Re: can ants distinguish between colors as red, orange, and yellow?

Thank you for your question.

Yes, ants can see colors. But they certainly see the color of an object 
different to us humans. This is due to following reasons:
1.) Ants have 4 different light absorbing pigments (humans only 3).
2.) They probably see UV light as a color.
3.) They probably see different directions of polarisation of the light as 
different colors.
While most insects (for example bees and wasps) can not see red light, ants 
can. So, yes, it is most likely that they can distinguish the colors you are 
specifically interested in, red, orange, and yellow.

The brain computes out of all the information delivered from all sensory 
vision cells one image. Sadly we still lack any real idea how this is done 
in ants. Therefore it is impossible to tell how this image looks like for a 
ant.

One more warning: there are thousands of ant species. Most of what we know 
about ants comes from a very few species investigated. It is near sure, if 
scientists investigate further they will find surprises and exemptions to 
what I said. 

I already answered a similar question, you might like to check it out:  click 
here 


The information given is from:
Heinz Penzlin, Lehrbuch der Tierphysiologie, 4. Auflage, Gustav Fischer 
Verlag  -  (sorry - in German language only)

Hope that helps
Jurgen Ziesmann