The Zoo Master returns with another animal-themed coin and today's exhibit is a Saker Falcon. Just look at this beautiful exhibit, as depicted on a hungarian 50 Forint coin minted in 2004:
Some Info About the Bird
The saker falcon is a large falcon species that breeds from Central Europe eastwards across the Palearctic to Manchuria. It has a wingspan of up to 4 feet and is a formidable hunter with its diet mainly consisting of rodents and birds.
Males weigh anywhere from 730 to 990 g and females from 970 to 1,300 g
When it comes to speed, it's the second-fastest bird in level flight after the white-throated needletail and relies mostly on horizontal chases rather than high-altitude dives that are preferred by other falcons.
Unfortunately this is yet another animal that is currently classified as endangered, with numbers steadily going down thanks to human related activity
BirdLife International categorises this bird as endangered, due to a rapid population decline, particularly on the central Asian breeding grounds. Ever since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United Arab Emirates have been the main destination for thousands of falcons caught and sold illegally for hefty sums at the black market. Kazakhstan is estimated to lose up to 1,000 saker falcons per year source
Oh, did I mention that it is the national bird of Hungary, the United Arab Emirates, and Mongolia?
Which explains that the bird makes such a prominent appearance on a hungarian coin :)
Speaking of coins, let's flip it and see what we have on the other side:
Pretty basic stuff. Just the denomination (50 forints) with big letters :D
I didn't take a photo of the edge but there's nothing to see, it's just a smooth surface.
When it comes to composition we have a 75 % Copper, 25 % nickel alloy with a total weight of 7.6 g. That's a generous amount of copper I think for a modern standard circulation coin.
Anyways, here are some more boring semantics from Numista for anyone interested:
Issuer: Hungary
Period: Republic (1989-date)
Type: Standard circulation coin
Years: 1992-2011
Value: 50 Forint
50 HUF = EUR 0.13
Currency: Forint (1946-date)
Diameter: 27.4 mm
Thickness: 1.7 mm
Shape: Round
Technique: Milled
Orientation: Medal alignment ↑↑
All in all a really beautiful coin if you ask me. Price wise, it's a standard circulation coin that I believe is still in use so they are pretty cheap. Maybe 10-20 cents? Dunno, I have a bunch from a trip I took to the country a long, long time ago :)
The Zoo Master is a new series where I showcase my animal themed coins from all around the world. The zoo Master really loves coins with animals :)
Feel free to click the links below to explore my bestiarium:
Silvergoldstackers Re-blog Lottery
Looks like cheap hive is back on the menu which means it's a good time for me to start accumulating HBI again! I will be drawing every day one winner with each new post. 5 hbi, one winner takes all. Feel free to re-blog this post for a chance to win some for free. My only condition is that you are an active member on the silvergoldstackers community here on hive or discord! If you are not, come on the discord, say a hi and tag me!
Yesterday's participants were:
And the winner is...
I will be gifting the rest one hbi as well as a participation trophy cause I am awesome 🎉🎉
So long plebs!