Exercise #4

Cats are built to hunt. Among their superior senses, they have excellent eyesight. They have a wider field of vision than humans do, so they can accurately judge where their prey is. Their large, light-sensitive eyes, like their wild cousins, are for night hunting. A cat’s pupils contract to slits rather than circles. This allows them to control more precisely the amount of light that enters their eyes and also to protect their retinas. The pupils also have a reflective layer called the tapetum lucidum that helps cats see better in darkness—and makes their eyes shine yellow-green in car headlights or flash photographs.

Text above was taken from page 10 of:

Singer, Marilyn. Cats to the Rescue. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2006. Print.

Cats can see better than humans and they see very well even at night. The pupils in their eyes can open very wide to see better. To protect their eyes in bright light their pupils narrow to slits to limit the light coming into their eyes. In photos where a flash was used, cat’s eyes might look a yellowish green color. This is because one of the things that helps them see better in low light reflects this color in bright light. These special features of their eyes help them to see what they are hunting.

Works Cited

Singer, Marilyn. Cats to the Rescue. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2006. Print.