Why do babies have blue eyes when they are born? And why do their eyes change color after a while, often several times before settling down?
/Kate
Not all babies have blue eyes at birth.
The body’s production of melanin is strongly affected by light. The color of the eye can change after birth, and often does. Babies who are genetically predisposed to high levels of melanin might have brown eyes at birth, but many have little or no melanin in the eyes (or on the skin) at birth. During the next few days, melanin production increases, and the genetically coded color levels will express themselves.
Tris
This discusses changes in eye color even for adults, and mentions melanin levels as Triskadecamus said.
Neither of my kids were born with blue eyes. Jr Ranger I had brown and Jr. Ranger II had a steel grey. They both still have those colors, fourteen and seven years later. Now that I think about it, I don’t know anyone who’s children wwre born with blue eyes that changed as they got older.
Ranger, meet Cranky.
Not a radical change, though. I didn’t notice, but our son’s photographer noticed it when he came to take pictures at around 17 months (my son’s age, I mean). People who saw the photos (and my son) after that point asked about his eye color changing, too. He went from very gorgeously blue to a much duller blue-grey. Sniffle.
And meet tygre’s #1 Son - who was born with bright blue eyes that changed to green after the age of 2. He’s almost 4 now.
Hubby and I both have green eyes as well.
#2 Daughter has blue eyes still - she will be a year old on Thursday - but I’m expecting that hers will likely change as well.
–tygre
Nice to meet you both 
Apparently my family and friends are just odd. I suspected as much…
My first baby’s eyes ( Tees ) were flat black with no real iris pattern when he was born. Looked like giant pupils from a couple feet away.
As a young man unfamiliar with new babies, I was startled and worried by this. They assured me it was normal, and in a few days the blue irises came in. There were no changes after that.
As for my second child ( :**D ) her eyes were similar, but more flat grey with a distinct black pupil. Then quickly blue and no further change.
Our daughter was born with light/medium blue eyes which have stayed pretty much the same.
Son was born with the “typical” baby dark blue/gray that I think the OP is referring to. At 18 mos. his eyes are now medium brown.
Perhaps the title of the thread might have been, "Why are Caucasian babies’ eyes blue? ". And, it’s an honest question, I’m not trying to race bait, or start any kind of argument AT ALL here.
My children’s eyes are deep deep brown, almost black. Apparently they were the day they were born, although I didn’t get my mitts on them until one was 6Mo, the other was 4.5 Mo. They’re Korean.
Cartooniverse
Have we had any medical professionals weigh in here?
I know for felines (the future former and I raised purebred felines) they always had light blue eyes from the moment they opened their eyes and slowly changed to their “final” color over the following weeks.
That’s true whether the ending color was another shade of blue, copper, or even odd eyed.
-Doug
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- instead of opening a new thread…*
If a baby is born with blue eyes that’ll change to hazel, how old would he or she be when they started to change? A couple of weeks, a month, longer? I know that it might take them a while before they change to their final color, but that’s not what I’m really asking; just when they’ve begun to change enough so the color’s noticiably different than it was at birth.
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I was born with blue eyes. I’m half-Asian. I think they changed to brown within a week. (sulk)
Whatsit Jr.'s eyes were midnight blue when he was born. Within a week they were noticeably lighter, although still blue. Within a month, they had changed into an interesting shade of hazel with flecks of gold.
I state this without any authority at all other than its the view of a friend…who has a keen but non-academic interest in these matters…
Evolution has made babies more ‘desirable’ in as much as way back when mothers may have had to choose (no contraception, flood, famine, pestilence, all that Biblical malarkey) which of their offspring to feed (and in the absence of any other determining factors), they were swayed by physical appearance.
Babies born with melanin/big blue eyes may have been harder to not breast feed than babies with small brown eyes…I imagine a similar argument, or not, could be advanced as to why babies can scream so loudly, etc.
The obvious point being, he belatedly says, that there is a higher likelihood of babies born with melanin growing up to procreate more babies with melanin.
It’s also a terribly sad fact that these kinds of choices are still made today, although I have no idea how African mothers approach their decisions.
Hm, Asian babies tend not to have blue eyes, either.
The darker the color, the sooner it changes (this makes sense if you think of the degree of melanin - people with more melanin tan more quickly, too). Hence, people of asian and african descent, who generally have very dark brown eyes, will have their eyes be brown at birth or shortly thereafter. Sometimes it is hard to tell, because if they are blue, the blue is so dark that it looks black. I do recall a chinese friend mentioning that babies are born with ‘black’ eyes that turn brown. So, could be blue but too dark to register as blue - not like you spend a lot of time shining bright lights at their eyes to differentiate the difference… if they’d even keep their eyes open if you tried!
My little sister is a good example of the age of color change - or rather, her kids are. The oldest has fairly dark brown eyes. Her eyes turned, IIRC, when she was a few months old. Her second child has light brown eyes. His didn’t turn until about 15 months old. I can’t remember what color eyes the baby has… And my eyes have slowly changed to green from blue - in my 30s (even convinced the DMV to change the color on my license when I renewed it, by asking them what color THEY thought they were… And I used to have blueberry blue eyes).
Anyway, here’s my favorite ‘explanation’ link. It does say that ‘all’ babies are born with blue eyes. I suspect that some babies are born with brown, just the same way as babies are born with different colors of skin (melanin DOES produce to some degree before birth!).
Genetics, heh, go figure - my twins were born with slate blue eyes that change to the most remarkable grey which they kept for a couple of months, I had hopes of forever, but by about 8 months finalized on deep brown. The baby started out deep blue and have shifted to a bronzy hazel, but since he’s on;y 8 months old I’m not convinced this is final. Their genetic makeup covers contributory ancestors from every continent but Africa.
My dear friend (caucasion) and her (black) husband produced two lovely children one of whom was born with blue eyes the other with a weird pale amber - both now have brown eyes.