74th Annual W.N.Y. Science Congress

Hey, It's adventure van and I'm here with a blog about a Science 'Congress'. I put in a Bronze Medal winning report about the color dogs can see. It was awesome, with plenty of stands and people, and if your pet helped you with the experiment, you could bring it! (I didn't. Wah.) There are some shows, some food-trucks, and the awards ceremony is forwarded with a 10 minute talk. It's awesome. You don't have to enter, but just coming and checking out the reports are awesome. The report is down below.

How well do dogs see color?

The Stereotype:

Dogs CANNOT see red from green, but CAN see blue from yellow.

“Dogs' eyes, like those of most other mammals, contain just two kinds of cones. These enable their brains to distinguish blue from yellow, but not red from green.” – Live Science, How Do Dogs See The World, by Natalie Wolchover, on http://www.livescience.com/34029-dog-color-vision.html

“Colors dogs can’t distinguish
Actually the color spectrum made up of wavelengths of light is the same to all of us. Only the perception of those colors can be quite different. As dogs only have two different color receptors in their eyes they have problems to distinguish certain colors:

• Red — Orange — Green
• Greenish Blue — Gray
• Different shades of Purple

The list is not completed and there are a lot of different shades which can’t be differentiated if you are colorblind. And the conclusion is dogs can see colors but are at the same time colorblind.” – Colblindor, Can Dogs See Colors, Unknown, on http://www.color-blindness.com/2007/02/27/can-dogs-see-colors/

HOWEVER!

I have been working, with extensive research, to find out whether or not this Stereotype is true. And, I believe I have enough research to say this:

! THIS STERYOTYPE IS WRONG !

Why is it? How can you prove it?

Simple. You go and figure it out your self.

THE REPORT

The materials:

What do you use to dispel a widely believed myth? A dog and 5 poker chips!

The Experiment:

How It Was Done:

The Dog was given a poker chip, told the color, and given a treat. This was repeated multiple times, until when we said the color, he’d look at us like “Treat? Where? Where?” We did this 5 times, with the following colors:

·         Black: While it was once believed dogs see in black and white, it was disproved a while ago. I was using this color to see A: If he told the difference in-between Black/White and if he had problems with Black/Blue choices.

·         White: I’ve used this color for the Black/White  comparison.

·         Red: It is now believed that dogs can see only Yellow and Blue, but not Red.    However, I did not have a Yellow chip, so I was forced to just use Blue and Green against Red. I used this color to disprove the myth that dogs can’t tell the difference.

·         Blue: I’ve used this color to shove it against Red.

·         Green: I’ve used this color to add a little diversity to the experiment.

Then, the second part happened: I paired up the colors against each other, put a treat behind each one, and said the name of a color. He then would nudge/stare-at/attempt-to-eat the one that he thought was the right color. The results are on the chart on the opposite side.

The results were staggering.