Why Dog Eyes Glow at Night

Posted by Clare Bristow

dog-eyes

Have you ever noticed your dog's eyes glowing at night, and wondered why they do that?

At the back of their eyes dogs have a mirror-like layer of cells called the tapetum lucidum.

The job of the tapetum lucidum is to improve your dogs vision in dim light, and it does this by reflecting light back to the retina.

The more light the retina receives the more information it has to work with to translate that light into images (that's a very simplistic version of how our eyes work!).

So when your dog's eyes are glowing, what you're seeing is light being reflected by the tapetum lucidum.


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Comments

5 Responses to “Why Dog Eyes Glow at Night”

  1. MyAvatars 0.2 Angel on December 10th, 2007 8:08 pm

    Useful info. I saw dog eyes glowing at night, but I couldn't even suppose why. Thank you, now I feel myself so clever.

  2. MyAvatars 0.2 Linda Bolzenius on December 28th, 2007 4:23 am

    I am a very big dog lover, I have owned several dogs, but I have a lab and golden retriever now, At night the labs eyes glow bright blue, like flashlights, and the golden's glow orange, which really amazes me because the dogs I have owned in the past either glowed green or red. I was wondering if anyone could tell me why that is.

  3. MyAvatars 0.2 Clare Bristow on December 30th, 2007 11:38 pm

    Hi Linda, that's an interesting question.
    I think it is to do with the eye tissue that forms the tapetum lucidem and the shape of your dog's eye lens - light travels through these at different speeds depending on their density and shape respectively. As a result we see the light as a different colour depending on the speed its travelling at.

  4. MyAvatars 0.2 Marilynn Tillman on January 1st, 2010 8:44 am

    I searched to find this subject because I have been around hundreds of dogs throughout my life and I have never seen their eyes glow anything other than green or red. I have just recently adopted a pure white pitbull and her eyes glow the most beautiful bright blue. I was wondering how common it really is. I guess not very. Thanks for your information everyone.

  5. MyAvatars 0.2 Lucy Lucy on January 30th, 2010 3:03 pm

    I also have a Pitbull, and her eyes glow bright blue at night. My last dog was a pitbull, too, and hers also glowed blue. Maybe it's a pitbull thing?

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