Through the eyes of a wild animal: Part 1

The location and structure of the human eyes enable us not only to see how long and wide an object is but also to see how far away it is from us and how thick it is. If we had 2D vision (like what you get when you close one eye and look through the other) we would still be able to see objects clearly but judging the distance would be a problem, so we would look rather clumsy trying to grab things that are further beyond our reach.

So for this reason nature has decided to give the natural predators/ carnivores the ability to see in 3D. Or else finding something to eat would be quite a challenge! Thus most of the predators have their eyes located at the front of their head, a feature of 3D or stereoscopic vision. So think of the big hunters like the tiger, cheetah, leopard, lion (lioness rather), wolf, hawk (more or less), bear, owl etc. all of these have their eyes located at the front of their heads. This gives them the ability to judge the distance to their food and pounce upon it at the right moment.




awww.......... purrr

And what about the prey? the hunted? Well, as far as they are concerned they would rather prefer to have the ability to scan a wide area than be able to see in 3D. Because ill judging the distance to the grass patch is not going to be fatal, but not being able to see the hunter creeping up from behind is! Therefore most of the hunted animals have their eyes located on either side of their heads giving them access to a panoramic view. Deer, antelope, horse, zebra, goat , sheep, buffalo and the like. These animals can only see in 2D, but they have a wide field of view almost close to 360 degrees enabling them to spot any suspicious activity around them.


Eyes focused on the grass


But of course nature is pretty diverse. And there are very many types of visionaries and all of them can't be categorised into these two classes. But at any time in your life if you do find some unidentifiable wild animal charging towards you, and if it has got its eyes at the front of its head, you are in deep trouble!

And what about us humans? does this mean that we are born predators? Well I'm not an expert in natural history but if you ask one he or she would probably argue that this has to do with humans being descendents of apes, if you believe in Darwin that is (the natural historian not the blogger). So for our predescessors it was vital to be able to judge the distance to the next swingable tree branch (I just made that word up I think). So we humans inherited the 3D vision due to this reason.


So you could say we were born to be Tarzan!