Where eagles dare... The arrival of the first White-tailed Eagle chicks in over 100 years into the country sparked controversy and even a protest at the airport. However, a decade since the White-tailed Eagle Reintroduction Programme began, a partnership

THEY were native to the land but had become extinct here due to the efforts of their main predator — man. When the idea of reintroducing the White-tailed Eagle after an absence of almost a century was first mooted, it caused huge controversy and drew vehement opposition from farming organisations.

Firstly, the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) and Golden Eagle Trust had to tackle the logistical challenges. Reintroducing the Golden Eagle and the White-tailed Eagle, both of which had become extinct in Ireland, was a priority.

The reintroduction of the former in Donegal in 2001 with chicks from Scotland was logistically simpler. They had to look further afield to Norway for a supply of White-tailed Eagle chicks.

Other considerations included the funding that would be required and where this would come from, and even how many chicks would be required.

Dr Allan Mee, project manager of the White-tailed Eagle Reintroduction Programme, got involved in 2007, having recently returned to Ireland from California, where he had been doing a post-doctoral study at San Diego Zoo on another magnificent bird of prey, the California condor, the largest flying bird in North America.

With over 30 years’ experience with birds since his initial degree in Zoology, he had previously worked with Lorcan O’Toole, the general manager of the Golden Eagle Trust and project manager of the Golden Eagle Reintroduction Programme.

Having grown up on a dairy farm in Ballyorgan, Co Limerick, he had some insight into the views of the farming community.

“We would have been aware of what the perceptions might be in the farming community about releasing eagles into the wild and they had some experience of this in Donegal in 2001, so by the time the project started in Kerry, there was five or six years’ experience of what to expect,” he told Farming Independent.

Bringing chicks by ferry from Scotland was far more straightforward than flying them in from Norway, a country that has a strong population of the bird.

White-tailed Eagles are still considered rare in Europe and are ‘green-listed’ for conservation purposes though populations have been on the increase, helped by reintroduction projects like those in Ireland and Scotland. It’s estimated there are less than 10,000 breeding pairs in Europe.

In 2006, three Norwegian experts were brought over to evaluate the proposed release site, Killarney National Park in Co Kerry.

The following year, the first 15 chicks were collected from nests in western and central Norway, under licence, and flown to Ireland where their arrival at Kerry Airport was greeted by 100 protesting sheep farmers.

Reservations

Irish Farmers’ Association regional development officer William Shortall explains the reservations farmers had.

“There was a huge lack of information and inaccurate information about the White- tailed Eagle, which can have a wing span of up to eight feet (over 2m or 6ft on average), and this was something that hadn’t been seen in Ireland for a long time. He was a predator by nature,” Mr Shortall said.

“There had been a pair of birds in Mull in Scotland causing problems that had taken about 86 lambs so there was a genuine concern among sheep farmers this bird could be feeding on lambs.

“They had enough to worry about with foxes and grey crows than eagles too and that all fed into the negative publicity.”

Designation is still a huge issue for the IFA with huge areas designated as Special Areas of Conservation (SAC) for the hen harrier, and there was widespread concern the reintroduction of another species could lead to more.

By January 2007, Dr Mee had come on board as manager of the White-tailed Eagle Project and this was when they had to complete all the paperwork to bring the birds into Ireland.

Public meetings were organised in south Kerry to meet with the farming community and to talk to them about what was involved.

“There was a fair bit of controversy and the feeling was to try to get people on board and bring farmers to Donegal to show them how the Golden Eagle reintroduction project was working after six years,” Dr Mee recalls.

“The worry the eagles would predate lambs in sheep farming areas was high on the agenda, and this was also around the time a lot of land was being designated as Special Protection Areas.”

It was also felt the introduction of the birds would interfere with windfarm planning applications.

“It was feared the Whitetailed Eagle would bring another layer of bureaucracy,” he said.

“We were trying to reassure people they’d been reintroduced to Scotland and had been there since 1975 and there still hadn’t been a special protection area designated because there wasn’t the need for one. There wasn’t a high density of breeding pairs.”

Looking back on it now, he describes those initial meetings as ‘confrontational’.

From an initial stance of being against the project, IFA and the ICMSA later got involved in the steering committee, which was instrumental in allaying these fears.

“The hotel industry was a major supporter of the project but we could see nothing in it for the farmer except another threat,” Mr Shortall added.

“I don’t think there would be many farmers out there now