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Pets

Do Bulls Hate the Color Red?

Updated: Jun 04, 2024

Bulls do not hate the color red. Bulls, like other cattle, have partial blindness and cannot differentiate between colors. Rather, bulls charge at whatever object is moving the most. For example, matadors use not only the muleta, the well-known red cape of bull fights, but they also use the capote, a larger cape that is magenta on one side and gold or blue on the other.

More about bulls:

  • The term "bull" refers only to the non-castrated male, whereas the term "cow" only refers to the female. Males that have been castrated are generally referred to as a steer, ox, or bullock.
  • An adult male can weigh between 1,100 to 2,200 pounds (500 to 1,000 kg).
  • Fighting bulls are mostly bred free-range and selected based on their stamina, aggression, energy, and strength.
Discussion Comments
By Hazali — On Sep 08, 2014

I don't know how well this relates to the article, but I thought it would be interesting to bring up. The other day, I was watching an animated movie called Barnyard. One thing I noticed is that the male cows had udders. This is just my opinion, but I thought it was very disturbing and unneeded. Maybe it's supposed to be a joke, but I also imagine that it would confuse kids as well, who need to be able to tell the difference between fiction and reality. After all, "cow" only relates to female, and they're the ones who have udders. However, "bull" refers to male, and they don't have udders.

By Viranty — On Sep 07, 2014

Speaking of being colorblind, I have always wondered how people are able to tell that animals are colorblind, since that might be rather difficult to do. Perhaps one way in which they go about doing this is when people look at the eyes of certain animals, through x-rays and experimentation, they notice that some animals lack the color receptors that people do. This could be a possibility, and that makes it all the more interesting. I imagine that it must be quite difficult for animals with (partial) colorblindness to adapt to their surroundings, as their perceptions would need to be based on movement, more than anything else.

By Euroxati — On Sep 06, 2014

From reading this article, it really shows that animals perceive the world a lot more different than we do. Not only do they view colors a lot more different than us, but on another note, some of them don't even see colors. On the other hand, considering how bulls are colorblind, I've always wondered how it became a running joke in the media for bulls to be attracted to red capes, unless it was more based on charging at anything that they see. Overall, while it's true that animals view the world a lot more different than we do, their perceptions and body language are quite interesting.

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