The Eyes of an Animal - How They Differ from Ours

Have you ever wondered about the eyes of an animal, and how they differ from ours? Not only in shape, size and color...but in vision.

I am not an expert by no means on animals eyes, but decided to do some research and share with my readers.

A couple of  questions that I was interested in were, "why do animals have luminous eyes at night and why do some animals' eyes shine red at night and some yellow?"

I found out:

The eyes of many animals, but not humans, contain a reflective layer called the "tapetum lucidum".  That helps the eye gather more light, which improves night vision.  You just see what's reflected back at you; the rest of the light is absorbed by the creature's eye.

But it's not a precision mirror, and it tends to give you less accurate vision during the day.  Humans go in for precision (which is why we can read) at the expense of hunting or seeing predators at night.

The tapetum lucidum is reflective, but it's not like a mirror.  It's more like some bird feathers and butterfly wings, where it uses ridges or dots of clear material to achieve a colored effect.  The distance between the ridges interacts with the frequency of light to give you different colors.  The colors you're not seeing are the ones that the animal are what the animal actually sees.

Another question I had was, What does the phrase "eye of the tiger mean?"

I found out:

In the wild, seeing the "eyes" of the tiger signifies death, because right before a tiger attacks, it turns its ears forward so that the spot on the back of each ear faces nearer its prey. The "eye spots" on the back of tigers' ears serve to confuse predators and reduce the risk of attack from behind. Hence, once someone sees these "eyes", the tiger is about to attack.

Did you know:

• Dogs and cats are color blind. They are said to be able to see only in pale shades of color.
• Snakes have 2 sets of eyes. One pair for day and one pair for night.
• Insects and bees use compound eyes made up of hundreds, even thousands of  tiny lenses placed together in a honeycomb pattern.
• Horses eyes point sideways to give them excellent peripheral vision.

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Elephant Fitted with Giant Contact to Repair Injured Eye

What happens when one of the world’s largest animals hurts its eye? She gets a giant contact lens, of course.

A vet at Amsterdam’s Artis Zoo fitted elephant Win Thida with the protective lens last week in an hour-long procedure, the first of its kind in Europe, the zoo said. The animal’s cornea was likely damaged by a branch while roughhousing with her mates, and each time she blinked, it further irritated the wound. The contact was fitted to help her right eye – eight times the size of a human’s – heal without complications.

Animal ophthalmologist Anne-Marie Verbruggen leans into Win Thida's stall at Amsterdam's Artis Zoo during an hour-long procedure to fit a contact in her right eye.

So how exactly does one perform eye surgery on an elephant? Win Thida, who weighs in at just above 4 tons, was lightly sedated, given an eye anesthetic and enclosed in her stall to prevent her from moving too much during the procedure.

A specialist eye vet, who regularly fits horses with contacts, performed the surgery from a ladder while leaning into the stall. Win Thida couldn’t be put to sleep as elephants can’t lie down for long periods without developing breathing trouble.

Animal ophthalmologist Anne-Marie Verbruggen inserts a contact lens into Win Thida's eye to help her damaged cornea heal.

The vets expect that the super-size contact will fall out of the 44-year-old elephant’s eye after several weeks, although if it doesn’t, there will be another trip up the ladder for the doc who performed the surgery. After spending nearly a month squeezing her eye shut in pain, she was “instantly better” after the procedure, the zoo said.

Zookeepers first noticed Win Thida’s injury when creams and painkillers did little to help, vets decided to insert the lens. FOLLOW US!

Vet Removes Dog's Eye Without Permission

Tampa Bay, Fla. (WTSP) -- A dog owner got a call on Monday that shook her to the bone.

"I got hysterical," said dog owner Kimberly Hayden. "I was like what are you (the Veterinarian's Assistant) talking about? She was there for a follow up. And she goes, 'no, we extracted her eye.'"

To read more on this story, click here: Vet Removes Dog's Eye Without Permission FOLLOW US!

Elephant Fitted with Giant Contact to Repair Injured Eye

What happens when one of the world’s largest animals hurts its eye? She gets a giant contact lens, of course.

A vet at Amsterdam’s Artis Zoo fitted elephant Win Thida with the protective lens last week in an hour-long procedure, the first of its kind in Europe, the zoo said. The animal’s cornea was likely damaged by a branch while roughhousing with her mates, and each time she blinked, it further irritated the wound. The contact was fitted to help her right eye – eight times the size of a human’s – heal without complications.

Animal ophthalmologist Anne-Marie Verbruggen leans into Win Thida's stall at Amsterdam's Artis Zoo during an hour-long procedure to fit a contact in her right eye.

So how exactly does one perform eye surgery on an elephant? Win Thida, who weighs in at just above 4 tons, was lightly sedated, given an eye anesthetic and enclosed in her stall to prevent her from moving too much during the procedure.

A specialist eye vet, who regularly fits horses with contacts, performed the surgery from a ladder while leaning into the stall. Win Thida couldn’t be put to sleep as elephants can’t lie down for long periods without developing breathing trouble.

Animal ophthalmologist Anne-Marie Verbruggen inserts a contact lens into Win Thida's eye to help her damaged cornea heal.

The vets expect that the super-size contact will fall out of the 44-year-old elephant’s eye after several weeks, although if it doesn’t, there will be another trip up the ladder for the doc who performed the surgery. After spending nearly a month squeezing her eye shut in pain, she was “instantly better” after the procedure, the zoo said.

Zookeepers first noticed Win Thida’s injury on December 26. When creams and painkillers did little to help, vets decided to insert the lens. FOLLOW US!