What kind of light do you use for a pig pen?
Animal Biology
Pigs require the proper amount of light so they can recognize one another, interact, and perceive components of the enclosure like feeders. There is strong evidence indicating that pigs' eyes may be better suited to low levels of natural light than highly intense light. When choosing how to light your indoor or outdoor pig units, having this information is essential.
Although pigs need sunlight to synthesize vitamin D3, a vitamin D deficit is not thought to be a concern in the production of pigs since vitamin D2 is present in well-balanced pig diets.
Commercial lighting is unlikely to be at a level that pigs find unpleasant, although spotlights and other high intensity illumination should be avoided. Pigs like to sleep in low light or complete darkness, thus it makes sense that reclining portions of the enclosure shouldn't have strong lighting to encourage resting behavior.
Seeing colors and being sensitive to flicker
There is evidence that pigs see colors less accurately than people do, and that they are less sensitive to the red end of the spectrum. The impact of colored lighting on pig productivity is not well studied. Pigs react as if it is night when red light has been utilized.
Pigs' flicker sensitivity is still not well understood, however it seems doubtful that they can detect flicker from fluorescent lights that are operating properly. (Tubes that are malfunctioning and flicker may be seen by humans should be taken out.)
Productivity and Seasonality
Seasonal factors may have an impact on a pig's reproductive performance, with summer months seeing lower reproduction for mostly temperature-related reasons.
The success and behavior of reproduction in pig units may be impacted by day-length control. However, sire line qualities have a far greater influence on this topic than illumination, which is merely a small factor.
Other significant results of seasonality include:
Piglet suckling rises as day duration (15–18 hours) increases.
Growers and finishers eat more as the days become longer.
The effects of 24-hour lighting on stress levels and disruptive behavior on productivity (especially in young pigs).
Welfare
Pigs' stress levels might rise under 24-hour lighting. Additionally, excessive brightness might cause weight loss and eye injury. Aside from these problems, lighting elements normally have very little impact on pig behavior, and they are fairly tolerant of and adaptive to artificial illumination regimes.
Legislation
In facilities without natural light, Defra now mandates that pigs have access to at least 40 lux of supplementary lighting for a minimum of eight hours each day. According to the original study on which this was based, pigs can detect objects, visual cues, and discriminate between day and night in environments with light levels between 40 and 80 lux. More subsequent research, however, did not entirely support this since it was noted that the kind of light source-fluorescent or incandescent-will also influence how vividly the pig perceives their surroundings. Using the same lux level, fluorescent lighting seems to be roughly twice as bright as incandescent lighting.
Conclusion
There isn't much study on the impact of lighting, and what there isn't doesn't provide enough data to draw reliable conclusions. It would be helpful to know more about the seasonality of pigs, particularly in light of the energy waste or unfavorable conditions caused by excessive or insufficient illumination.
