Ask Lafeber

Acrylic cage ventilation

I know the general opinion against acrylic cages and I share it but still trying to think of ideas to make it work in the interest of allergies. So here’s addressing some issues with them.

1- Lack of climbing exercise -what if I put acrylic panels over a regular cage (which I intend to build) with lots of bars to climb?
2- Lack of ventilation- In addition to holes, what if I have an extractor fan over the cage venting through my room vent into the outside (or a HEPA filter). For 2-4 air changes an hour (as recommended for bedrooms and should be ok for a pair of budgies), the flow rate for my cage size works out to 1-2 litres per minute (compared to~15 in a bathroom). Only experimentation will tell but shouldn’t create a draft (and how much draft can budgies take?)

General cage questions: how to make bars (rather than mesh?). Wood is obviously an easier DIY material to work with than steel but could I possibly work with plastic bars in the interest of lightness? Want to build a large cage (ideally 6x3x3 ft h).

Hi,

If you have allergies, you should probably not get birds. What you are describing is unrealistic and not in the best interest of the birds. Surrounding a cage with acrylic will only encourage bacteria, mold and mildew to grow. It will be impossible to keep clean. I can’t comment on your filtration plan because I have no idea if it would work. But I know the acrylic will cause sound to bounce back to the birds and will likely cause them to be stressed and unhappy. I can’t imagine a homemade cage surrounded by acrylic being a good environment for any pet bird. You need to consider what their experience would be and realize that this is not the pet for you. Bird shed a lot of dander every single day. There is a reason why acrylic cages are not recommended by any reputable bird expert. As for the cage bars, you can’t use wood because they will chew it up, and the same with plastic. Metals can have lead or nickel and can cause heavy metal poisoning if you use the wrong type. Any type of welding you would use would also be lead most likely, and would poison them. Any type of mesh also tends to have exposed lead welds. There are some that are galvanized after welding, but once you cover it with acrylic, it will end up staying moist and will end up rusting or degrading. To answer your question about horizontal or vertical bars, a good bird cage will have both in order to provide different kinds of climbing. Budgies and other parrots chew on everything! They will chew on welds or anything you try to use to hold the cage together. Even budgies have very powerful beaks.

Thank you for asking Lafeber,

Brenda