Knowing where and how to obtain wildlife lighting products is often difficult for coastal homeowners and property managers. While members of the lighting industry are developing new products each year to meet wildlife lighting criteria, most wildlife lighting products are sold through specialized lighting distributors and are not readily available in common home improvement and retail stores due to existing contractual agreements with lighting agencies.
To help bridge this gap, Sea Turtle Conservancy (STC) is working to connect home improvement and retail stores that are interested in selling wildlife lighting products with manufacturers capable of selling wildlife lighting products directly to local stores to give coastal homeowners easier access to approved fixtures and bulbs. Stores that carry approved product are provided a professional display to help educate customers about wildlife lighting solutions. The home improvement store initiative aims to bring a broad awareness of the benefits of wildlife lighting to coastal communities while making product more accessible.
If you do not have a nearby home improvement store that carries wildlife lighting, need specialized fixtures or bulbs, or require larger product quantities, you can source wildlife lighting products by following the steps below.
Select Lighting
Locate a Distributor
Purchase Lighting
Install Your Lighting
If you represent a coastal home improvement or retail store or are a resident who is interested in your local store carrying wildlife lighting products, please contact Julia White at julia@conserveturtles.org.
STC offers a professional display to participating home improvement stores which is available in two sizes. Participating stores will also be listed on our public map, which is great resource for the public to browse when trying to locate a store that carries wildlife lighting in their area.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) conducts rigorous testing of fixtures and bulbs and certifies them as wildlife lighting. Once a product is certified, FWC includes it on its Certified Wildlife Lighting Website, which is broken up by application. This guide is a great place to start when looking for wildlife lighting.
Additional products outside of FWC’s list may also meet the criteria for wildlife lighting. These criteria include: Keep it low, Keep it shielded, and Keep it long (wavelength). Keeping fixtures low to the ground ensures that a light will illuminate the area for its intended application – often for safety purposes. Shielding fixtures ensures that the light source will not be visible from the beach and will direct light downward. Utilizing long wavelength light at 560 nanometers or longer, which appears amber or red, will prevent sea turtle disorientations and protect human health. The wavelength output of a wildlife luminaire can often be found on the product’s specification sheet.
Not many home improvement stores currently carry wildlife fixtures and bulbs. However, if enough customers request that they carry wildlife lighting, it is possible that your local home improvement store may begin to stock product if enough demand is demonstrated. In the meantime, another avenue for purchasing wildlife lighting is through a lighting distributor in your area. Below is a list of distributors STC has worked with in the past. This is by no means an exhaustive list. Distributors are listed alphabetically.
- Border States (formerly Sequel Electrical Supply) – Northwest Florida and Alabama
- Lighting by Lavonne – Panama City, Florida
- Mathes Electric – Northwest Florida
- Mayer Electric – Central Florida
- Rexel USA – Southwest Florida
- The Lighting Gallery Inc. – Spring Hill, Florida
- Synergy Lighting – Southwest Florida (ships internationally)
- United Lighting and Supply – Fort Walton Beach, Florida
- World Electric (formerly Frontier) – Southeastern United States (ships internationally)
Turtle & Hughes is a lighting distributor and a Tour de Turtles partner. Check out their website below to view and order select wildlife bulbs online. Please ensure the product you are ordering is the correct wavelength.
