Top Birds with Unique Eyesight

They have an acuity that is 7-8 times that of humans, say the specialists. Bald eagles, despite their camouflaging colour, frequently hunt fish and track the fish's movements from great heights.

Image Source: Wikipedia

Bald eagle – best distance vision

Harris hawks have twin fovea, like other raptors. Birds have numerous types of photoreceptors: Violet single cones; short single cones; middle single cones. Long-range light-detection cones. Conical This bird can see four colours clearly. Despite having small eyes, the hawk can discriminate between different colours (such a grey mouse on green grass), according to study. This raptor can register objects at 77 Hz, while humans can only do it at 50-60 Hz.

Image Source: Wikipedia

Harris hawk – best color vision in a raptor

Nocturnal birds. Their vision quality is multifaceted. Tawny owls have broad, near-eyed binocular eyesight. Some reports say tawny owls have 100x better vision than humans. 500 m distant, they can spot prey. Tawny owls can see red, green, and blue-green. Owls have a reflecting eye feature called tapetum lucidum. The owl's eyes have a vast (up to 70% overlap) binocular field of vision. Due to a bigger pupil, owls' night vision is 2.2 times better than human vision.

Image Source: Wikipedia

Tawny owl – best night vision

It's vulnerable to predators and needs superb panoramic vision to spot danger. This is because: The American woodcock's eyes are huge and far apart on its head. The American woodcock's eyes can view 350° horizontally and 180° vertically. This is a bird's largest visual field.

Image Source: Wikipedia

American woodcock – best panoramic vision

Robins' lifestyles vary. Depending on the area, robins might stay put or move. Spring robins travel at night and need adaptations to navigate. Their vision depends on several things. Robins have retinal photoreceptors for colour vision. Robins' retinas include cryptochrome and flavin adenine nucleotide in addition to rods and cones. These compounds allow birds to sense magnetic fields, which aids night orientation. Robins have an unique brain area that accumulates magnetic field visuals, improving night vision. Cluster N is only found in night-migrating birds.

Image Source: Wikipedia

European robin – a unique ability to detect magnetic fields visually.

Hummingbirds need colour because they eat nectar. They've adapted to see many hues. They can perceive colours beyond the rainbow's spectrum. Hummingbird retinas have three cones. Each cone is calibrated to catch blue, red, and green light waves. In addition to the three conventional receptors, there's a UV cone. These birds sense distinct colours from UV light and regular spectrum hues.

Image Source: Wikipedia

Broad-tailed Hummingbird – best tetrachromatic vision