What colours do dogs best respond to?

I don’t think the clothes are the problem , more the smells and noise . Oh and making yourself as small as possible when approaching them , always reward the good things they do Speak like you would a baby

Your best is in the violet, indigo or blue family, which dogs have the best ability to differentiate shades, but really I don’t think they care!

” . . .in the late 1980s, a definitive set of experiments was done at the University of California, Santa Barbara, by what may well be the world’s foremost research program on comparative color vision.

These experiments showed that dogs do see color, but in a more limited range than that seen by normal humans, who see the rainbow of colors described by “VIBGYOR”: Violet, Indigo, Blue, Green, Yellow, Orange, and Red (plus hundreds of variations on these shades). Instead, dogs see “VIBYYYR” (Violet, Indigo, Blue, Yellow, Yellow, Yellow, and Red). The colors Green, Yellow, and Orange all look alike to dogs; but look different from Red and different from the various Blues and Purples. Dogs are very good at telling different shades of VIB apart. Finally, Blue-Green looks White to dogs.

The simple explanation for these differences in color vision is this. The retinas of normal humans have three (3) types of color receptors, called “cones”. Each cone type is particularly sensitive to light of a narrow limit within the entire VIBGYOR range. That means that three different “cone lines” of communication run back to the visual part of the brain, which then compares the weight of the signals coming in from each of cone “line”. Different weights produce a perception of different colors. In dogs (and in “green-blind” humans), there are only two (2) types of cones, so there is less basis for comparison by the brain, and thus the perceived color range is more limited. In sum, dog color vision is “color-limited”, not “color-blind”.”

Source

@sandystrachan indeed .. though I have noticed in dealing with animals in general and canines in particular, that the size colour and arrangement of clothing does have an effect on their first reaction to the subject.

@Marina thank you for the elaborate explanation. I’ll take note of that. I didn’t know about the green-blind issue to be so similar to humans.

I remember reading about the color phenomenon @Marina explains somewhere might have been fluther and what good news it was, since previous to that I had always heard they were color blind. It’s funny, because I wear tons of blue, and have always had a good connection and deep love for dogs. The color discovery for me explained why dogs have always been so responsive.

@Anatelostaxus Actually, while I knew they could see color, and I knew they could not see it as well as humans, i did not know all of that detail, and was pleased to learn more myself. So, thanks for asking!

I wouldn’t worry so much about the color of my clothes. What I think is more important is to spend individual time with each pup away from the other. The sometimes problem of having 2 pups at the same time is that they become more dependent on each other and bond less completely with you.