Sea Eagle v Lamb - Update

Last year I reported that there was a claim by crofters, smallholders and farmers that the reintroduced White Tailed Sea Eagles were taking Lambs. Even as I first heard the claims, the numbers of lambs supposedly lost to the Sea Eagles just did not add up. Quite simply the supposed losses to the Sea Eagles would have required the birds population to be greater than actually exists and that the birds were feeding exclusively on the lambs. That means all year round and as lamb is seasonal, at the very least there appeared to be a great deal of exaggeration going on.

So as I reported here earlier this year, the various conservation bodies and charities undertook a study, scientific research, to discover what numbers of lambs were being taken. By radio tagging Lambs with a collar that would instantly alert the researchers if the lamb died, the conservation bodies watched and waited.

The tags can tell mortality by motion sensors, combined with monitoring heart beat and collar orientation. Not cheap equipment combined with having to have staff available to respond to an alarm so that if lamb had died the exact reason for the death could be established. As Sea Eagles could have also been feeding on the bodies of fallen stock where the birds had not been responsible for the death.

Now this technical detail is important as the preliminary results are now in. The details still have to be collated and a full report written, but during 2009 not a single lamb was taken by the Sea Eagles. As during 2008 the farmers were claiming that the Sea Eagles had taken three hundred lambs, this is a remarkable change in behaviour by the wild birds.

My reader will rightly see the tone of cynicism in my posting. Had the Sea Eagles been taking the number of Lambs claimed that would have been a genuinely serious problem. Not just for the farmers but it would have placed a serious question mark over any or all reintroduction programmes. Had the claimed losses been twenty or thirty lambs, then the Sea Eagles would have been the credible culprits. But this was nothing more than an attempt to defraud charities like the RSPB and government bodies like Scottish Natural Heritage for losses that were nothing more than natural losses that result from poor stock keeping.

I personally don't resent the costs of the research, as it was done so well that it will silence most critics of reintroductions.

Having spoken to animal behaviour specialists, it would be impossible for a bird, or a population of birds, to so suddenly change their feeding habits to have not even attempted to have taken a single lamb this year, when last year they were supposedly taking three hundred lambs last year.

It seems as though some people just don't want to see these magnificent Sea Eagles. Even though by being there they are bringing in tourists and the money they spend. Right from the start the whole claim of the White-tailed Sea Eagles was completely untrue. The difficulty is that should a particular raptor start really taking lambs, it will be more difficult for the farmer to be believed.

Further to this good news, I can report that this year at Kilder Forest a pair of Osprey nested for the first time. That means in England three pairs nested and reared chicks. Slowly the Osprey is naturally returning to England and Wales after having successfully re-established its self in Scotland.