Spreading their wings
Anyone under 30 may find it hard to believe that red kites – reintroduced to England during the 1990s and now so common over Reading and the M40 and M4 corridor that people barely give them a second glance – were once about to disappear from Britain. Could white-tailed eagles, recently returned to the Isle of Wight after a 240-year absence in England, soar to equally spectacular heights by 2050?
“Why not?” says Tim Mackrill, a quietly confident raptor specialist who works for the Roy Dennis Wildlife Foundation. “These birds belong here, cheek by jowl, right among us.” Together with Forestry England, the foundation is leading an ambitious project to repopulate southern England with the huge eagles – Europe’s largest, with a wingspan of up to 2.4m. Also known as sea eagles, their nickname with birders is ‘flying barn doors’.
When first proposed, the scheme was greeted with howls of outrage. “Letting 8ft killer sea eagles loose on the South Coast is
