thread!

Joel, I presume that you are referring to this thread from December 07, 2007:

"Full Spectrum" Redux

That thread had absolutely nothing to do with my future offering of a product, rather a contribution to the general knowledge and discussion of the subject--you brought a specific product discussion into the mix. My answer to you was as follows:

" I will not tout my own product--or for that matter any other product that has not established itself in the generic market for at least 5 or more years. To do so would not be objective, would not constructively add to the conversation, and presents ethical problems. I will be happy to address your question about that in a thread on the "Products" or "For Sale" board. This thread is strictly for overall education on the subject."

You did not choose to go that route, or to contact me personally for any citations or references. The product announcement for the SpectraBird line did not appear until January 20, 2008 in this thread:

Avian Lighting Announcement

This would have been the appropriate venue to ask what makes SpectraBird different--yet you did not ask that question there. You state how expensive my tubes are--have you been to the site since it was in testing development back in December--before the announcement? I believe that the words "Coming Soon" "Under Development" and "Products not currently Available" were written in big red letters on every page.

The "real world" price has never been in the $50 range for a pair of tubes--and with the discount offered to members of this list bring the price to $35 and less for decreasing sizes per pair. These prices are well below offerings by Zoo Med, Vitalite, and certainly the compact fluorescents that are sold (improperly so) for avian use.

A failure to communicate? I do not haunt the bird forums or lists every day--or every week for that matter. Unless it is a particular thread that I have already contributed to and subscribed to notifications, I may not see a particular item for some time--if ever! My email address is publicly available to everyone on this list--as well as the PM feature which emails me whenever a new PM is sent. Listed on the SpectraBird site are telephone numbers, email addresses, and mailing address. If you were truly interested in answers, perhaps you should have called or emailed prior to bashing me in this thread that I was not even aware existed.

The information that you seek is explained in detail on the website and on the product information pages. I will also post a short version today in the product announcement thread. You are to be commended for following the recommendations that were made on the Birds & Lighting Website in choosing a solution for your fids.

Note though that the site has been frozen in time for nearly 7 years now--due to changing webhosts and losing access. It has truly surprised me that they have left it up all this time--especially since over 2.7 million visitors have been there in the past 10 years.

The site is now being updated, articles revised, products re-evaluated, and everything hosted on a new site that allows for growth. Some no longer exist, such as the Ott bioLight--others such as the low CRI (90-94) devices prevalent at the time are no longer considered acceptable due to improvement in the offerings of general full spectrum lamps. Yes, in 1999 I told everyone that the Philips TL950 was a valid choice. It still is, and other general lighting full spectrum tubes have entered the market during the intervening years as well.

But also in those 6 years I have been researching, building upon, and improving that platform to provide an avian specific lighting tube--which the TL and all other linear fluorescent full spectrum tubes are not. We are discussing progress in product development--hence things change over the years in the range of selection that one has access to.

It was even mentioned in the December post in response to you that Philips manufactures the base lamp assembly for us to our specifications--and additional features are added at our manufacturing facility in Kentucky. The SpectraBird is a vastly improved version of the TL950--specifically for bird vision and health.