I’m a dog-lover in a big way. Not much in my life more important than the care of my dogs. That said, I wonder when on our late evening walks if I’m acting in his better interests when I shine down the road or would it be better if I kept the beam nearer my feet and let his innate night vision do its thing. Any thoughts?
Good question!
I don’t know the answer, though.
Of course, dogs have much better vision and (night vision) than humans.
I would just use the flashlight for the benefit of the humans, and hope that the dogs can see what they need to see with their superior vision. 
My dog doesn’t seem to notice the light from led’s. she will be out in the yard and i will light her up and she doesn’t even look around to me.
I use red and my dog doesn’t notice it or act differently. With a dual channel red/white, as soon as I switch to white she notices. Helpful as I can keep the red on her to watch her without disturbing whatever she’s doing, then switch to white to get her attention; she also taught herself to take white aimed a certain way as “walk/pay attention in this direction”.
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What a great training idea …
Yeah, I was impressed, I didn’t even specifically try to train her, she just started acting that way. Very nice when the path branches and I want to tell her to go a specific way.
That makes it even better!
My dog, which passed away last year, was quite old and I’m not sure he could see too well.
Sometimes there would be a wild rabbit in our yard not too far away from him, and he usually wouldn’t see it.
At night, if there were a rabbit in our yard, I would point my flashlight directly at the rabbit and my dog never figured out that there was a rabbit there (at night.)
He loved to chase rabbits, though he rarely caught them, so I thought I was helping him by pointing my flashlight right at the rabbit. 
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I think of it like using night-vision binos. You look through 'em and can see everything in Glorious Green that you’d have zero hope of seeing without 'em.
But as soon as you put 'em down, you’re totally night-blind until you dark-adapt for 20min.
I figure the same with dogs/cats. You can shine up ahead to let them see better, or so you might think (they can’t talk to let you know if it’s better or worse), but then as soon as you’re shining on something else, some Big Evil Bear can sneak up from the side/back and eat him, because he’ll essentially be night-blind except for where you’re now shining, which is likely not in the direction of the Big Evil Bear.
Older dog seems to have occasional trouble seeing at night and will follow the light in dark areas. Younger dog is largely disinterested in the light.
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Apart from a number of (useless) doglights I made myself I have two lights when I’m going on a nightly walk with my dog.
- The famous discontinued Fenix CL05 liplight. I attach it to her harnass, so it shines more or less around her.
- Same goes for the Glotoob. Awful expensive in NL, but I got it in a black Friday sale.
Being 13½ yrs old, my dogs vision isn’t what it used to be. The light makes both of us walk more relaxed.
Me because I’m less prone to breaking my bones by tripping over my grey dog in the dark.
My dog, because she doesn’t run into branches hanging over the path.
I never use red light when walking with the Fenix, because dogs can’t see red light. I use the green light instead.
I was going to post almost exactly what Lightbringer said. A light helps you because you can always point it in the direction you’re looking, otherwise it destroys your night vision. It’s going to do the same thing to your dog, but your dog doesn’t have the benefit of always being able to point the light where it’s looking.
Most dogs will struggle with even the simplest u.i. and never really reap any benefit from the light.
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Hahaha!
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+1! 
Every dog I have had enjoyed Me Shining my lights down the trail. I spot animals that they like to investigate.
Thay all became experts at following the beams and locating the animals by their eyes.
As long as I have enough flood I wont trip on the varoius roots, groundhog holes and other possible obstacles.
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My dog could not care less. Doesn’t change her behaviour at all with flashlight vs without flashlight. There’s more interesting things on walks apparently
For both my dogs, the world is primarily one of auditory and olfactory experiences, with vision being secondary. At night there’s generally enough light for me to navigate by with ambient outdoor lighting some >99% of the time (the flashlight is primarily for finding leavings). The young dog has seemingly never cared one way or another about the flashlight unless they look into it; sometimes I think they trigger on motion in near-darkness at night (cats, rabbits) but that could just as easily be sound. The old dog has occasionally hesitated when the path is uncertain in darker patches and the flashlight can seemingly provide that confidence to proceed, but this is somewhat uncommon and they normally make their way with ease.
The older we get, the more we will need a flashlight. This goes for man as well as for his best friend.
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There are certainly a lot of different breeds. Some are much more alert than others, some are hunting dogs, some have a high prey Drive and some are just aloof.