(WHTM) — As hunters don the trademark safety-orange vests and caps for the upcoming deer hunting season, many have wondered if deer can see the color orange.
According to the National Deer Association, a study conducted by University of Georgia researchers Dr. Karl V. Miller and Dr. Gino D’Angelo deduced that deer and humans’ vision capabilities and physical structure are drastically different.
First off, the study explained that human eyes “[provide] crisp detail, but only in a very small circular area. In the areas of peripheral vision, everything is out of focus and detail suffers. Human vision is capable of perceiving the long-wavelength reds and hunter orange.”
We also have better depth perception than deer, which have to “shift their head to gain a three-dimensional perspective of an object by looking at it from several different angles. This is probably the main reason why deer bob their heads when they encounter potential danger.”
Humans additionally have an advantage when it comes to binocular overlap, or the area that both eyes view simultaneously. Our overlap is 140 degrees, whereas the overlap of deer is only 60 degrees.
This means humans are better at focusing on forward objects and single points, while deer are better at detecting outlines and movement in a wider visual range.
Using what they knew about deer and human focal perspectives, fields of view and color perception, Dr. Miller and Dr. D’Angelo used photo editing software to create “deer goggles” to simulate a deer’s view and a human’s view of a hunter wearing an orange safety vest and a camouflage outfit at sunset. Here is what the goggles revealed:
“With substantially fewer cones in their retina compared to humans, everything would appear ‘grainy’ to the deer, like a photograph taken with very high-speed film… Deer would not perceive the longer wavelengths of color, so the oranges and reds have turned to brown or gray.”
The deer could, however, see the UV enhancers glowing on a pair of camouflage pants.
While deer aren’t able to see the orange and pink that hunters may wear, they are able to pick up on other colors, according to Field and Stream. (Regulations may vary, but most states require hunters to wear clothing and headgear that is at least 50% blaze orange or pink while deer hunting.)
More specifically, it’s those with shorter wavelengths like blue or green.
“This is especially true in the dim light of dawn or dusk, which is when deer are most active,” the outlet wrote.
Deer, without built-in UV filters in their eyes, can see blue nearly 20 times better than humans, according to the National Deer Association. Although deer are not nocturnal, they have adapted to be most active at dawn and dusk due to their ability to see 18 times better than humans at twilight.
In short, if you want to hunt deer, don’t worry about the bright orange, but leave the blue jeans at home.