Color Blindness and Spotting Animals

_droptine_ · May 5, 2007

I have been doing some reading about color blindness and I am wondering if it makes a difference one way or another in spotting game. I myself am not color blind. I haven't hunted with anyone who is ( that I know of ) so I can't really make a determination.

What about you all? Are any of you color blind or hunt with someone who is color blind? Do you think it makes a difference one way or another?

proutdoors · May 5, 2007

I have a cousin who is color-blind, he can spot game as good/better than anyone I have ever been around.

PRO

BuckSnort · May 5, 2007

I could be wrong but people who are color blind don't see everything in b&w. It's just certain colors and shades.

proutdoors · May 5, 2007

You are correct.

PRO

elkslayer54 · May 5, 2007

I have a brother that is color blind, He sees game as good as I do. But where the hard part comes in is tracking, He can't see the red blood it is just a another dull coler to him. So I do the tracking. Later Bill

groundhog · May 5, 2007

What elkslayer said! to a tee. My brother is color blind and great at spotting game but he can't see blood worth a darn. I do the tracking.

huntindudley · May 5, 2007

There are differant kinds of color blindness. The most common is called red/green color blindness. I am red/green color blind and I'd say I can spot animals better than most people. I don't know why ? I also can not see blood (or anytning red or green) very well at all. It's not so much that I can't see red or green but if some one tied a red flag in a tree I'd never find it. The only problems I have had in hunting is having a hard time seeing hunters in "hunter orange", I've had to change out my red sight pins on my bow, I only shoot white and yellow vains on my arrows so I can see them, just dumb stuff like that.
Seeing animals has never been a problem for me.

kilowatt · May 5, 2007

The youngest guy in our group is color blind and he has sharp eyes when hunting, spots them right away. I have asked him how he can do his job since he is color blind, says he lets the customers pick the colors. He is an Auto Uphosterier(sp?)

Brian

supersider34 · May 5, 2007

Hunted turkeys this spring with a guy that was color blind and could spot game very well but had a hard time with blood.

TFinalshot · May 6, 2007

I'm red color blind AND blind in my left eye to-boot. I cant see red very well. I can stand right in front of the field of Indian paint brush and not see it. . .

Can I spot game, better than most guys that run with me. The eye doctor said that because I've grown up blind in one eye (i can see bright light but if I close my good eye, and I'm driving, I'd crash) my good eye has adjusted, and is more powerful and the contrast is better. By brain also as learned to deal with it, so I do have some "depth perception." I was not much of a hitter in baseball, but I could play the hotbox!

Makes for some interesting bino issues though. .
.

COSA · May 6, 2007

I'm color blind. I see animals better and faster with the naked eye than most anyone I've known. Their coat color almost stands out at amazing distances. When looking through glass though, I seem to lose all or more of the advantage. A lot of times I see an object with the naked eye that is "offshade" in an instant, then it takes some time to identify it with the binos or scope.

Another oddity, I see game much better without my glasses than with them. Now my vision is not that bad, but still does not make sense.

Gunther · May 6, 2007

Myself and a couple of my brothers are color blind in red/green. I tend to see better in low light then people who are not color blind. Tracking sucks I have a hard time.

rutnelk · May 7, 2007

I also have red/green color blindness. I can see deer in the fall when everything is gray as good or better than most people. The problem I have is seeing deer in the summer time when their coats are reddish and all of the foliage is green. Most of the people I go scouting with can spot the summer deer easily because of their color but I can't even see them until they move. But in the fall I can spot a deer in a sagebrush flat from a mile away.

I too don't see blaze orange as well as most, even in the fall. My dad will tell my brother (who is also color blind) and me that there are hunters on the opposing hill. Neither one of us can see them very well unless they are moving. We don't have a problem seeing other hunters if they are in the open, but it is more difficult if they are in the brush. It's kind of scary but it makes us more aware of our surroundings and we take more time identifying our targets than most people do because of this.

It is also difficult to see blood when tracking like someone else already mentioned. A few years back we were tracking an elk that we had hit and my brother and I couldn't see the blood at all. My nephew could see the blood easily and was able to follow the blood trail right to the elk.

OutdoorWriter · May 7, 2007

A person who is color blind pretty much sees the world in regards to color the same as any ungulate -- deer, elk, etc. etc. -- and many other game species, which possess only two types of color-sensitive cones.

I wrote an extensive article on deer vision and their ability to see way into the UV part of the color spectrum for OUTDOOR LIFE way back in the early 1990s. It was the culmination of two years of research, including being present at tests on live deer at a research facility in GA. -TONY

littlebighorn · May 7, 2007

Interesting discussion! I am with huntindudley and rutnelk, red-green color blind, which is the most common type of color blindness (according to what I have been told). I can see red and green, but mix them up, especially red in a green background, and someone has to point them out to me before I can spot it. (far away hunters on a hillside)
I have always wondered about summer deer because my son sees them better than I can. I rationalized that it was his "younger eyes" but maybe it is my condition. And tracking a wounded deer is definitely a problem for me. It has actually kept me out of archery hunting for years, until I now--when I have my son's help. But hand me a rifle in the fall and my brother claims I can see deer better than anyone. I am not sure!

jims · May 7, 2007

I have the orange-red-green "jinx" as well. I am another one that has problems seeing orange-clad hunters and specks of blood. I remember going to the eye doctor and he had a bunch of cards with different colored dots on them. I couldn't see the numbers or saw different numbers on the cards than noncolorblind people. When I put on a pair of special glasses I could see the same numbers on the cards as people that were not colorblind. I wonder if there is a such thing as glasses with special lenses a green-red-orange colorblind guy could wear to make blood stand out? My biggest fear is wounding an animal and not being able to recover it because I can see the specks of blood!

I'm not exactly sure if colorblindness is an advantage or disadvantage when spotting game? I know I can spot game a lot better than some people and other people are better than me. Being good at spotting game takes a lot of practice and can actually be learned. Knowing where to look at different times of the day, what to look for, how to scan an area, etc. will up your odds considerably for locating and finding trophy critters! Obviously quality optics and knowing how to use them is just as important as anything else!