Deer eyesight at night?

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dreaming bucks
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Deer eyesight at night?

Unread postby dreaming bucks » Tue Apr 07, 2015 1:55 pm

How far do you think they can see in the dark? Meaning, if you were going on a morning hunt, and you were there an hour before daylight, could they see you walking across a hayfield from 200 yards away?

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Hawthorne
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Re: Deer eyesight at night?

Unread postby Hawthorne » Tue Apr 07, 2015 2:08 pm

When I was younger before I thought about access I use to walk right up on deer in the dark in fields within 20 yards sometimes. 200 yds is along ways in the dark. I would just try and make sure they aren't downwind from your access and maybe find a treeline to walk down.

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whitetailassasin
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Re: Deer eyesight at night?

Unread postby whitetailassasin » Wed Apr 08, 2015 4:00 am

dreaming bucks wrote:How far do you think they can see in the dark? Meaning, if you were going on a morning hunt, and you were there an hour before daylight, could they see you walking across a hayfield from 200 yards away?

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Without a doubt they can! there eye shape lets them take more light in when its dark out to see at greater distances. I don't know about you guys but in an open field I can see a deer coming from quite a ways, maybe a black blob, but I can still see it for quite some distance. A deer is much more adapt than we are at nightitme vision.

Copied from an article....Whitetails have built-in advantages over humans in the area of night vision. Their pupils are larger, allowing more light to reach the retina’s light receptors. Deer also have a tapetum, a reflective eye structure that enables whitetails to recycle light. The tapetum acts like a mirror, causing a deer’s eyes to shine at night, and when light isn’t absorbed by receptor cells the first time it enters the eye, the tapetum reflects it back over the cells a second time. - See more at: http://outdoorchannel.com/article.aspx? ... XPCPm.dpuf

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Hawthorne
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Re: Deer eyesight at night?

Unread postby Hawthorne » Wed Apr 08, 2015 6:03 am

I've had good luck accessing my spots after just after daylight in open fields in farm country. The deer are usually back in cover by then. Sometimes they will get up and move around in the morning after they lay down. Ill only go in before daylight if I have an access without bumping deer in farm country.

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Tennhunter3
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Re: Deer eyesight at night?

Unread postby Tennhunter3 » Wed Apr 08, 2015 7:18 am

Deer have very good nighttime vision. Better then their daylight vision. A deers eyes see in a yellow image. 200 yards you should be ok as long as you move slowly and carefully. They I believe can see grey and blue images also similar to turkey's but I know a lot of deer have been killed in blue jeans.

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Re: Deer eyesight at night?

Unread postby KLEMZ » Wed Apr 08, 2015 1:44 pm

A deer can run full blast through the thickest cover on the darkest night. Given a clear line of sight, I would say they can see us whether we are walking with or without a flashlight. White light , red light , green light.. I don't believe it matters.


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