• Question: How can cats and dogs see in the dark?

    Asked by Platypi to Ashley, Bernard, Carsten, MariaMagdalena, Monique on 12 Nov 2015.
    • Photo: Monique Henson

      Monique Henson answered on 12 Nov 2015:

      If it was completely pitch black, with no light at all, then cats and dogs wouldn’t be able to see. Dogs can see better in the dark than we can for a few reasons. They’ve got large pupils (the opening at the middle of your eye), which let in more light. They’ve also got lots of cells that are sensitive to light (rods) in their eyes. We have those too, but we have fewer because we have more of another type of cell that let us see colours.

      On top of all of this the back of their eye is different to ours. When light hits the back of their eyes it bounces back towards the light sensing cells. Human eyes don’t do this.

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