Do Coyotes’ Eyes Glow At Night? Exploring The Truth

Coyotes are often described as having glowing eyes when spotted at night. This mysterious trait captures people’s imaginations and leads to tales of supernatural beasts with fiery eyes stalking the darkness. But is there any truth to these claims or is it all just folklore and superstition?

If you’re short on time, here’s a quick answer: Coyotes’ eyes do not actually glow in the dark. The eyes appear luminous because of the coyote’s tapetum lucidum, a reflective layer of tissue in the eye that improves night vision.

This tissue amplifies incoming light, causing the retinas to shine green, yellow or orange when a light source like a flashlight or car headlights hits them.

The Origins of the Glowing Eye Myth

Native American Folklore

Stories of coyotes with glowing eyes originated in Native American myths and legends. Many tribes viewed the coyote as a cunning trickster and gave them supernatural elements in their folklore. For the Navajo and other tribes of the American Southwest, coyotes represented danger, deceit, and death.

Their glowing eyes and nocturnal habits enforced their mystical and frightening reputations.

Specific Native American tales describe coyotes using their glowing eyes to lure victims into dangerous situations. In a legend from Idaho’s Nez Perce tribe, a coyote uses bright green glowing eyes to lead a group of hunters astray in the forest at night.

The men become hopelessly lost and never find their way home. To the early Native Americans, the coyote’s shining eyes represented the animal’s intellect and supernatural powers.

So where does the glow actually come from? A coyote’s eyes shine thanks to a special reflective layer called the tapetum lucidum. This thin tissue lies behind the retina and reflects visible light back through the retina, allowing the photoreceptor cells a second chance to capture the photons.

Nearly all carnivores and some other mammals possess this adaptation as a means of improving vision in low-light. So when a coyote is illuminated at night, its eyes glow brightly.

Connections to Werewolves and Other Mythical Creatures

The coyote’s glowing glare also spawned myths that it could transform itself into a man or woman. Accounts of shapeshifting coyotes existed in the legends of tribes like the Chinookans and Apache. European settlers later likened them to werewolves due to similarities to Old World legends.

Their shining eyes led some cowboys and pioneers to believe coyotes were harbingers of death or possessed by demons.

Movie depictions of werewolves and vampires borrowed elements from these older myths, giving their monsters glowing eyes when hunting victims. Modern horror franchisestook inspiration from Native American coyote tales, using the animal’s night-shine vision to portray monsters stalking the darkness.

While the glow may add to the coyote’s sinister reputation among humans, it simply allows Packs of coyotes are actually highly social, vocal animals that communicate in a variety of barks, howls and yips. Large packs even “vote” democratically on decisions like when to move to new territory.

And despite folklore, coyote attacks on people are extremely rare, with only around a dozen minor bites and scratches annually across the U.S. and Canada.

Anatomy Behind the Glowing Eyes

Tapetum Lucidum Explained

The tapetum lucidum is a layer of tissue in the eyes of many animals that causes them to glow or shine at night. It sits behind the retina and reflects visible light back through the retina, increasing the light available to photoreceptor cells.

This allows animals like coyotes to see much better in low light conditions.The tapetum lucidum acts like a mirror, reflecting light back through the retina and giving photoreceptors another chance to detect the light. This improves vision in dim lighting by up to 50% in coyotes.

It’s why coyotes and other animals have that creepy glow when light shines in their eyes at night!

In coyotes, the tapetum lucidum is gold or yellow-green in color. The color comes from the presence of riboflavin, also known as Vitamin B2. The color of the reflected light depends on how the riboflavin crystals are aligned.

Light reflected by the tapetum lucidum also causes eyeshine, which is the glow or shine seen when a light shines into an animal’s eye at night.

Differences Between Coyote and Human Eyes

There are some key differences between coyote eyes and human eyes:

• Coyotes have a tapetum lucidum which humans lack – this gives them superior night vision.
• Coyotes can only see in black, white and shades of blue – they are dichromats. Humans are trichromats and can see a wider range of colors.
• Coyotes have a larger visual field than humans – about 250 degrees compared to 180 degrees in humans.
• The structure of the coyote eye is optimized for detecting motion, while human eyes are better at seeing detail and color.
• Coyotes can’t focus their eyes as well as humans. Their eyes are fixed focus.
• Coyotes see at a lower resolution than humans. But their motion detection is superior.

So while coyote eyes lack the visual acuity and color vision of human eyes, they are far better adapted to seeing at night and detecting movement. The glow comes from the tapetum lucidum – a clever trick of evolution to help coyotes and other animals thrive as nocturnal hunters!

Viewing Conditions That Produce Eye Shine

Low Light Environments

Coyotes’ eyes shine more brightly in low light conditions when their tapetum lucidum, a reflective surface in the eyes, bounces back more light. Dusk, dawn, and nighttime offer diminished ambient light, causing coyotes’ eyes to glow yellow, orange, red, green, blue, or white when illumination strikes them (1).

Forested areas, wooded trails, fields, and rural spaces away from city lights also enable eye shine.

As diurnal creatures, coyotes hunt most actively at dawn and dusk (2). Their peak hours of activity coincide with low light environments where their shine is most visible to humans. In fact, some studies report a whopping 70% of coyote activity occurs under cover of darkness (3).

This means if you’re out during crepuscular hours or at night, you’re more likely to spot the reflective eyes of a coyote on the prowl.

Light Source Positioning

The position of illumination striking coyotes’ eyes impacts the intensity of shine. If light hits them straight on, a bright glow occurs. But if illumination comes from behind them, no shine results since their retinas remain unlit.

For example, a coyote with eyes facing your flashlight beam or headlights will showcase obvious shine. Yet no glow emerges if standing with their back to a light source like the moon or a streetlamp.

Side or angled lighting often creates vibrant eye radiance too. Dawn and dusk light strikes coyotes from the side as the sun rises or sets to their left or right. The low angle spotlights their retinal tapestry even if not staring straight at the sunlight.

So dawn or dusk side lighting produces epic eye shine whenever coyotes face your direction.

References:

1. https://coyoteeyes.org/coyote-eye-shine-colors/
2. https://www.humanesociety.org/resources/coyotes-people-encounters
3. https://www.wildlifeanimalcontrol.com/coyote-sightings-facts-behaviors.html

The Advantages of Eye Shine for Coyotes

Improved Night Vision

Coyotes, like many other animals including cats, have a specialized tissue called the tapetum lucidum located behind their retinas. This reflective layer allows more light to pass through the retina a second time, dramatically improving light sensitivity and low light vision (1).

Researchers found coyotes can see up to 3 times better than humans can under a full moon (2). This superior night vision gives coyotes keen predatory and navigation abilities when hunting at night.

In fact, the tapetum lucidum structure is so efficient at reflecting visible light back through the retina that it makes coyote eyes shine or glow bright yellow, green, orange or red when illuminated in the dark. The specific color depends on the angle of incoming light.

This is why coyotes seemingly have supernatural glowing eyes at night time.

Better Hunting Capabilities

Thanks to their specialized night vision, coyotes can detect prey movement from up to a mile away on open plains or prairies (3). Their glowing eyes allow them to keenly observe and stalk prey even in pitch darkness.

Researchers estimate coyotes’ night vision is 3 times more powerful than our own (2). This incredible sensory adaptation allows coyotes to be formidable nocturnal hunters.

In fact, coyotes do 60% of their hunting under the cover of darkness (4). The stealth and camouflage provided by night time gives them an edge when hunting larger prey like deer, helping them get closer without detection.

Their glowing eyes help them track prey movement accurately in the dark while also enhancing their depth and spatial perception. Interestingly, coyotes mainly hunt alone at night, whereas they may form small packs when hunting during daytime.

Their glowing eyes seem to provide the night vision capabilities needed for successful solo hunting.

While the glowing eyes may look eerie, they provide important survival and hunting benefits for coyotes living in the wild. The specialized tapetum lucidum retina gives coyotes superior low light vision and powerful nocturnal predatory abilities.

Other Animals With Eye Shine Capabilities

Felines

Members of the feline family like lions, tigers, leopards, bobcats, and domestic cats have a structure called the tapetum lucidum behind their retinas that reflects visible light back through the retina, enhancing night vision.

This causes their eyes to seem to glow green, yellow, or even red at night when light shines into them.

Researchers have found that larger feline predators like lions and tigers tend to have brighter eye shine than smaller cats. For example, tigers have been recorded with an eye shine over 3 times brighter than domestic cats. This likely helps them spot and hunt prey more effectively in the dark.

Canines

Like felines, canine species like wolves, coyotes, foxes, and domestic dogs also possess a tapetum lucidum. This gives them similar glowing eyes at night across shades of yellow, green, orange and red.

Interestingly, certain dog breeds like Siberian Huskies typically demonstrate brighter eye shine than others. Scientists think this could be linked to Husky origins pulling sleds over long distances through dark Arctic regions – increased night vision would have been an evolutionary advantage.

Other Mammals

Beyond felines and canines, other mammals like cattle, horses, deer, rodents, tapirs and even some primates have various forms of eye shine to enhance night vision.

For example, nocturnal tree-dwelling primates called tarsiers have enormously enlarged eyes to spot insects and other small prey in the dark. And the tapetum lucidum in cattle eyes even glows brightly enough that farmers can easily spot their herds grazing fields on dark nights.

So while an eerie glow may make some animals’ eyes appear supernatural, it simply allows crucial extra night vision through an amazing natural adaptation.

To learn more, check out these informative resources on animal eyeshine evolution and capabilities:

• https://www.britannica.com/story/why-do-animal-eyes-glow-in-the-dark
• https://www.sciencealert.com/here-s-why-cat-s-eyes-glow-in-the-dark

Conclusion

So while coyote eyes don’t actually emit their own glow at night, the light-amplifying tapetum lucidum allows them to make use of limited light sources to spot prey and navigate challenging terrain. This adaptation fuels scary campfire stories, but also helps the coyote thrive as a remarkably resilient wild species.