The eagle has a great partiality for hares, cats, young fox cubs, and young lambs. I remember James Macintosh, head stalker at Loch Rosque, telling me that on two occasions whilst waiting at a fox den he had shot an eagle. He added that, whilst the old foxes are away, the cubs, when they get hungry, sometimes make such a noise that they can be heard at a considerable distance, and that he believed this attracts the eagles, particularly if their eyrie in which they are rearing their young happens to be in the vicinity. He went on to say that he thought this accounted for his sometimes finding fox dens containing only one or two cubs instead of the usual number of three to seven. There is no doubt that eagles sometimes attack deer calves, fixing their talons in their victim’s neck or back and striking the calf with their wings. They frequently hunt in pairs, and have been seen to drive the calf over a precipice.
On rare occasions eagles have been known to attack a full-grown stag. In certain parts of the Highlands they have lately increased in numbers, and perhaps as a consequence, their ordinary food not being so plentiful, have become bolder.
Only last year I was stalking in a forest where a few days earlier a stalker had witnessed a most unusual incident. The following is his account of what he saw:
“A gentleman and I were out stalking on the 25th of September, and while the gentleman was having lunch, I went off about 200 yards to have a spy. I got a stag lying at the foot of a rock. While I had the glass on him, an eagle suddenly swooped down and attacked him. The stag went headlong into a bog, but managed to get up. I then ran back for the gentleman thinking we would have a shot, but by the time we got back the stag and eagle were over the sky-line and the eagle still following while going over the sky-line, but after that we don’t know what happened, as both eagle and stag went out of sight.”
Donald Matheson, who has had a lifelong experience in the forest and has only recently retired after having been for many years stalker at Glen Shieldaig to Mr. C. J. Murray of Loch Carron, told me that on one occasion, but on one occasion only, he saw an eagle attack an adult stag.
“It would be, as far as I remember,” he said, “between the 6th and 10th of October in the year 1888 when I was spying one morning at the forest stables. I picked up a stag on the top of Glen Shieldaig, quietly feeding on the Glaschnoc side, and while having my glass still on the stag an eagle swooped down on his head. The stag fell on his hind-quarters, but was soon on his feet again and ran for his life while the eagle was fixed on him. The stag made for a thick clump of birch-trees, and immediately the stag got under cover the eagle could not keep its hold, owing to the thick branches of the trees, and left the stag. The eagle kept hovering for some time above the wood where the stag was concealed, but at last flew away.”
Whilst stalking in the neighbouring forest of Applecross two years ago, Colonel the Hon. Claude Willoughby had a most interesting experience, a description of which he has kindly given me permission to reproduce here:
“On 30th September, 1921,” he writes, “I was stalking with Alick Mackenzie on Applecross. We had come through Corrie Chaorachan into Corrie Na Na and spied a stag with hinds on the west face above the loch. The wind was west, and after a difficult and exceedingly good stalk across the Corrie and above these deer, avoiding hinds, also another stag with hinds, we arrived at a point within 150 yards of the stag we were after and found him lying down. Owing to the light and the distance, I determined to wait for him to rise before shooting. After waiting half an hour, hinds which we had seen beyond the place where he was lying came galloping past him. He rose and I shot him; he fell dead. We at once saw that the reason of these hinds galloping was that an eagle was after a calf which had separated from the herd. We saw the eagle land on the calf’s back twice, but the calf escaped.
“The eagle then attacked a hind in the herd. A kestrel hawk now joined in, and mobbed the eagle. This attack lasted only a short time. The eagle then circled round my dead stag, the kestrel soon after disappearing. The eagle settled on a rock about five yards from the dead stag, and remained there until we showed ourselves. All this took place within 200 yards of us.
“On the Tuesday following Lord Derwent was also stalking on Applecross, near Corrie Attadale. He and the head stalker Finlayson saw an eagle attack a calf, which it knocked down twice, but the calf escaped.”