Color Blind Herpers

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rpecora
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Color Blind Herpers

Post by rpecora »

I was playing around with color vision tests on line and came across the following blurbs on the site I was visiting. I am color blind or more properly stated color vision deficient.

There had been some discussion a while back in this regard of the idea that color blind herpers could see things better at times then those with normal vision. I thought this would be interesting to share.

"At one time the U.S. Army found that colorblind persons can spot 'camouflage' colors where those with normal color vision are fooled by them. In fact, a reduction in color signals makes the differences in texture and brightness more apparent...!"

"Color vision deficient people have a tendency to better night vision and, in some situations, they can perceive variations in luminosity that color-sighted people could not."
SnakeDude
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by SnakeDude »

that's cool. i think my sister is color blind, but she's in denial...LOL
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Jon Wedow
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Jon Wedow »

That's pretty interesting and to me makes a lot of sense, especially for detecting species which utilize camoflauge. I would expect that these same people would have difficulty seeing things people with normal vision would consider to be strikingly obvious like a green snake on brown earth or a red bird in a tree. I have tested the red bird theory with humorous results ;) Maybe the ideal herping duo would be one who is colourblind and one who is not?

On a similar note, I know of somebody with a type of blindness that leaves only peripheral vision and she is a master at spotting snakes! I have always thought that I look to hard at objects and want what I'm seeing to be a snake. I would imagine that if I was unable to do that my sucess may actually improve!
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Jon Wedow
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Jon Wedow »

SnakeDude wrote:that's cool. i think my sister is color blind, but she's in denial...LOL
I have a friend who is red-green colourblind and is in complete denial. He is adamant that he can see all colours as they really are.

Image

I believe somebody who is not colorblind will see 7-6-26-73-74-45 on this
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Gyri
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Gyri »

On the Timber project one of the guys I work with is color blind. He said it's not usually a huge deal except at night driving through traffic lights. We used a dark forest green paint on the basal rattle of snakes we captured and he couldn't see that worth a damn. I don't think we could have picked a worse color though, lol
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Stohlgren
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Stohlgren »

Interesting. I am colorblind and haven't noticed any above average ability to spot snakes. I have many non-colorblind friends that are by far better snake spotters than me. My own girlfriend was kicking my ass at a summer long snake finding competition until I found 24 under one long (female horridus with babies, and yes, I counted every one of them).
Jon Wedow wrote:I would expect that these same people would have difficulty seeing things people with normal vision would consider to be strikingly obvious like a green snake on brown earth or a red bird in a tree.
The above is certainly true. I spent a month doing some river work with a friend in southern MO and my friend could spot rough green snakes in the bushes left and right (25-30 in that month) and I only found 2. Their yellow bellies stood out to him much more than they did to me. Of course he was always looking for inverts in the bushes so that probably helped a little too.

That being said, I have spent a lot of time conducting visual encounter surveys for indigos and diamondbacks and do pretty well. A lot of that has to do more with knowing where to look than any colorblind snake-finding vision.
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Stohlgren
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Stohlgren »

Gyri wrote:On the Timber project one of the guys I work with is color blind. He said it's not usually a huge deal except at night driving through traffic lights. We used a dark forest green paint on the basal rattle of snakes we captured and he couldn't see that worth a damn. I don't think we could have picked a worse color though, lol
I hate those damned blinking yellow/red traffic lights late at night. Never know whether to stop or go through them.
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rpecora
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by rpecora »

Stohlgren wrote:
Gyri wrote:On the Timber project one of the guys I work with is color blind. He said it's not usually a huge deal except at night driving through traffic lights. We used a dark forest green paint on the basal rattle of snakes we captured and he couldn't see that worth a damn. I don't think we could have picked a worse color though, lol
I hate those damned blinking yellow/red traffic lights late at night. Never know whether to stop or go through them.
By far that is my biggest pain in the neck. Also, I can't even count the red lights I've almost gone through. My first ticket ever was for going through a red light. I started paying much better attention after that.

I think night driving is where the advantage is especially for smaller size critters.
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Natalie McNear
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Natalie McNear »

I've heard that color-deficient individuals are better at spotting camouflage as well, and wondered if they were perhaps better at finding camouflaged snakes where color is not an issue. However, I always find myself wondering what some herps look like to people with the various kinds of color blindness (reg/green, yellow/blue, etc), like SF Garters. For example, to someone who's red/green color blind, does the stripe in the black area of the snake below match the vegetation? To someone who's blue/yellow color blind, do the dorsal and lateral stripes match the flowers?

Image
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Warren
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Warren »

There's a whole spectrum of colour blindness. I can see traffic lights as bright green, bright yellow, and bright red. The garter looks bright red and blue to me. Yet I can only see two of Jon's numbers. I had the same test on a licence upgrade recently, and I told the woman, "I have no idea, I'm just making up numbers at this point."
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by gretzkyrh4 »

Jon Wedow wrote:Maybe the ideal herping duo would be one who is colourblind and one who is not?
Well seeing as I can only see two of the numbers on your test chart, it looks like we'll have the chance to test your theory in a few weeks. I'm not completely colorblind, but about on par with how Warren described it.

Chris
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Eric East
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Eric East »

That's one smokin' garter!
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monklet
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by monklet »

I see a 2 at the left of the middle left, and a 27 in the lower left ...that's it. But I can definitely tell red from greem, IF at close distance in good light. The main font on the website obviously yellow and the "HerpNation" bit in the logo is bright red. I do experience bright color but it must be a trip to have full color vision! :shock:
ADCIII
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by ADCIII »

I can see none of the numbers on the chart but I can see the herpnation logo just as monklet describes plus I believe I can see all colors and describe them correctly as far as the basic color such as red, blue , yellow etc. It's probably the lighter shades that I am really off on. Does that chart heavily rely on grouping various shades together to show the numbers? I have been told I am color blind but maybe I'm just shade blind. Whatever it is, it certainly does not help herping, Art :lol:
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Natalie McNear
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Natalie McNear »

In those number charts, the shades of the colors are exactly the same - only the hue is different. So perhaps in real-life applications where most colors are different, easily-distinguishable shades from each other, being color blind doesn't really make that much of a difference? "The main font on the website obviously yellow and the "HerpNation" bit in the logo is bright red" is exactly how I'd describe it too, and I'm not color deficient.
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monklet
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by monklet »

I think I just have to see things in better light ...I believe it's, as the OP state, a color defiency rather than a total inability to see the colors. Just not as sensitive to subtle tones.

I worked at the Gem Institue of America for a bit years back where they train people to discern very subtle differences in color. Some definitely excel! Bu thankfully for me at least, Zonata are flaming scarlet, Triaspis are luciously green and Puget Sound Garters are soothingly powder blue.

Natalie ..what is the difference between hue, shade, tone and color? ...guess I could look it up though. Not sure I know.
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Natalie McNear
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Natalie McNear »

I'm probably not the best person to ask since I've never taken a formal art class or anything. But as I understand it, shade is the amount of black mixed in (i.e., how light or dark it is), and hue is like the basic category (i.e., red, blue, green, yellow, etc). And those combined with the tone, though I'm not sure what a tone is, make a specific color, like "safety orange".
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monklet
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by monklet »

Thanks Natalie ...maybe a hue is variant of a dominant color in a mix. So that pink may be a reddish hue, and purple is a bluish hue, etc.?
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monklet
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by monklet »

Another thing that I find curious is that it seems I attach less importance to color ...but is that due to my general insensitivity or more a cognitive/perceptual issue?

add: ...or could it be that a coginitive/perceptual issue is why I am color deficient in the first place??? ...will probably never know but an interesting question to me.
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Stohlgren
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Stohlgren »

monklet wrote:I believe it's, as the OP state, a color defiency rather than a total inability to see the colors.
This is the case. When someone says they are colorblind it does not mean they only see black and white. I am red-green colorblind but can see red and green. I have always had trouble with shades of blue and purple. Which may seem odd for a red-green colorblind person, but the difference between the two is that purple is blue with red in it. So to me they often look the same. This is how those colorblind tests work. The numbers are slightly different shades than the dots around them. If the numbers have a red or green shade to them I can't tell them from the surrounding dots.
monklet wrote:Another thing that I find curious is that it seems I attach less importance to color ...
I have noticed this myself. I assume it is because of my colorblindness.
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monklet
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by monklet »

Fun interesting comments and observations ...never really got to share that with another "deficient" person ;-)

add: oh year, it is dark blue and dark purple, and dark blue and black that are almost impossible for me.
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rpecora
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by rpecora »

My trouble colors are green and yellow. Bananas are a bitch as well as autos. Navy blue and black. I always have to ask before I buy. As previously stated traffic lights. But worst of all rainbows. I would give almost anything to be able to see more than two colors in a rainbow.
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Jon Wedow
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Jon Wedow »

gretzkyrh4 wrote:
Jon Wedow wrote:Maybe the ideal herping duo would be one who is colourblind and one who is not?
Well seeing as I can only see two of the numbers on your test chart, it looks like we'll have the chance to test your theory in a few weeks. I'm not completely colorblind, but about on par with how Warren described it.

Chris
So if the camoflauge theory holds true I expect you should have no trouble turning up a handfull of Lachesis by just quickly scanning through the jungle ;)
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by gretzkyrh4 »

Jon Wedow wrote:So if the camoflauge theory holds true I expect you should have no trouble turning up a handfull of Lachesis by just quickly scanning through the jungle ;)
LOL. Pretty sure that one would be a stretch even if we had you, Eric, Mario, Julie, & I looking at the same time. It's good to have a goal though.
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Sam Bacchini
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Sam Bacchini »

SnakeDude wrote:that's cool. i think my sister is color blind, but she's in denial...LOL
That's interesting. Color blindness is a sex linked trait, so it is very rare in women (though it does happen).

My Dad was colorblind, but thankfully I am not.
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by hellihooks »

rpecora wrote: "Color vision deficient people have a tendency to better night vision and, in some situations, they can perceive variations in luminosity that color-sighted people could not."
Boy... that really makes me see red... :crazyeyes: :lol: :lol:
I'm blessed with 'fighter pilot' vision...20/10 in my left, 20/13 in my right, (and I can manually focus my vision) and see all colors well. Brad (Monklet) should be able to vouch for my long-range vision. Not sure if it was color vision related or not, but I found specks that day and Brad did not (next year for shore, bud)
So... how's these specks look to you CB's?
Image
Image
To me, specks are usually pretty cryptic and always seem to sit on rocks that match their colors well... how do they know... :crazyeyes: :lol: :lol: jim
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Hans Breuer (twoton)
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Hans Breuer (twoton) »

Warren wrote:There's a whole spectrum of colour blindness. I can see traffic lights as bright green, bright yellow, and bright red. The garter looks bright red and blue to me. Yet I can only see two of Jon's numbers. I had the same test on a licence upgrade recently, and I told the woman, "I have no idea, I'm just making up numbers at this point."
True. We discovered my son's limited color blindness when he was unable to see the hot pink cherry trees peppering the otherwise green-forested hills of the national park we used to live in Taiwan. Consequently, he can't see the "26" in the test image above.

PS: When I saw the name of this thread, I thought "finally somebody addresses the rarely touched-upon topic of latent racism in herper circles".....
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Andy Avram
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Andy Avram »

An old herpetologist told me he had students down in an area where Rough Green Snakes were occasionally seen and was telling them they should occur in habitat such as the bushes they were standing near. Suddenly a student said, "like that snake?", reached in and pulled out a Rough Green. Supposedly, he was colorblind and the green on the snake showed up different to him then the green in the bushes, so they stood out like a sore thumb to the kid and he ended up finding tons of them over the weekend.

I need to find that colorblind guy and take him herping with me.
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Warren
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Warren »

Hans Breuer (twoton) wrote:When I saw the name of this thread, I thought "finally somebody addresses the rarely touched-upon topic of latent racism in herper circles".....
:)

In a sense we are all colourblind, since many insects and other animals can see UV, and many plants and animals specifically display UV for this reason - a spectrum that we are blind to. Let alone infrared seen by heat pits, electromagnetism felt by the lateral lines of fish, chemosensing felt by insects, earth's gravity felt by birds, etc.

When you compare the minor differences in sight between individual humans with the massive differences between all humans and other animals, "We are all Keller now" (Helen, that is).
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monklet
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by monklet »

For snake's sake Jim, the first was out in broad daylight, the second was under a freakin' rock :P No doubt it helps to have keener vision, and be a better herper of course ;) , ...but I'd have seen the first one, color-blind or not. Interesting though, when the snake is the same color as the rock, why would color sensitivity help ...sort of countervails your argument, eh ol' chum? :D
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by WW** »

For those wishing to relate to how colour-blind people see the world, check out http://www.vischeck.com/ - a pretty cool resource!

It also gives you the possibility of uploading image files and showing you how colour blind people would see them, and providing alternative colours that will be easier to distinguish. Being CB myself, I direct my students there when they send me endless diagrams/graphs with lots of colours that I cannot tell apart.
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by Hans Breuer (twoton) »

What a cool site. Vielen Bedanken! :-)
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monklet
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by monklet »

The world.
Image

How the world looks to a person with a red/green color deficit (deuteranopia).
Image

What's the point, they both look exactly the same ... :lol:

From: http://www.vischeck.com/examples/
Pretty interesting site, thanks :)

added: Now I gotta wonder what some of my Spring outfits look like to normal people.
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by hellihooks »

monklet wrote:For snake's sake Jim, the first was out in broad daylight, the second was under a freakin' rock :P No doubt it helps to have keener vision, and be a better herper of course ;) , ...but I'd have seen the first one, color-blind or not. Interesting though, when the snake is the same color as the rock, why would color sensitivity help ...sort of countervails your argument, eh ol' chum? :D
Yeah... just razzing you a bit Brad... I know it was just the luck of the draw, me finding them before you... :crazyeyes:
But seriously... the claim is CB folks have better contrast vision... I was wondering if your supposed deficit (had you happened upon them first) might have allowed you to see them easier. When a speckled is on speckled granite that matches it's coloration... you might in fact have an advantage picking them out... :crazyeyes:
I've always been interested in 'perceptual anomalies' and the visual system (such as the pop out 3-D pics,) throughout my study of neural physiology... might go so far as to say I focused on the visual system... :roll: yuk yuk... cyaaaaaaaaaaa :D jim
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monklet
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by monklet »

Good points Jim ...perceptual stuff is very interesting to me as it really helps us understand ourselves and how we respond to our environment, but I have no formal training of course. You simply have more experience in the field and probably a more refined search image ...in addition to keen eyesight, so your odds of finding stuff are probably just better than mine.

edit: oh yeah, forgot to say, no offense take :)
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Re: Color Blind Herpers

Post by hellihooks »

monklet wrote: added: Now I gotta wonder what some of my Spring outfits look like to normal people.
You really DON'T want to know... :crazyeyes: :lol: :lol: jim
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