I’m not trying to troll, I’m genuinely curious. Thinking about deer specifically, it doesn’t seem like visual camouflage would really help much when hunting them. Deer sense predators by sensitive hearing (big ears) and smell (long snout). Their eyes are on the sides of their head, so they detect motion rather than high-resolution.

So trying to blend in with the surroundings doesn’t seem to be an advantage in this case. Assuming all this, what’s the point of clothing with camo print on it?

  • Fizz@lemmy.nzEnglish
    6·
    19 hours ago

    Hunters try to account for the deers senses, approaching from up wind so they cant smell you. Sneaking so they cant hear you, it makes sense that you’d also use camo so they cant see you.

    Most of the hunters I know go for the hi vis orange camo so you stand out to humans but not deer since they cannot see the colours.

    • baggachipz@sh.itjust.worksOP
      21·
      18 hours ago

      But if you’re moving slowly, isn’t that enough? The camo still seems useless in this context. I get wearing orange but as far as I can tell, the camo pattern is entirely useless.

      • NebLem@lemmy.world
        8·
        18 hours ago

        Breaking up your silhouette is the advantage, but for deer specifically the woodland color palette isn’t doing anything. However its really common to hunt more than one kind of animal, and fowl in particular have great eyesight.

        That being said, plenty of old timers hunt okay in standard outdoor gear and use the environment for their concealment. The high end stuff is absolutely for the larpers.

        • baggachipz@sh.itjust.worksOP
          21·
          18 hours ago

          Right I’m just thinking of it with regard to deer hunting which afaik is the most popular type. Duck hunters, turkey hunters, sure… camo would help. But there’s so much “lifestyle gear” specifically depicting deer hunting which is all camo print.

          • RattlerSix@lemmy.worldEnglish
            3·
            16 hours ago

            It still breaks up the hunter’s pattern and is still an advantage to look like sticks and leaves even if deer see sticks and leaves differently than we do.

              • RattlerSix@lemmy.worldEnglish
                2·
                14 hours ago

                It’s fact that breaking up your outline works, just Google “science deer camouflage.”

                It’s common sense that if you dress like a tree, you’ll look like a tree to a deer no matter how they see trees. If they see trees as yellow triangles and you dress like a tree, you’d look like a yellow triangle to a deer. The only other thing is they see UV better, so don’t use UV reflective cloth or you’d look like a strange glowing yellow rectangle.