Why sheep have rectangular pupils: these mammals can see almost 360 degrees around them

If you look directly into the eyes of a sheep, you will notice that instead of an elastic round pupil like in humans, they have a rectangular black spot in the middle of their eyes. Why is that?

Thanks to this shape, sheep can see almost 360 degrees around them. And this comes in handy when a predator is approaching and the animals need to run away, writes IflScience.

"It was very clear that these animals tend to almost always have eyes on the side of their head instead of frontal eyes like we do. The fact that their eyes are on the side of their head allows them to see almost 360 degrees around them," says principal investigator Marty Banks of the visual spatial perception laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley.

According to the scientist, the elongated pupil improves panoramic vision by letting in more light, so the left eye can see behind the animal on the left, and the longer pupil allows more light to enter in that direction so they can see better.

"Interestingly, the fact that the pupil is narrow vertically, has the effect of sharpening horizontal contours the animal might see. And they might well need that for placing their feet on the ground as they try to run away from a predator," Banks explains.

In fact, there is a wide variety of pupil shapes in the animal kingdom. Cats have vertical slits that are great for ambush predators, while tall predators like humans tend to have round pupils. And if you think sheep's pupils are weird, google what cuttlefish pupils look like.

Perhaps the strangest of all, however, is the mongoose. While most animals seem to follow this rule of vertical for predators and horizontal for prey, this bloodthirsty filiform has pupils more like sheep's.

"That animal does not fit our account at all," the scientist said.

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