Absurd claim that White-tailed Eagles ‘snatched’ five Shetland ponies leads to inevitable call to ‘shoot eagles’

The absurd claim that White-tailed Eagles had ‘snatched’ five Shetland pony foals on South Uist hit the headlines at the end of August.

A crofter / farmer named Donald Cameron said that five of his Shetland pony foals had disappeared between May and July when they were a few weeks old, and that he could see ‘no other explanation’ other than they’d been taken by White-tailed Eagles.

The average healthy weight for a Shetland pony at birth would be around 20-27kg, with rapid daily weight gain up to around 36-45kg at a month old. White-tailed Eagles in the Western Palearctic weigh between 3.5-5kg (males) and 4.5-7kg (females).

The premise that an eagle could ‘snatch’ and then carry away something that is three times heavier than itself is plainly nonsensical.

On hearing Donald Cameron’s claims about the loss of his five Shetland ponies, NatureScot organised for expert eagle biologists to examine the prey remains in two White-tailed Eagle nests closest to Cameron’s croft. There was no trace of any Shetland pony body parts (and even if there had been, it still wouldn’t mean that the eagles had killed the ponies; it’s far more plausible that they could have scavenged a carcass). The only mammalian prey found were rabbits and Brown Rat, with most of the remains being seabirds, ducks and geese.

This fits with the findings of a recent and extraordinarily robust recent scientific paper, examining the diet of breeding White-tailed Eagles across Scotland over a 20-year study (1998-2017), where seabirds and wetland birds featured prominently in the diets of eagles on the Uists:

The same paper demonstrated that the number of lamb remains found in eagle nests has declined over the last 20 years:

On the rare occasion where eagles may still take the odd live lamb, there’s a Sea Eagle Management Scheme, run by NatureScot, where support is available for those who experience sea eagle predation impacts.

But Donald Cameron is not satisfied. He claims that the examination of the two closest White-tailed Eagle nests was ‘inconclusive’ and also claims that the eagles are “decimating everything we have”.

In the most recent sensationalist scaremongering article from The Telegraph on this subject (6th October 2025 – they’re really dragging out this story), it says that Mr Cameron believes the White-tailed Eagles are responsible for the so-called ‘eerie silence’ on Loch Druidibeag.

The article begins with this:

‘Visiting Loch Druidibeag 20 years ago, you might have spotted swans perched on the water, geese on the banks and curlews surveying the sheep grazing the slopes that rise dramatically from the water’s edge.

‘But today, the waters have fallen silent. Eerily so. Now, the only thing that moves in the loch, on the island of South Uist in the Outer Hebrides, is a battered rowing boat bobbing beside a jetty as waves lap against the shore.

‘Donald John Cameron’s family have farmed this land for generations. But he believes an ancient foe is responsible for the eerie silence – and that it has also snatched away some of his most cherished animals‘.

I put this claim to an ecologist who has lived and worked in the Outer Hebrides for many years:

“All bollocks! No change to the bird life in the Druidibeag area as far as I can see. It’s a great place for wildlife. Several hundred Mute Swans on Loch Bi just to the north“.

Funnily enough, a few years ago a journalist was sniffing around on a story about Loch Bi. A local farmer / crofter had told him that he’d seen White-tailed Eagles feeding on the carcasses of dead Mute Swans on Loch Bi, and he reckoned the eagles had killed them all. The story never appeared in the media after NatureScot informed the journalist that Bird Flu had killed the swans, and the eagles were doing what they do best – scavenging the remains.

Back to the latest article..

It continues: ‘… there are thought to be 150 pairs of the bird [WTE] now living on the island. In fact, the eagles are now an all too familiar sight for farmers.

‘Lambs have allegedly been abducted in the dead of night, dogs have been attacked and Mr Cameron claims his Shetland pony foals were snatched by the eagles.

‘Although conservationists have insisted there is no evidence eagles took the foals, it is easy to understand Mr Cameron’s concern. The White-tailed eagle’s wingspan can go to eight feet and it’s sharp talons mean it’s thought to be capable of snatching animals weighing up to 12kg‘.

FFS. There aren’t 150 pairs of WTEs on South Uist! Back to my ecologist friend:

“There are seven known territories on South Uist, with one or two other locations where pairs may be establishing so 7-10 pairs would be the best estimate. In the areas where the ponies are there are two territorial pairs“.

And since when have ‘sharp talons’ had any bearing on the weight that an eagle can carry?! The main physiological features that determine how much a raptor can lift/carry are primarily related to muscle strength, wing surface area and body weight. It’s utter nonsense to argue about the sharpness of its talons in this context.

It’s farcical to be writing about these things, and talking about lambs being ‘abducted in the dead of night’, but it all plays into the demonisation of raptors in general, but particularly of White-tailed Eagles.

It’s just the latest in a long history of baseless accusations made about this species, although this is the first time that the eagles have been accused of taking Shetland ponies – usually they’re accused of being a threat to babies and toddlers (e.g. see here and here), which of course feeds into sensationalist headlines that editors know will sell copy.

Mr Cameron told one journalist that the ponies were ‘like my pets’. Yep, if there’s one thing that will stir up irrational fear in the public, apart from threats to babies and toddlers, it’s threats to people’s pets. Just ask Donald Trump – I suspect he knew exactly what he was doing when he falsely accused immigrants from Haiti of killing and eating dogs and cats in Ohio:

“In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs, the people that came in, they’re eating the cats. They’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”

False hysteria would be funny if it didn’t have real world consequences. There are horrific consequences for those immigrants, of course, and for the eagles, those consequences are also very real. The Telegraph article claims that Jon Gillies, the Chief Executive of the company that manages the South Uist Estate, is calling ‘for the right to shoot down the eagles‘.

The article says: ‘He says this year’s attacks have led him to stop taking his show cocker spaniel on walks with him in the hills because “I don’t want my dog to be killed”. And he thinks the law that allows crofters to shoot a dog if it attacks animals should be extended to sea eagles.

‘Mr Gillies says: “I think that a crofter should have the right to protect their livestock, and I don’t believe that livestock should be sacrificed to protect another species.”

‘The 62-year-old, who grew up on the island, said: “I remember as a boy when local people would take matters into their own hands by going into the hills and burning out golden eagle nests because everybody thought they were taking sheep. Once the fear gets into people’s minds, that’s how they respond“‘.

EXACTLY! It’s all about generating fear and the media has a lot to answer for.

That photograph of a White-tailed Eagle standing on a bloodied dead lamb, with the eagle’s beak covered in blood and wool, is a case in point. It’s used over and over again whenever there’s a scare story about eagles killing lambs but the context is never provided by the newspaper.

I think this photo is used to add ‘credibility’ to the scare stories – a reader will look at it and think, ‘Oh, well there must be some truth in this story because look, there’s a photo of an eagle that’s killed a lamb ‘on a hillside in Scotland”.

But that photograph is staged, using a captive eagle and a dead lamb. The scene was set up by Pete Cairns, a brilliant conservation photographer who, ironically, uses powerful imagery to explore conflicting attitudes towards predators. Here he is on Twitter (X) in 2022, responding to the mis-use of this very photograph:

I have no idea what happened to Mr Cameron’s five Shetland ponies. Maybe they were stolen? Locals tell me the ponies are left to roam freely across miles of rugged moorland and they’re small enough to shove inside a van without anyone noticing. There are credible reports of Shetland pony theft in southern England in recent years (e.g. here, here, here, here and here).

Maybe it’s those pesky translocated sea eagles from the Isle of Wight? Cue journalist from The Telegraph making some phone calls…