A Desert Hawk is a bird-of-prey whose natural habitat was the open desert on the planet Arrakis. Upon the Atreides arrival on Arrakis in 10,191 A.G., The Duke Leto Atreides came to believe that true power over the planet of Arrakis lay within the desert. As a result, the Desert Hawk developed significance, since the Atreides symbol had always been the Hawk.