Farmer Claims Eagles Are Carrying Away His Ponies, and Says Birds Have Taken 5

A Scottish farmer is missing several pony foals. He thinks eagles are to blame.

Donald John Cameron runs an agritourism business with partner Lindsay Robertson on the island of South Uist, according to The Sunday Post and the BBC. His Shetland ponies, which are crucial to his business, have started “disappearing,” he told the BBC — and he can’t think of any explanation other than sea eagles.

Five pony foals have disappeared, and the Scottish farmer hasn’t “seen or found any carcasses” to help him determine how and why the little horses are gone, he told the BBC.

Losing animals isn’t altogether unusual, he added to the outlet, “but to lose five is totally out of it.” While some have suggested people may be the culprit — “you couldn’t rule it out,” Cameron said — the farmer thinks something more feathery is behind the missing foals: sea eagles.

Sea eagles, or white-tailed eagles, are the largest bird of prey native to the U.K., according to The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB). The animals are “massive, heavy-set” birds with a wingspan that can grow to be close to 8 feet.

“White-tailed Eagles are versatile and opportunistic hunters and carrion feeders, sometimes pirating food from other birds and even otters. They eat largely fish, but also take various birds, rabbits, and hare,” the RSPB added.

“I can’t see any other explanation,” Cameron told The Sunday Post of the flying apex predators, which he said arrived on the Scottish island around seven years earlier. He also told the outlet that he sees them circling not only his ponies, but also his sheep.

“They’re not dissolving into thin air,” he dded to the Scottish newspaper. “We have had Shetland ponies for 60 years-plus, and nothing like this has happened before. The only difference in the last few years is that we have a bigger presence of white-tailed eagles.”

The National Sea Eagles Stakeholders’ Panel was created to address concerns about the reintroduced birds and claims that they have attacked livestock, per The Sunday Post. David Colthart, a farmers’ representative on the panel, told the outlet that Cameron’s case marks “the first time” he has “heard of white-tailed eagles being suspected of lifting Shetland pony foals.”

“I have seen photos of them carrying deer calves, so it’s not impossible given the small size of Shetland foals,” Colthart told the newspaper.

Cameron has also contacted the wildlife agency NatureScot about his concerns. A spokesperson for the agency told The Sunday Post: “While there is currently no direct evidence to support his view, we will be analysing prey remains from sea eagle nests across North and South Uist this year to help inform our wider work with farmers and crofters. This will include visits to nest sites near Mr Cameron’s holding.”

Meanwhile, Charlie Heap, director of the National Centre for Birds of Prey, told the BBC that he thinks Cameron is barking up the wrong tree.

“Like all birds,” Heap told the outlet, sea eagles are miracles of engineering and of lightness.” But the largest one “you’re going to find is going to be about 5kg,” or about 11 pounds. “Just to give you a comparison,” he added, “that’s about the size of a reasonable [sized] house cat. They are only capable of carrying their own weight.”

Heap continued, “I have no idea what’s happening to this poor chap’s foals. I do feel his pain. I would suggest he’s looking in the wrong direction for the culprit.”

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Cameron maintains that sea eagles are to blame — or at least, some predator is. The behavior of the missing foals’ mothers suggests another animal took the baby ponies away, he told the BBC.

“Usually, if an animal loses a calf or a foal or a lamb, they will stay with the dead animal,” the farmer told the outlet, adding that instead, the mother of the first foal that went missing “went back on her own to the area she was last with her foal.”

Regardless of what’s behind the five disappearances, Cameron is worried about the impact on his business. 

“We advertise pony experiences, and people ask what animals we have, and we tell them ponies and foals,” he told The Sunday Post, “but if the next day we’ve only got ponies, it’s not good for anyone.”