# Eye glowing red



## mozart (Feb 24, 2012)

Is this a cause for concern?










I think I recall reading, years ago, something about a red reflection in a dog's eye being indicative of retinal cancer. I can no longer find anything to back that up online. 

The back story is that this is a ~7-year-old rescue dachshund, spayed female, of unknown history, that my family has owned for three years. Her eyes have always glowed like this with camera flash; I can't tell you if it's consistently the same eye that shows red, or if it varies. She has never had an official eye exam (the small animal veterinary care around here is pretty poor), but we have no reason to suspect that she has compromised vision. This is her only "symptom," if you can even call it that.

I've read that pale-colored or animals may lack a tapetum lucidum in their choroid (and thus reflect red), but that doesn't seem to apply here, nor would it explain why one eye shines blue and the other red.


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## Keechak (Aug 10, 2008)

I used to have a dog with blue eyes, for 15 years his eyes flashed red in the camera, he developed cataracts at 10 years old and wasn't adversely affected by them till he was 14 years old. I wouldn't worry.


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## Kyllobernese (Feb 5, 2008)

I have a blue eyed dog and his eyes always flash red from the camera. You cannot remove it with the "red-eye" on the camera.


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## Kyllobernese (Feb 5, 2008)

I have a blue eyed dog and his eyes always flash red from the camera. You cannot remove it with the "red-eye" on the camera.


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## Willowy (Dec 10, 2007)

Is that eye blue? If so, normal---blue eyes always shine red. But if not. . .I dunno . But if she seems OK I wouldn't worry.


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## mozart (Feb 24, 2012)

Both eyes are brown, for what it's worth, and both have an odd reflective quality unlike the other dogs' eyes, but which I can't properly explain.


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## JDBOYZ1 (Mar 31, 2021)

mozart said:


> Is this a cause for concern?
> 
> 
> 
> ...


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## JDBOYZ1 (Mar 31, 2021)

My dog's eyes glow red with any flashlight. She has one Brown eye and one Brown & Blue eye. I dont think eye color matters. I thought only Wolves eye glowed red though?


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## LeoRose (Aug 20, 2015)

Nine year old thread, and the OP is long gone.

Eyes can shine many different colors when reflecting light. My brown-eyed dogs reflect anything from yellow to green to a blueish color. Blue-eyed animals, like my Siamese cross cat, usually reflect red. Humans usually reflect red, as well.

2020-12-13 Lana Vs Christmas Tree DSC_0186 by Rosemary Elwell, on Flickr

That said, if your dog's eyes have usually reflected one color (range), and suddenly start reflecting a drastically different one like red, or you start to not see any reflecting at all, then yes, there could be cause for concern.


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