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Serendipity
The return of the majestic sea eagle
White-tailed eagle. (Photo by Mike Crutch/A9Birds)
So much in life depends on good luck, on being in the right place at the right time, and for me, in 1967, the right place was the famous Fair Isle Bird Observatory in the Shetland Islands, where I was warden. My boss was the charismatic Scottish ornithologist George Waterston, who had set up the observatory and was the director of the RSPB in Scotland. He phoned me one day from his home at the Scottish Centre for Ornithology in Edinburgh, where he lived with his wife Irene, and told me that he wanted to reintroduce four young Norwegian sea eagles to Fair Isle. Would I rear and release them, he asked, and start by sounding out the crofters and letting him know what they thought? I was bowled over with excitement.
A decade earlier, I had been a teenage birdwatcher living in Hampshire, where one of my favourite places was St Catherine’s Point, a chalk headland on the Isle of Wight reaching out into the English Channel and ideal for studying bird migration by day and night. To get there, I would catch the ferry from Portsmouth to Ryde, then take a small train before hitch-hiking the rest of the way, in those days my quickest route to out-of-the-way birdwatching sites. One day, my diary reminds me, I must have been dreaming about sea eagles – now called white-tailed eagles to distinguish them from other sea eagle species around the world – and decided that I would first of all visit Culver Cliff near Sandown. In 1780 this had been their final breeding site along the south coast of England. I walked from Bembridge, carefully choosing low tide so that I could get round the base of the cliffs and look up at the chalky white headland where the old books on Hampshire birds recorded their nest. Of course, there were no sea eagles to see that day, but I could vividly imagine them circling above me, their huge wings, bright yellow bills and white tails thrown into sharp focus by the clear, blue sky.
The white-tailed eagle breeds throughout northern countries from Greenland and Iceland, east from Scandinavia through Russia to the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido. Originally the breeding range extended south to the Mediterranean Sea, with the last nesting records on the island of Corsica in the 1950s. Some birds from northern populations migrate south in winter. These huge eagles build big, bulky nests in cliffs, in large trees and on the ground, and lay one to three eggs, rearing up to three young. They are a generalist raptor, eating a wide range of carrion and live prey including mammals, birds and fish. Seen by many as a threat to their livestock, the species had been subject to much human persecution over the centuries, resulting in their loss as a breeding species in all countries in southern Europe, with the last breeding pair in the UK on the Isle of Skye in 1916. Even so, the bird has had ancient associations with man: even Neanderthals are thought to have decorated the wing bones, while in Neolithic times people in the Orkney Islands placed the remains of sea eagles beside human remains. This was richly brought home to me when I visited the Tomb of the Eagles on South Ronaldsay. A farmer there had discovered an underground tomb, accessible nowadays via a tunnel. Visitors can lie on a trolley and pull themselves into an underground chamber. In the last 50 years, white-tailed eagle numbers have started to increase and the bird has reclaimed lost range, such as in northeast France and the Netherlands, while populations have been reintroduced in Scotland and Ireland.
In 1958, when I was just 18, I was the assistant warden at Lundy Island Bird Observatory, where sea eagles had nested at least two centuries before, and the following year I worked as a field ornithologist at the famous Fair Isle Bird Observatory in Shetland, where I was later to become warden. On that island there had once been two pairs of ‘ernes’, the lovely Scottish name for sea eagles. The present-day Fair Isle place name ‘Erne’s Brae’ is a memento of the days when they used to nest there, although they last bred on Fair Isle before 1840. At that point, of course, I had no idea that my life was to become so closely involved with sea eagles.
George Waterston’s vision of restoring sea eagles to Scotland had been with him for many years; in 1959 he had helped his cousin, Pat Sandeman, when he arranged to save three sea eagles from being killed in Norway when they were still regarded as pests. Pat released them in Glen Etive in Argyllshire, but the adult was caught at a chicken farm and taken to Edinburgh, while one of the young was killed nearby in a fox trap and the third simply disappeared. Although the attempt was unsuccessful, neither man gave up on their idea, and in 1962 George joined the Norwegian expert, Johan Willgohs, when he was surveying sea eagles on the coast north of Bergen. This was a great stimulus to George, and Mike Everett, an RSPB colleague, told me that, from then on, his office walls were papered with even more photographs of sea eagles. Whenever Pat called by, the two men would enthusiastically discuss how to make another attempt. Things would quieten down, another year would go by, but in July 1966, in Cambridge, George gave a paper to the 14th World Conference of the International Committee for Bird Protection, and advocated reintroductions, especially that of sea eagles. He received support from some ornithologists but a cold shoulder from others. Foreign support was probably the turning point, with Professor Karl Voous of Amsterdam, who supported the proposal in a letter to Peter Conder, head of the RSPB, because the species was in such great decline, remarking, ‘Indeed, the enthusiasm for reintroduction is a kind of contagious disease.’ Kai Curry-Lindahl, the eminent Swedish ornithologist, was very supportive and gave practical advice, while the expert himself, Johan Willgohs, supported it and offered to collect four young eagles.
George discussed the idea with the National Trust for Scotland, the owners of Fair Isle, and secured their agreement. He wrote to me, asking me to go to the islanders and ask if they could arrange a meeting of the island committee in mid-September, when he would be briefly on the island. He would give a talk on sea eagles and, being George, he also asked if there could be a Fair Isle dance afterwards, which always offered a great chance to catch up on island news. The meeting took place, there was a wide-ranging discussion, and George’s request did not fall on deaf ears, with the islanders giving their tacit support, with just one proviso: ‘If they start eating our sheep, they’ll have to go!’ It would be my job to rear and release them. I was thrilled to get such a fantastic opportunity, which would turn out to add excitement to my life for many years to come.
In my archives I found a letter I wrote to George on 12 November 1967, along with a six-page memo, entitled ‘Reintroduction of the white-tailed eagle to Fair Isle as a scientific experiment’. I outlined my thoughts on the project, the reasons for the birds’ extinction and the potential for success. The last pair bred on Sheep Rock between 1825 and 1840. This was at a time when the island population was rising rapidly, going from 160 people in 1801 to 232 in 1841; this was also a time when sheep were becoming more common in Scotland. I said the species was most unlikely to recolonise naturally because of its sedentary nature and low numbers, so reintroduction was essential. Food on Fair Isle was plentiful and the latest seabird counts (pairs) in 1966 gave fulmar 5,000 (there were none when the sea eagle last nested), shag 1,100, eider 150, oystercatcher 88, herring gull 300, kittiwake 7,900, guillemot 5,600, razorbill 1,000, puffin 15–16,000 and black guillemot 150–200. I included a list of when they were available as prey. Fish around the isle were plentiful, with larger fish, like ling, washed up on the beaches after storms. Rabbits were very plentiful, too, with possibly 3,000 present in autumn. We needed to keep a close watch on lambs in spring. The sea eagles could increase bird tourism and the resulting income, and Fair Isle’s isolation would deter future egg collectors and indiscriminate birdwatchers and photographers.
The next months were hectic for George as he drew up a proposal. Peter Conder wrote to George on 6 February 1968, explaining the need for a concise report, preferably one sheet of foolscap, to be presented to the RSPB conservation committee on 28 February. It then would have to go to the International Council for Bird Preservation, British section AGM on 6 March, to the Advisory Committee for the Protection of Birds for Scotland on 7 March, to the RSPB Council on 13 March and to the General Committee of the Nature Conservancy on 2 May. Again, George received knockbacks from various members of the ornithological establishment, but he also received support from senior scientists, including Dr Derek Ratcliffe and Dr Adam Watson. George was eager to bring in the birds in 1968; he had estimated the cost to the RSPB to be £750, but producing a film for television would be extra. He was cutting it fine but got final approval from the Nature Conservancy in June.
Fair Isle was chosen for the project because of its remoteness, the abundance of prey species and the fact that the experiment could be conducted by the resident observatory staff. It is a beautiful but isolated island, measuring about 5 kilometres from north to south and 3 kilometres wide, lying between Shetland to the north and Orkney to the south. It’s a rugged island with big cliffs, but the more fertile southern part was where the 70 or so islanders lived on their crofts, cultivated their crops of oats, potatoes, turnips and hay and kept a few cows and hens, as well as sheep. Lighthouses at the north and south ends of the island were each occupied by three families when I lived there with my own family in the 1960s. The northern end of the island was heather moorland, rising to the top of Ward Hill at 232 metres, and this was where the islanders kept the majority of their sheep. We lived at the Bird Observatory, based in old naval huts which nestled in the slope running down to the harbour where the island boat, Good Shepherd, was moored. In summer the island was thronged with seabirds, with thousands of guillemots, razorbills, puffins and kittiwakes on the cliffs, and great and arctic skuas on the land.
Fair Isle Bird Observatory, the author’s former home at the old naval station at North Haven; distinctively shaped Sheep Rock in the background.
Once we knew that the sea eagles were to arrive in late June, it was my job to work out how to look after them and then to release them. There was no handbook on what to do, so I drew on my knowledge of looking after other species as well as a bit of agricultural know-how and decided to house them in four large cages, each 3.6 metres square and 1.8 metres high. Subsequently, we called them ‘hacking cages’, as the rearing in captivity of raptors for falconry and releasing them to fly was known as hacking. The cages were made of wooden frames and wire netting and they were built in pairs, each cage containing a small roosting shelter, a log of wood and a central perch. The first two were built by my assistant warden, Tony Mainwood, and myself on the hill slope of Erne’s Brae, just south of Ward Hill, facing eastwards. At the observatory we were well used to this sort of work, as we often had to repair our big Heligoland traps, also made of timber and wire netting, which we used for catching migrant birds for ringing and research. We built the second pair of cages on the cliff top of Roskillee, just north of the observatory. The cages were made in such a way that, when the young were ready to be released, the front of each individual cage could be lowered down to allow the eagles to leave. Before building the cages, I had made the decision to keep the eaglets apart in case there was fighting between them, but a male and a female would live adjacent to each other in each set of cages. Soon we were ready and eager to start.
Johan Willgohs, the authority on the species in Norway, was ready to collect four young eagles once the Norwegian government had given permission for the birds to be collected and exported to Scotland. Sea eagles, along with other large raptors, had been habitually destroyed in Norway, much to the concern of conservationists, and Johan advocated that the species should be protected. He and his wife Einey visited eyries in Trondelag in northern Norway in the spring and returned in mid-June to collect four young eagles, two males and two females, from different eyries. The Loganair Islander aircraft, based in Orkney to run the new inter-island air service, was chartered for the occasion and, on 24 June, flew back from Bergen to Kirkwall airport with Johan, Einey and three of the young birds – the fourth had been delayed by a late arrival of a coastal ferryboat in Norway. The regular pilot, Captain Andy Alsop, soon set off for Fair Isle and landed the plane on the island’s gravel airstrip. The eaglets had landed.
Arrival of the first Norwegian sea eagles at Fair Isle on Loganair Islander aircraft in 1968. From left to right, author, Johan Willgohs and George Waterston. (Photo by Dennis Coutts)
A few days earlier, George Waterston had come to Fair Isle for the momentous occasion, along with John Arnott from BBC Scotland and Dennis Coutts, a photographer from Lerwick who was a friend of ours and a keen birdwatcher. Also staying at the observatory, by chance, was a young friend of mine from Inverness, John Love, who was later to become the main player in the sea eagle saga. We unloaded the first large cardboard box from the plane and opened the lid, to be confronted by the first of the massive eaglets. What awesome birds they were: huge, solid birds with big sharp bills and large feet and talons, and dark soulful eyes. Since then, our reaction at the sight of those birds – they are huge! – has been repeated again and again, every time a new person peers into a cardboard box to see their first young sea eagle. Once we had them unloaded, we took a pair in the observatory van to Erne’s Brae, where each bird was put on an ‘eyrie’ or nest, built inside the shelter, with a supply of cut-up rabbit. The first two had been named Ingrid and Jesper by Johan and Einey; the third eaglet, a female called Torvaldine, was placed in the cage at Roskillee.
Over refreshments back at the observatory, Johan brought me up to date with each bird and its character, and gave me expert advice on how to feed them. With great excitement and anticipation, we returned to the cages that evening and fed each eaglet by hand with fish and pieces of rabbit. We immediately recognised that each had a different nature. Torvaldine was a noisy and bold female, who fed readily from our hand and was able to tear up large pieces of food; Ingrid was quieter and would pick up and eat pieces of fish placed in front of her; Jesper, the male, adopted a cowering posture and refused to have anything to do with us. That first day I force-fed him by opening his bill and pushing in some fish, but we decided to leave cut-up food in his cage and, next day, found that it had all been devoured. We were learning our first lessons.
Those first few days were busy times, with radio interviews for the BBC’s Afield programme, recording for a Sea Eagles for Fair Isle film by the RSPB, photo sessions and a chance for island and observatory friends to view our new charges. The fourth eaglet arrived on a Scandinavian Airlines flight to Glasgow airport at 50 minutes past midnight on 6 July. George wrote to me: ‘I collected it and it slept in my dormobile with me overnight in the car park, and after giving it a breakfast of fish I put it on the Shetland plane at 10 am. If it’s a female call it Einey or Johan if a male.’ It was looked after at Sumburgh and put on board the Good Shepherd on 9 July. It was a male, so the newly named Johan was put in a cage next door to Torvaldine. Our small, precious brood was complete.
I was eager to move to the next stage because I had decided the eaglets had two key requirements: plenty of food and as little human disturbance as possible. It was important that they remained wild, so human contact was to be minimised. As soon as they were able to tear up fish and dead rabbits, we started to cut down on our visits. We gave each eaglet about a kilo of meat or fish per day but we found that, usually, they didn’t eat it all. In the first few weeks they spent a lot of their time lying down in the shelters or in the sun. They roosted in their shelters at night and were in them well before dusk; in fact, we often put two or three days’ quota of food in each cage in darkness, so that the birds wouldn’t see us and become used to our presence.
Each day, one of us would hunt rabbits or secure fish to feed the eaglets, and they grew rapidly. By 7 July, the first eaglet was seen perching freely on its log; on the 13th, Jesper was doing wing-flapping exercises, and he made his first flight across the cage seven days later. By the last week of July the three older birds were flying well, while Johan, the second male who arrived later, was younger and less advanced. They became shyer when they started to fly, and Torvaldine stopped calling at us when we approached. The main reason I had made the cages just 3.6 metres across was to lessen the risk of damage to the birds when they started to fly, because the further they could fly, the heavier their crash against the wire netting. With a short distance, they could not get up speed but could flap their wings to exercise. After two weeks, the restlessness slowed down and they spent lots of time preening their feathers and watching the world outside.
Once all the eaglets had been successfully reared to the flying stage, plans were made for their release. Aggressive skuas were nesting on the hill, so we delayed the releases until they had left for the winter. I did not want a mob of bonxies (great skuas) chasing one of our precious ernes over the cliffs and out to sea. I also suggested that one eagle should be released and allowed to settle down on the isle before another be set free – as usual, hedging our bets. Tony and I caught up each eagle for colour ringing and to check its weight, measurements and condition. While handling them, we were struck by the distinct warmth of their legs, feet and bills, which was quite unlike any of the many other species that I had handled for ringing.
The following table gives the weights, measurements and colour rings of the four young sea eagles:
Sea eagle stats, Fair Isle, 1968
The difference between the large females and the smaller males was very obvious, especially in their weights and the size of their huge bills. When they arrived they had been nearly at their full body weight, so the main difference was in the big growth of the flight and tail feathers. I was delighted that their feathers showed remarkably few starvation marks, which are caused by a day with no food, apart from a few small ones which corresponded with the time when they were first collected from the eyries.
By the evening of 15 September we had fixed a release mechanism on the side of one cage with a pull-cord running across the Mire of Vatnagard to a hide, from which we could observe the eagles. From under cover, I could pull away one side of the cage from a long distance away, allowing Ingrid to come out of her cage of her own accord without being frightened. The 16th of September was a fine, clear day with no rain, so just after dawn – crouched in my hide – I pulled away the side of the cage. The others watched from the airstrip, much further away. Ingrid looked at the opening for five minutes, and then, rather than flying, out she walke...
