Page 50 - World of Animals - Deadly Predators

HAWKS ON
THE HUNT
Sharp claws and even sharper eyes make hawks formidable predators
Words Victoria Williams
awks are powerful birds of
prey belonging to the family
Accipitridae. They can be divided
into two groups – the ‘true’
H hawks belonging to the subfamily
Accipitrinae and the members of the genus
Buteo. The former are usually found in or
near woodland and include sparrowhawks,
goshawks and sharp-shinned hawks. Birds
classified in Buteo are called buzzards in
Europe, but in America they’re known as
hawks. This genus includes birds with shorter,
broader wings like the red-tailed hawk, the
common buzzard and the Galapagos hawk.
Widespread and varying in their appearance
and behaviour, they all share keen senses and referred to as the killing talon as it’s used
fatally sharp talons.
All hawk species hunt during daylight
hours, but they’ll sometimes use the cover of
dusk for the last attack of the day. A hawk
on the hunt for its next meal uses height to
its advantage. Soaring through the air or
perching on a high resting place, the bird
uses its sharp vision to search for prey – its
eyes are fixed in their sockets and cannot
rotate like ours, so the bird turns its head
from side to side to scan the landscape
below. Hawks have eyesight several times
better than our own and can even see light
waves invisible to us, allowing them to spot
prey a mile away. After locking onto a target,
The crested
goshawk has short different species have different tactics for
wings, helping getting their talons around it.
it manoeuvre
between trees Some hawks, like red-tailed hawks and
in Asia’s other buzzards, launch themselves down
tropical forests
from the sky or from perches and glide at
© Getty groups still rely on them today. The birds are
high speed to catch prey as it passes below
them. Stretching their legs out in front of
them, they time their descent carefully and
meet their prey with a heavy blow. Other
species, like sharp-shinned hawks, forego
stealth and surprise in favour of long chases.
Darting between trees, they pursue smaller
birds closely until they catch them or the
prey escapes.
On impact, a hawk uses its muscular toes
to clamp its talons onto its prey. Hawks
have four razor-sharp talons on each foot
– three pointing forward and one pointing
backwards. The large talon on this backward-
facing toe, known as the first digit, is often
to tear into the prey while the others hold
it down.
Hawks don’t kill their prey particularly
quickly. While the force of the bird’s weight
and the impact of its talons will sometimes
be enough to end an animal’s life, the hawk’s
initial focus is simply to subdue the prey
and hold it still. Small prey animals can be
suffocated or pierced, but when dealing with
larger creatures the hunter will usually hold
it securely and begin to eat it while it’s still
alive. Some of the meat is stored in a pouch
in the neck called the crop so the bird can
eat more than it has room for in its stomach –
after the first helping has been digested,
this stored food moves down into the
digestive system.
The deadly power of raptors has been used
by humans for hundreds – if not thousands
– of years. Birds of prey were used in many
civilisations for hunting and sport, and some
trained to carry quarry from successful hunts
back to their handlers, where it is exchanged
for another piece of food. While falconers
specialise in training and flying falcons, a
person who flies hawks is sometimes known
as an austringer. Hawks were historically
launched from the arm of a person either
on foot or on horseback to pursue game
including hares, rabbits and birds, but today
a small number are launched from the
windows of moving vehicles.