Can Animals See in IR?? A true Synopsis is needed, scientific vs. reality...

On the subject of the IR source: For those using "zoomable" lights where you can focus the light into a narrow beam or wider flood, set up your light zoomed in with narrow beam and walk out in front of it some distance away. Note how you cannot see the source except nearly directly in front of the light. Try again with it zoomed out and you can see the light from a much wider angle.

If you consider the coyote point of view when he's in front of you, the zoomed in light will appear to flash on where as the zoomed out light might be a small, non bothersome light that gets slightly more intense when you focus him in the IR beam. Don't have experience with this yet, but it's my theory.
 
Originally Posted By: fxredSo would any grade of filter even say a 720 reduce the glow... I want to get all the light from my 850 but don't want my glow to be seen.... I know red lights and green lights do not work where I'm at so the red glow has me a little anxious...

Go buy a filter and let us know what you see, you might be on to something. Theory is easy, proving it could be disappointing or.............

Most if not all of us believe if we can see it a coyote can also see it.

If we can't see it a coyote can't.......makes sense right.

But if we can't see it AND we can't see the coyote it's of no use....right?

Seems pretty simple, I'm happy with my setup or I'd give it a try.
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted By: fxredSo would any grade of filter even say a 720 reduce the glow... I want to get all the light from my 850 but don't want my glow to be seen.... I know red lights and green lights do not work where I'm at so the red glow has me a little anxious...
-
I run for years and firm believer in a 720nm filter over my pvs14 Obj. great for cooling down a full moon or unwanted bloom of farm or industrial lights in the distance .
But As far a running a ' IR filter' over you NV IR Diode in your illumination ???? .. ( No ) . It is not a wide spectrum, like you can pick and choose a frequency you want to kickout of it with a specific filter over your IR illumination unit . That's the beauty of it , Your IR illuminator Diode is already in a specific nm frequency .
.
 
Originally Posted By: UndrcoverrednekOn the subject of the IR source: For those using "zoomable" lights where you can focus the light into a narrow beam or wider flood, set up your light zoomed in with narrow beam and walk out in front of it some distance away. Note how you cannot see the source except nearly directly in front of the light. Try again with it zoomed out and you can see the light from a much wider angle.

If you consider the coyote point of view when he's in front of you, the zoomed in light will appear to flash on where as the zoomed out light might be a small, non bothersome light that gets slightly more intense when you focus him in the IR beam. Don't have experience with this yet, but it's my theory.


-
your pretty close and I Agree with what your saying . for others that don't get it I tried to explain it in my Post above ( # 3113295 )
and I can't comment on Digital and there compatible IR illumination sources, only regular NV intensifier tube and there IR supplement .
The Coyote is never seeing your IR your spilling on him . I have shot more coyotes than I can remember less than 50 yards and have never spooked a coyote out at a distance with my IR illumination .

When you colimate and focus your IR diodes flood into a controlled pattern ' circle of light' . ' If ' close enough to, Your unit emits a faint glow ( signature ) that the coyote might see , An eye can pick up a 'faint' signature glow at the unit source if your ( center of diode ) is in ' line-of sight' to the eye .

( for me ) and if your worried that a Coyote might see your IR unit when you flash him .
Try never to put your Coyote in the illumination center, eye-line with the IR columated focused beam . It helps if the shooters sets-up the units beam direction with the target in the ' low bottom' of your focused columated beam of IR .
Keep the center of the IR diode above the eye-line of the coyote, by keeping the target in the bottom 25 or 30% of your circle of illumination. Spill the center and top of illumination above and down range
.
 
I appreciate all of the replays. You are talking to a rookie on the issue that has not even gotten out to us the gear yet that I got for my early xmas all of my thoughts are theoretical. Ducks, Geese and my dog get the mornings right now and my wife gets the evenings if I want to stay married lol. I truly love this site and all of the knowledge that is shared and everyone's replies. If I feel like I am having equipment issues I will try something but I'll have to fail first. Amazon has the filters for $20. I just need to get out and have my trials and errors. Once again thanks.
 
I had this coyote coming in and I'd only get a picture or 2 and he was gone. Finally I started getting more and more pics, I believe he finally got acclimated to the lights and or the noise from the cameras. I finally changed my cameras to video. While both cameras are 850 IR, the flash on one is much more visible than the other. The night this video was taken took almost 10 minutes to coordinate him in a shooting position with one of the cameras on. He'd grown accustom to the trail cams but the 850 IR light from the house seemed to get his attention and he'd move on and off the bait.



I shoot through a small lane through a group of trees as you can see in the post below. You can see my IR move in the video. Does he see the glow at the source or the IR bouncing off the trees?? I don't know what they see I just know he reacted to the light. My opinions are based on my experiences I believe they see something, maybe just the glow at the source. I think it's an improvements from red lights and the reaction will vary with each coyote.

http://www.predatormastersforums.com/for...461#Post2936461

Redneck, Index what you guys are saying makes sense. So you know what was going on at the time, the light was not completely focused down, I back off my zoom light to fill the FOV of the scope, but it is centered on cross hairs so at the time of the shot he's not in the halo.
 
Last edited:
Finally hit the big time after 30+ years of hard scientific neuroopthalmic genetic work helping blind children see.
thumbup.gif


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=t4GVQxsOLSg


Helping blind children to see was a lot of difficult technical genetic neurological work, unfortunately helping animals and humans to see IR will probably take another couple of hundred millions of years of wishful thinking......
 
Originally Posted By: HTRN57In all of our research over the years, coyotes and other animals (including humans) can definitely see the glow (IR signature) emitted by the IR device. IR signature (glow) intensity is a function of the IR LED wavelength and the power rating. Therefore, if the power rating of both units is the same, the lower wavelength LED will produce more glow than a unit that has a higher wavelength rating. Trail camera manufacturers go to great lengths to produce units that put out little IR glow to keep from spooking game. My trail cams are all set to take video and I've witnessed several occasions when deer look directly at the camera (when in operation) and clear out rather quickly. So in general, in most cases it is the IR emitter glow that is causing issues with spooked game (including coyotes). I have noticed that bobcats, foxes, and even deer are less concerned about the IR glow than are coyotes. Coyotes around here (central IL) seem to be very sensitive to the IR glow. Kevin

+1
Exactly what I have noticed, 940nm less glow vs 910nm ,850nm or 780nm of equivalent power. The less power the less glow, IR filters 5-8% reduction in output if rated for the below the IR wavelength (a 950nm filter will reduce the 850nm IR light by about 30% due to it being on the lower side of the filters rated cutoff wavelength and the glow will be reduced). If a simple filter could block the visible wavelength, game camera manufacturers would be all over them, as well as the military. But the military lasers still emit a faint glow, the game camera still emit a faint glow and most people can see it. The 940nm is not as noticeable, but once my eyes night adjust I can clearly see it. The variable 850nm IR light even on low has a slight glow. I need a 940nm one modified with the pot
wink.gif
 
Last edited:
The pupil of the eye ONLY responds to visible electromagnetic energy that the eye can see and visualize, it does not respond to to any IR or any other electromagnetic energy that it cannot see or visualize.

The autonomic response of the pupil to visible wavelengths is completely unconscious and uncontrollable by the owner of the eyeball and indeed too much visible light will cause intense eye pain. IRand other non-visible wavelenths cause NO eye pain and zero response from the brain.
 
Weeellll Pilgrim, the answer is yes, or at least it must be visible to the two of us since we claim to see the glow at the emitter. As someone stated earlier though, you don't have to get much of an angle from directly in front of it for it to not show.
 
Originally Posted By: SkyPupThe pupil of the eye ONLY responds to visible electromagnetic energy that the eye can see and visualize, it does not respond to to any IR or any other electromagnetic energy that it cannot see or visualize.

The autonomic response of the pupil to visible wavelengths is completely unconscious and uncontrollable by the owner of the eyeball and indeed too much visible light will cause intense eye pain. IRand other non-visible wavelenths cause NO eye pain and zero response from the brain.


If your point is that a lack of an observed pupil response indicates that they can’t detect an IR emitter, I respectfully disagree. First, we see with our brain, not our eyes. Second, although in order to see or for the pupils to react, a light source must stimulate a certain amount of photoreceptors, there is no guarantee that the exact same amount of photoreceptors needed to see is the same amount as needed for a pupil response. The nerve fibers that control pupils branch before they reach the “seeing” portion of the brain. Keep in mind, even in complete darkness, some photoreceptors are firing (noise), but it is not enough to actually perceive light. Also, although pupil response can’t be controlled with respect to light, light is not the only factor that controls pupil size. Accommodation (focusing) controls pupil size as does hormones so if a coyote is searching the ground in front of it and then suddenly looks at a distant light source, their pupils will dilate as well as a fight or flight response. Finally, it is almost impossible to detect small changes on an animal because pupil response can be very subtle.
 
Weeelll Pardner, I thought my eye was responding I just wanted some reassurance. I can't see the beam, I was wondering why I see something at the source.
 
Originally Posted By: pmackIs the glow at the source of an 850 IR visible.
-
yes signature at source only .
if I take and use IR ( 850nm ) eye-safe power modes . in a completely zero light, dark room of the house and look into the emitting diode . You can see a tiny IR signature at the diode source . But all light of that 850nm frequency thrown in illumination of target is totally invisible to the eye of human and same for coyote .

(for example) an older Surefire M1 IR handheld, with a ' wide-angle ' beam . There is ' faint ' dull Red in color glow .
At ( arms length in front of you ) it has a 'very dull' red orb looking directly into it . and I mean very dull .
looking at the Surefire M1 wide-angle IR ( Across the room ) in complete darkness , shining it into a big mirror to see if there is any signature to be seen back at me . I can see something there, a small very dull Red color dot .

If you take a high-end IR unit and put it on eye-safe low power mode. and put it on a 'narrower' beam collimated down in size, to fill the your scopes Obj. field of view @ 100 yard .
And you put it at arms length in front of you, and look into it . There is a small tiny red glow .

The collimated 850nm beam signature is a brighter red but very small in size compared to the 'very' dull red but little bigger signature of the 850nm M1 surefire wide beam .
You have to look right into the 'center' of both the collimated beam and the Surefire M1 .
You have to be looking and have both units diode, in-line with your eye's line of sight to see it . If you move both Collimated and wide-angle IR beam off center in any direction other that center of the eye's line of sight they both ' totally Disappear ' and are invisible to the eye in total darkness of a closed room .
.
 
BTW, No terrestrial mammal of any species has ever had any response to IR in my career in Veterinary and Human Opthalmology, including no mouse, no rat, no rabbit, no guinea pig, no ferret, no chicken, no mongoose, no feline, no canine, no porcine, no bovine, no water buffalo, no mountain lion, no equine, and no homo sapien has ever had any pupillary response to any non-visible electromagnetic radiation of any kind, including all wavelengths of IR. Their pupils did, however, all respond to visible light.

To help substantiate many of the empirical claims made in this thread, I did hear of a woman in the University Eye Clinic once who claimed that MHz cell phone signals from cell phone towers and her cell phone caused pain in her eyes though, but she was in a psychotic state and had to be examined in a straight jacket and was taken away by armed men.
 
Skypup based on your experience and expertise in the field on Opthamology I believe and agree with all you're saying.

My experience makes me want to think otherwise. The response with my trail cams over the years tells me there's a reaction, could be audible, or visual but many if not all react to the camera, while others don't care at all.

When using red lights I believe I was hidden by the light as do most predator hunters. Tolerance to that visible light varies and some come charging in while others are wary and avoid the light. NV was the first step and now thermal to avoid the adverse reaction to visible light.

The video and picture I posted above are of same 850 IR light, I don't believe the coyote can see the beam and I'm not sure if he sees the red glow from my shooting position or if I'm hidden from him just as I was with red lights. The picture created by the camera leads the mind to believe you're hidden just as you were with red lights but in reality what is visible is just the glow of the emitter. Say similar to what we'd see looking at a cigarette lighter from a distance.

IS the glow generated by the heat signature of the IR, or just the intensity at the surface of the source?



 
Last edited:
Originally Posted By: DoubleUpSkyPup, Lol, don't ALL coyote hunters need to be in a straight jacket? Merry Christmas to all!

When I tell people their's some thing special about sitting in the middle of a dark cold field at 3 AM shivering with shooting stars going by waiting for that critter to show they all think I'm crazy.
 
Last edited:
Coyotes see with their nose ten million times better than with their eyes!

Merry Christmas to All and Happy Hunting in the New Year!
 
Back
Top