This Sleep Cage O.K.?

I have a 9 week old Pineapple Conure. He has a large cage for during the day. Has a playground attached to the side. The room he is in is a spare bedroom which is also my TV room. I realize that he needs 10-12 hours every night but the problem is that I also sleep there many nights, on a recliner, due to a back problem. Lights are out at 8:00p.m. but I do get up around 4:00a.m.

And sometimes I get insomnia and watch TV. So my thinking was to get him a sleep cage that I can put in another room. This would also be on a shelf in a closet (open doors). White noise would be from a PC in that room and it would be dark or maybe a night light if needed.
With this setup, he would be undisturbed for the 12 hours needed. I have looked at some cages and wanted opinions on these two.
One would be open bars and is 20x12x15. The other is the acrylic carrier which is 10x12x15. Some say that the acrylic is hard to clean...and these were people just using it as a travel carrier.

Any opnions? Thanks.

Do you hear him up when you're in the living room watching TV or moving around after the cage cover is on? If not, no reason for a sleep cage if you ask me.

My amazon would sleep through a hurricane so long as his cage cover is on. We don't exactly throw loud parties, but my hubby is usually up until 11/12/1 and I wake up at 4am. We're in a small condo (and before that, other very small spaces) and it's never disrupted him for there to be some noise and movement at night. The way I see it, the jungle is neither silent nor pitch black at night. I see no reason to make special accommodation for something they deal with out in nature just fine.

The acrylic seems a little small/claustrophobic for my taste, the first carrier would be more ideal. Many members here utilize sleeping cages this way and hopefully they will chime in. We don't use sleeping cages as my cockatiel's main cage is in the living room and I just cover it with a big heavy towel at night.

Those both seem a bit small. Maybe something a bit larger?

Something like this may offer more roombut at the same time may be easy to fit into a room/closet.

I have the second cage as a travel carrier for Ducky or Kermit (bar spacing is a bit too big for my budgies). The cage itzjbean suggested had 3/4” bar spacing, which I would consider too large for a GCC. I would suggest getting a parakeet cage like this one:
http://a.co/fRGYTfh

First cage has promise, particularly if used during normal evening sleep hours. As a day-cage for sleep/relaxation it might be a bit too small.

Kiwibird said:

Do you hear him up when you're in the living room watching TV or moving around after the cage cover is on? If not, no reason for a sleep cage if you ask me.

My amazon would sleep through a hurricane so long as his cage cover is on. We don't exactly throw loud parties, but my hubby is usually up until 11/12/1 and I wake up at 4am. We're in a small condo (and before that, other very small spaces) and it's never disrupted him for there to be some noise and movement at night. The way I see it, the jungle is neither silent nor pitch black at night. I see no reason to make special accommodation for something they deal with out in nature just fine.

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Yeah, Peanut's cage is in my son's room and she goes to bed at 9:00 pm and doesn't make a peep until 8-9 am. I put a sheet over her cage and she sleeps right through him watching TV or playing video games or whatever. It doesn't disrupt her at all, if it did she'd be calling out to me like she does when she wakes up in the morning.

Kiwibird said:

Do you hear him up when you're in the living room watching TV or moving around after the cage cover is on? If not, no reason for a sleep cage if you ask me.

We're in a small condo (and before that, other very small spaces) and it's never disrupted him for there to be some noise and movement at night. The way I see it, the jungle is neither silent nor pitch black at night. I see no reason to make special accommodation for something they deal with out in nature just fine.

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Right now, I only use a partial cover. The breeder told me that a cover is NOT recommended. Not sure if this was just his personal opinion? Right now it's 2:50a.m. and I was sleeping in the same room as him and heard him moving around. It just concerns me since EVERYONE says they need 10-12 uninterrupted (noiseless) sleep.
I am just worried since, if sleeping in the same room, I get up at around the 7 hour point and am sure to wake him.

FlyBirdiesFly said:

I have the second cage as a travel carrier for Ducky or Kermit (bar spacing is a bit too big for my budgies). The cage itzjbean suggested had 3/4” bar spacing, which I would consider too large for a GCC. I would suggest getting a parakeet cage like this one:
http://a.co/fRGYTfh

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Coincidentally I have that exact same cage. But thought it too large for a sleep cage. One other problem is the door is pretty small.

Not sure why your breeder said not to cover the cage (?), but I promise it's fine to fully cover the cage! I can definitely see a half covered cage being bad for sleep if you're up and have some lights on. I'd suggest buying a large fleece blanket online (black or very dark blue) as the cage cover. If you can sew, custom fit one (you can also order a custom fitted cover, though they are expensive). It'll block out most light but not so much it's pitch black in the cage. What they 'need' is 10-12 hours of uninterrupted darkness. Especially as sexually mature adults who's hormonal behaviors are triggered by the light of days getting longer in the spring. If a parrot has a bad nights sleep, they'll nap during the day to catch up.

P.S. It's 3:25am here. I'm up already and sitting about 4' from my birds cage. Not a peep, though I'm sure if he was half uncovered he'd be up and giving me the death stare for waking him up! I also sometimes watch a show, but I keep the volume pretty low this time of night and turn on the closed captioning! Kiwi does occasionally ruffle his feathers (especially when the heater kicks on, for some reason) or repositions himself or poops Just like us, parrots move a little in their sleep or wake up for a minute and move to a comfier position. Some individuals will poop during the night, which is completely normal (others hold it until morning, also completely normal). What you don't want to hear happening at night is eating, playing, vocalizing, climbing on the bars or any kind of constant activity. That means the bird is actually awake. Some light movement every so often is pretty normal though and not indicative of a bird being wide awake.

I'd say, if it makes you feel better to get a sleep cage theres no harm in it, but IMO it's completely unnecessary and just one more thing to keep clean.

Kiwibird said:

Not sure why your breeder said not to cover the cage (?), but I promise it's fine to fully cover the cage! I can definitely see a half covered cage being bad for sleep if you're up and have some lights on.
I'd say, if it makes you feel better to get a sleep cage theres no harm in it, but IMO it's completely unnecessary and just one more thing to keep clean.

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I think there reasoning for not covering completely was to eliminate 'night-frights'. They said to only cover 3 sides and leave the front open.

I had a Moluccan for a few years and we always covered his cage completely. Problem was he chewed a hole in the cover on the side of the cage so he could see where I was.

Ah. Does your bird suffer night frights then? If so, a sleep cage may not be a bad idea, but you'd still want him in a room with a night light or similar because night frights often cause birds to fall off their perch and they need some low lighting to be able to climb back up.

My dad's goffin cockatoo actually needs his cover replaced every few months because he chews big holes in it. Must be a cockatoo thing because none of the amazons I've been around have ever chewed their covers.