Red light...green light?

Whichever color they are not used to. That about sums it up. I have great luck with a regular light/headlamp at night. Im ratting right now on a farm with pest. Just shot a rabbit at about 30 yards and 3 rats so far but they keep falling between the walls. I guess their buddies will have em for lunch. Just make sure you turn the light down real low.....just enough to get their eyeshine. A 30mm tube quality scope is definitely the way to go for light gathering. I use a 6-24X sf airmax and just leave it at 6 power with the crosshairs illuminated on lowest setting. I really want a nightsite setup tho.

I think I have always seen people use Red Light but I have no first hand experience with lamping.

Headlamp is just a light attached to your head. I use a fenix hp12. You can wear it slightly to the side so when you shoulder your rifle it lights up whatever is in your scope. I like using a headlamp because its just easier not having to point my rifle wherever I want to see.

This thread is full of win. I'll remember this stuff next time I have 'coon problems.

Fuji

"Marksman3006"Whichever color they are not used to. That about sums it up. I have great luck with a regular light/headlamp at night. Im ratting right now on a farm with pest. Just shot a rabbit at about 30 yards and 3 rats so far but they keep falling between the walls. I guess their buddies will have em for lunch. Just make sure you turn the light down real low.....just enough to get their eyeshine. A 30mm tube quality scope is definitely the way to go for light gathering. I use a 6-24X sf airmax and just leave it at 6 power with the crosshairs illuminated on lowest setting. I really want a nightsite setup tho.

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A Nitesite setup would be the way to go, but that's a pretty penny to dish out, maybe Santa-wife will be nice enough to put it in my stocking. Until then I'm looking at Wicked Hunting Lights kit seems to have all the night hunting essentials to get started, and reasonably priced to boot.

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I will be the first to admit that the headlamp works very well on racoons.....but poorly at best on rats and pigeons. Coons tree up and just give you a perfect headshot. Rats are smart and hide, I actually have to go in the barn and kick stuff/stir them up to get a shot. Sitting and waiting on the rats with a white light/headlamp was a complete fail. Same with pigeons at night. Im already signing up for a couple of nights of overtime to fund the nitesite viper. REALLY REALLY want a nitesite viper!!!!

Here's an interesting read for you. Hunting lights[/QUOTE]https://stalktech.com/embed/
It sums up all the facts about what light to use for hunting.

In some respects it depends on where you're hunting. Here in New Mexico, it is against the law to use any light source, even an invisible one! The only exception is hunting raccoon, and even then it requires a special permit. Further, no hunting at night, excluding the aforementioned, is allowed. This, according to the G&F, is to protect farm animals.

If you're on private property, and you have written permission from the "deeded" land owner (no BLM or leased land), you can use almost anything. I use an ATN X-Sight II, 5x20. Most of the time, you do not need a light source if the moon is out, or there is some ambient lighting. In fact, the last rat hunt I went on, didn't require switching to night mode at all! Sort of weird shooting rats, and seeing them in full color!

I never learned about the colored lights for pesting but I can say my nitesite wolf is amazing at night. You can watch the rats do there thing until they quit moving. Then it's over for them. Pricey though.

A trick I learned hunting hogs at night is not to shine the light directly on the prey and not to come from the ground up but from the top down. 

You mentioned the Wicked light The 402Z is nice as you can open the beam very wide or dial it in to a tight circle. 3 power settings and 1 or 2 battery operation. on lower setting with a wide beam it seems not to alarm rats as tighter beam. I'd get the green and a second bulb in red is less than 20.00. Prices are coming down and new NV scopes are out The 2.5X50 Yukon is airgun good and they offer a 2x extender prices vary from vendor to vendor and there are 2 models I think one offers a video out. Battery use is something to consider and with the throw of a lever the illuminator goes on and off. With some available lighting it easy to get a couple of nites use out of the batteries

I've had good luck using a red light.I usually use a small flash light with a red lens just bright enough to see their eyes light up and then I hitem withe a brighter red led tactical light and take the shot.

I think it is more about your night vision versus the animal's. A plain white light is comprised of a broad spectrum of colors. So seeing it then "blinds" you to being able to see anything when the light is off. So in order to not ruin your night vision you use a red or green as it doesn't blind you to the full spectrum of light. I.e., you may be blind to green light but you can still see all the others so you can still see in the dark. In fact I just went camping and had a white and green high power torches. I used white and then you blink and get those dead spots. Doing the same with the green I had no dead spots in my vision. Hope this makes sense. 

"Marksman3006"Whichever color they are not used to. That about sums it up. I have great luck with a regular light/headlamp at night.

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This is the one I totally agree...

When they "learn" to run away from your light, change the colour...when you run out of color choices just "get Infra red equipment".
Good luck!
Fred.