Close-up of a hawk.
Credit Photo by Bryan Hanson on Unsplash
The National Bird of Punjab, India
There is one thing we love about our jobs here at the World in Beauty – our close connection with photographers and their ability to catch the beautiful, intricate features of wildlife. To snap a picture detailing every tuft of hair and feather or to capture the expression in a bird or in an animal’s eyes is a gift. This hawk, whose eyes play a significant role in its survival in the wild, is mainly a woodland bird. They have long tails and visual acuity. Like most birds, their eyes are tetrachromats with four types of color receptors in each eye. These give hawks the ability to perceive the visible range as well as ultraviolet light. Therefore, they can hunt by dashing suddenly from a concealed perch.
In February 2005, Canadian ornithologist Louis Lefebvre announced a method of measuring avian “IQ” by measuring their innovation in feeding habits. Based on this scale, hawks were named among the most intelligent birds and are also particularly intelligent towards humans and other hawks. A relatively unknown fact – Hawks are highly associated with Guru Gobind Singh in the Sikh community. According to ornithologists, he is believed to have kept a white Northern Goshawk. This is reflected in that the Northern Goshawk was made the official state bird of Punjab, India.
