Eagle Eye

While I’m still reeling from the news that this beautiful boy succumbed to West Nile Virus only days after taking this photo, I did capture something interesting that I thought I would share.

The second photo captured the bird’s nictitating membrane sweeping across its eye.  This see through membrane is found in birds to help moisten, clean and protect the eye – especially while in flight. 

Here’s a few more interesting “Eagle Eye” facts:

• The eyes of a full grown adult eagle are approximately the same size and weight of an adult human’s.  Their eyes occupy the majority of their skull cavity.
• An eagle’s retina contains 600,000 cones per square millimeter.  That’s 4x more than a human allowing for incredibly sharp vision.
• While the human eye can see 3 primary colors, eagles can see 5.
• With the ability to rotate their heads far beyond the range of a human, eagles have a 270 degree field of vision.
• A young eagle’s iris is dark brown and eventually turns a bright yellow as they mature. Later in life, the iris turns a silver blue color.
• An eagle can spot a fish in the water from a distance of 3 miles.  It can spot other eagles in flight from as far as 4 miles away.

Where can I get a camera lens that can do that?