Which Animals Have Color Vision?

Whether or not an animal can see colors depends on several things, the main one being the kind of photoreceptors in the retina. There are two kinds of photoreceptors--rods and cones. Rods are responsible for vision in dim light, while cones enable animals to see in brighter light and detect a variety of colors. What colors an animal sees depends on the kind and amount of blue, red and green cones it has.

  1. Birds

    • Birds have a distinctive form of color vision that enables them to see even a greater variety of colors than the human eye. These colors appear brighter and more intense than people see them, so their perception of the landscape they fly over is rich and vibrant. With such a strong ability to distinguish between colors, birds can easily identify flowers and berries as they fly above them. Pigeons, in particular, can see millions of hues that vary only slightly from each other and they are hypothesized to have the greatest color detection ability of any living thing.

    Cats and Dogs

    • While most people accept that cats and dogs are color blind, in reality they can see some colors. They just appear faded. Dog and cat vision probably looks a lot like green-red colorblindness in humans. This means that they can't distinguish between greens and reds, but other colors like blues and yellows are easier to see. However, the shark is one animal that is totally colorblind and can only see in different shades from white to black.

    Bees

    • Bees and many other insects have the ability to see color. For insects that rely on flowers and plants for survival, this is an important characteristic to have. At first, scientists were unsure if bees could tell the difference between colors. They are relatively small creatures with compound eyes that scientists didn't know much about at the time. After a few simple tests with red and blue cards, they learned that bees do view the world in color.