Birds, fish, reptiles, amphibians, insects? Sure. But no mammals.
So I had to google it. Apparently, there is a sloth that moves around so slowly moss grows all over it and it doesn’t care. So it may appear green, but only in the sense that it wears it.
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This may have already been covered but whilst there might not be mammals that appear green to human eyes there are certainly mamals that appear green to the prey/predators in their environment.
Perfect example is a tiger who (to us) stands out like a sore thumb with its orange fur but is perceived as green with black stripes through the eyes of its prey, making it very well camouflaged in the jungle.
Do you mean my cats are actually green in the eyes of it’s potential prey?
walking 🥑
It’s an avocato.
You’d think evolutionary, there would be at least some green mammals to help them blend into the plant life around them. Like bunnies hiding in bushes, or monkeys in trees. I suppose shades of brown work similarly in the same situations.
I know some predators don’t see color the same way humans do — could the lack of green and dominance of brown have something to do with seeing motion, or heat, or something else we don’t see?
iirc, the reason tigers are black and orange stripey is because deers and whatever else they eat don’t see orange, they see green. This blends the tiger in with the surroundings better.
That’s why hunters’ jackets are bright orange. Hides them from game (whilst simultaneously making them visible to other people)
Right? I guess that’s what puzzles me the most about it. It must be really hard for mammals to become green since you would think it would confer an advantage in many environments you find them in.
I guess there are a lot of mammal species that kind of make themselves scarce during the broad daylight hours, so maybe green camouflage is less relevant if you’re only out between dusk and dawn?
This is just a guess, but could it be that brown is more useful since mammals (at least the first ones) dwell on and in the ground, where brown would be more beneficial for survival?
At least humans have the highest sensitivity specifically around 555 nm (green).
Does it count if they are glowing bunnies?
Ha!! You really had to go down the “rabbit hole” for that one I bet! Awesome.
“yes uhh… We need to make bunnies that glow in the dark… for medicine… Yess.”
We might not be looking at them with the right eyes
Wow, that is fascinating!
Makes me wonder about the other direction, going into the near infrared as opposed to UV. I remember from a class in remote sensing that many plants are actually most reflective in that band (more so than in green, even). NIR air photos are often used by biologists to get an indication of the health of a forest. But I have no idea whether animals also reflect NIR? It may be that most animals cannot see in that band in the first place, so it would not offer any camouflage advantage.
They’re out there but it’s been hard to document their existence since they blend in so well with their environment. This natural camouflage is a double-edged sword, however: they may be able to avoid getting eaten by predators but it also makes reproduction particularly challenging since they have a hard time finding one another to do it like the Discovery channel.
Even when a potential breeding pair are able to meet up, their coupling is far from guaranteed due to the abundance of other green orifices in their usual habitats. Grass-covered mole tunnels, mossy logs with holes in them and bee nests in leafy trees have all been accidental natural fleshlights for these poor creatures. Like they say, it’s not easy being green.
What about Shrek
He’s an onion
I don’t know how relevant this is but I heard human eyes are very good at picking shades of green out. Maybe mammals are generally good at spotting greens and so hiding as a green thing doesn’t work as well. Just a guess though
From what other posters are saying, it may be the other way around? That is, most mammals cannot see green, so it doesn’t matter from a camouflage perspective among mammals. Humans (and primates in general) are an outlier in this repect.
Bird of prey can, though, so there’s that.
Word! That’s cool
I thought veritasium explained in his night vision video that this wasn’t the case? I’m not sure though.
I thought Veritasium was a Harry Potter spell but apparently I should have already known and watched a YouTube video before posting my silly thoughts.
What about the Hulk???
Not a mammal, he hatched from a green egg
The ones from Dr Seuss
Wouldn’t that make him a monotreme?
I think you’re right. I can’t think of a single green mammal. Why can we have green or blue eyes, but not other things?
I remember reading an article in a Nickelodeon magazine when I was a kid about a cat that had a genetic defect that gave it green fur. It looked pretty cool.
Crazy. I had to look it up and I found some stuff, including this old web article from 2002 that talks about this cat. The cat’s name was, Miss Greeny, apparently.
There are multiple sources, but there is no wiki page and none of the sources seem well known, so I’m having a hard time figuring out if it’s legit, or just a really good hoax.
What about a moldy sloth?
Some slothmosses have and exclusive deal with their host!
I don’t think the OP claimed fish were mammals
I don’t think the OP claimed fish were mammals
I wasn’t responding to the OP, and yes, you’re right.
Our points are not mutually exclusive.
Edit: Moving quickly while on my cell phone. I meant to reply to this comment.
By making a root level comment you were exclusively responding to OP. So yes you were.
I just don’t think the situation in Tel Aviv is sustainable and, moreover, the lack of action on the global stage to mitigate it is troubling.
By making a root level comment you were exclusively responding to OP. So yes you were.
My mistake. My goal in writing it was to reply to this comment, and not the OP.
I guess you’ve never heard of parrots. Or snakes. Or fish. Or insects.
I’m guessing you misread the title as animals instead of mammals, and then didn’t read the actual post text
I think you read mammals as animal
I did. My bad.
You’ll get’em next time.
Damn. I never knew that these were mammals…
You might have to look up the word “mammal”
You might need to read the post where I admitted I misread it as “animal,” due to being half asleep. Thank you, helpy helper.
None of those are mammals…
Alan Davis?
Blue whales
Whoody Who?
https://youtu.be/0MDQp3fG4OI?si=tiVqzoE0m4p8F2Iu
Sorry it’s a short, couldn’t find a proper clip
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://piped.video/0MDQp3fG4OI?si=tiVqzoE0m4p8F2Iu
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Not a single one of those is a mammal. I guess you have never heard of one.
