Birds

Hawk

Accipiter and Buteo · also called hawks, buzzards

Not Evaluated carnivore Temperate forest Temperate grassland Mountains

“Hawk” covers two quite different birds doing the same job. One is the short-winged, long-tailed forest ambusher that threads through branches at speed to snatch other birds. The other is the broad-winged soarer that hangs over a field on rising air and drops on a rodent. Both hunt by day, both kill with their feet, and both see the world in far more detail than we do.

Overview

Hawks are medium-sized day-hunting birds of prey in the family Accipitridae, the same family as eagles and kites. The name mainly covers the forest hawks (accipiters — sharp-shinned, Cooper’s, goshawk) and the open-country hawks (buteos — red-tailed, red-shouldered, common buzzard). All are carnivores taking live vertebrate prey, and in all of them the female is larger than the male. They live on every continent except Antarctica.

Two shapes

Accipiters have short rounded wings and a long tail built for tight turns and ambush; buteos have broad wings and a fan tail built for slow soaring and hovering before a stoop. A hawk’s retina carries two to five times the receptor density of a human’s, with two sharp-vision pits per eye, and many can see the ultraviolet glow of rodent urine trails.

Rivers of hawks

On migration, hawks ride thermals in swirling flocks called kettles, circling to the top of each rising column then gliding to the next. At bottlenecks like Hawk Mountain and Veracruz, hundreds of thousands to millions pass over in one autumn.

Status

Hawks as a group are Not Evaluated. Most temperate species are common or increasing, several thriving in farmland and cities, after recovering strongly once DDT was banned in the 1970s. Some tropical forest and island hawks are declining from deforestation, and hawks everywhere are still lost to shooting, vehicle and turbine collisions, and rodenticide poisoning.

Hawk: common questions

What is the difference between a hawk, an eagle, and a falcon?

Hawks and eagles are both in the family Accipitridae and differ mainly by size and power, with eagles being the largest members, heavier, with more powerful feet and often feathered legs, and hawks being the medium and smaller members. Within hawks, the accipiters are agile bird-hunters of woodland and the buteos are soaring rodent-hunters of open country. Falcons are a separate family, Falconidae, not closely related despite the similar look; they have long pointed wings, kill with a notched beak as well as the feet, and the fastest, such as the peregrine, hunt by high-speed dives. The similarities among all three are a case of convergent evolution toward the demands of catching live prey.

How well can a hawk actually see?

Extremely well by human standards. A hawk's eye is large relative to its head, and its retina carries roughly two to five times the density of receptor cells that ours does, concentrated in two deep pits of sharpest vision per eye rather than one. The practical result is visual acuity around two to five times a person's, so a hawk soaring at a few hundred metres can resolve a vole moving in the grass, and it can also track fast motion smoothly and see into the near ultraviolet, which makes rodent urine trails visible as glowing lines across a field. The eyes are so large they are nearly immobile, so a hawk turns its whole head to look around.

Why do I see hawks circling high in the sky?

Usually they are riding a thermal, a column of warm air rising from ground that the sun has heated. By circling within the column with wings and tail spread, a broad-winged hawk gains height for free, then glides off in the direction it wants to travel, trading that height for distance until it finds the next thermal. Hawks use this to search for prey over a wide area, to patrol a territory, and above all to migrate, since soaring costs a fraction of the energy of flapping flight. Several hawks circling together, a kettle, is a common sight on migration days in spring and autumn.

Are hawks dangerous to pets or people?

To people, no; hawks do not regard humans as prey and attacks are limited to rare cases of a bird defending a nest, which amount to a swoop and at most a scratch. To small pets, occasionally. A large hawk such as a red-tailed hawk can take a small kitten, a very small dog, or free-ranging poultry and pet rabbits, and Cooper's hawks in particular hunt the birds that gather at feeders. The risk is low and easily managed by supervising small animals outdoors, providing cover near feeders, and keeping poultry in covered runs. Hawks are protected by law in most countries, so harming or trapping one is illegal.

Sources & further reading

Written by HideShark Editorial Team · reviewed by HideShark Science Desk. Published September 10, 2026. Last updated September 10, 2026.

Quick facts

Scientific name: Accipiter and Buteo
Diet: Live vertebrate prey caught with the feet, mainly small mammals such as voles, mice, ground squirrels, and rabbits for the open-country hawks and small and medium birds for the forest hawks, along with reptiles, amphibians, and large insects, and carrion when hunting is poor
Two body plans for two hunting styles: The forest hawks, or accipiters, have short rounded wings and a long tail for sharp turns through branches and ambush at speed, while the open-country hawks, or buteos, have broad wings and a fan tail for slow soaring and hanging in the wind before a stoop
Eyesight far beyond a human's: A hawk's retina is packed with several times the density of light-detecting cells that a human eye has, plus a second area of sharp vision looking sideways, so it can pick out a mouse or a small bird from a great height and judge closing speed precisely during a dive
Females are larger than males: In hawks, as in most birds of prey, the female is noticeably bigger and heavier than the male, by up to a third in some accipiters, which lets a pair take a wider range of prey sizes and may reduce competition between mates near the nest
Migration in rivers of birds: Many hawks migrate in enormous numbers along predictable routes where rising air lets them soar with little effort, and at famous bottlenecks such as Veracruz in Mexico and Hawk Mountain in Pennsylvania, hundreds of thousands to millions pass over in a single autumn season
The kettle: On migration hawks gather into swirling flocks called kettles, circling upward together on a thermal until they reach its top, then peeling off into a long glide to the next thermal, a technique that lets them cover hundreds of kilometres a day burning very little energy
They recovered when DDT was banned: Several hawks, along with eagles and falcons, declined sharply in the mid-1900s as the pesticide DDT thinned their eggshells, and populations of species such as the red-tailed and Cooper's hawks rebounded strongly after DDT was banned in the 1970s
Range: Every continent except Antarctica, with the forest and open-country hawks between them occupying almost every habitat that has some prey, including boreal, temperate, and tropical forest, prairie and steppe, desert, wetland margins, mountains, farmland, and city parks, from sea level to high alpine zones.
Conservation status: Not Evaluated ≈ Not assessed as a group, and most temperate hawks are common or increasing, with several thriving in farmland and even cities, but a number of tropical forest and island hawks are declining or endangered from deforestation, and hawks everywhere are still lost to illegal shooting, collisions with vehicles and wind turbines, and secondary poisoning from rodenticides in the wild