The world as seen in the eyes of a dog will be in white and in different shades of grey. You see, dogs were once believed to have no ability to distinguish colors. Dogs are acclaimed for their heightened senses. Dogs have protected humans using their excellent scenting and hearing abilities. Sighthounds are highly valued for their keen vision that keeps a prey in sight. Dogs are claimed to have the ability to see better in the dark as well . As long as a dog is on guarding duty, people can sleep soundly at night.
Nature has endowed our furry friends with very sensitive senses but the ability to see colors in the same way humans can was left out. Dogs can actually see colors but in a different way than what we humans can do. A study on canine vision conducted in the University of California has proven the fact that dogs can see colors but their vision as compared to human’s vision is less detailed. Of course due to the less detailed vision, a dog may not be able to appreciate a bright red ball given that in the eyes of the dog the color of the ball would either be black or brownish gray.
Humans and dogs are very similar in genetics. Similar to humans, a dogs eye has special cells called cone photoreceptors that controls color perception by catching the light. However, while humans have three cone photoreceptors, dogs only have two. The three cones in our eyes delivers 100% full range vision while dogs have approximately 20% range of color vision as they lack on cone. This makes a dog’s vision about six times inferior than what we humans have.
In the eyes of Fido the rainbow colors would be blue, light blue, grey, light yellow, brownish yellow and dark grey instead of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. The world, as seen by the dog will be in yellow, grey and blue colors. Surprisingly, dogs have the ability to see the subtle differences in the shades of blues and violets.
Humans cannot see the slight change in the shades of violet and blues because of the yellow pigmentation that obstructs short wavelengths and lessens the eyes’ sensitivity. The absence of the yellow pigmentation in the dogs eyes enables our four legged friend’s eyes to be more sensitive in identifying the different shades of violets and blues.
Find out more about how dogs see color and dog first aid at Sarah’s Dogs.
