Bill Bailey: 'Seeing a white-tailed eagle soaring over the Highlands was like a glimpse into the past'

My new book, My Animals and Other Animals is a memoir of sorts. It’s a stroll through my life so far, pausing at those moments where creatures of one sort or another have appeared in a series of incidents, excursions and mishaps... The pets that I’ve shared my life with and my wild animal encounters act as waymarkers, points of interest that blink and buzz and glow in my recollection like a festoon of lightbulbs strung out on the thread of memory.

Not only have I shared my home with a wide variety of creatures but, surprisingly, comedy has led to all manner of unexpected opportunities, presenting a whole range of documentaries on anything and everything from wildlife, to history, the arts, both factual and comedic.

As someone who has always had a keen wanderlust and a love of the outdoors, it’s been a source of great joy that comedy has taken me all over the world, and along the way offered up all manner of animal encounters. I’ve watched kangaroos snoozing on remote outback roads in Australia, cuddled a wombat at an animal sanctuary in Tasmania, had Sulawesi macaques high-five me while filming in Indonesia and cradled the head of a magnificent jaguar, tranquilised for a documentary in Brazil, held the paw of a sun bear in India, narrowly avoided stepping on king coral snakes in the jungles of Colombia and sung to a whale on the Barrier Reef. All this, along with equally marvellous encounters in these British Isles.

The sea eagle’s wingspan can extend to eight feet

Seeing a white-tailed eagle soaring over the Highlands was like a glimpse into the past, a window on a wilder age. The white-tailed eagle, sometimes called the sea eagle, was declared extinct in these isles early in the 20th century due to persecution by humans. Thanks in part to a scheme in which chicks were imported from Norway in the 1970s, the population is now doing well, with over 200 breeding pairs.

According to historical accounts, white-tailed eagles were once common throughout UK, with sightings as far south as the Isle of Wight. But the persuasive idea began to spread that these magnificent birds were a threat to livestock, while another, more macabre, myth tells of an eagle snatching a new-born baby from a mother’s arms. While never corroborated, it’s a powerful and terrifying image, and no doubt helped to stoke the long, merciless campaign to trap and kill these magnificent birds.

Alongside issues such as the loss of habitat and sociological changes, with ever bigger farms and more efficient methods to kill birds, the sea eagle finally blinked out in the UK in 1918, when the last one was shot in Scotland.

I first saw one on the Isle of Mull while filming a birdwatching TV show. I arrived in Oban, a place which I’ve become fond of over the years, before taking the CalMac ferry over to the Isle of Mull. As we drove around the different locations, it occurred to me what a diverse mix of characters there were in these parts. People were here from all over the world. A Finnish couple were running the pub by the jetty and various regional accents from all around the UK greeted us wherever we went. It became clear to me that this place exerts an extraordinary effect on people. It draws them in and compels them to start anew here among the eagles and sea lochs.

And why not indeed. From my vantage point on a hillside, the low cloud suddenly parted to reveal the mainland of Scotland across the water, a panorama of snow-capped mountains and receding peaks of purplish hues. A fine vista and my first sighting of an eagle was equally dramatic. It was deer-stalking season, so the eagles were out on the scavenge. When a deer is shot, the hunters will gut it in the field, leaving all the innards or ‘gralloch’ out for the wildlife. We slowly cruised around the inner sea loch and could see the figure of a bird high overhead.

First impressions: a huge wingspan, up to eight feet across, perhaps the largest eagles alive, wings extended stiff as boards, with feathery ‘fingers’ raised at each tip. Gradually it circled lower, close enough to make out clearly, in the binoculars, the majestic shape, the wings, the bright yellow beak and the white tail, and two sets of huge, fearsome talons. It almost doesn’t quite look real, more like a cartoon version of an eagle, such is its size and dynamic intensity. It’s an apex predator, which means that nothing will compete with it – except us.

As I continued to watch, I was struck by its outstretched feathers at the wingtips, gloriously aesthetic, like a painting. Like so many wildlife encounters, it made me catch my breath. These birds have a right to be here. In fact, they should be here and still would be were it not for centuries of persecution.

When I see success stories like the re-introduction of sea eagles to our islands, it instils in me something more than just a sense of wonder at Nature in all its raw beauty. It actually gives me hope, rather like when I hear music that speaks to me in a certain way. I hear a phrase, a chord change, a lyric that chimes with me and my reaction is instant: aha! Someone else feels this; someone else has had these thoughts! And I feel connected.

Seeing these eagles back in their natural home gives me hope. If these creatures can be brought back from the brink, then there’s a chance for all nature under threat. Wildlife these days is increasingly pushed out as habitats disappear. These creatures remind us of an older, wilder time, when we were less demanding inhabitants of these isles.

I watched as a single cormorant skimmed across the sea loch as a lowering mass of black cloud pressed downwards. It felt ominous and as the sky darkened the colours leached from the landscape, rendering the view down to layers of monochrome. But, as I’ve learned over the years, the weather of the Western Isles is capricious and can change in a moment... and so it was now. Within minutes the cloud lifted, allowing brilliant sunshine to burst through above and below, a great flood of light blocked by some huge, floating monolith.

The low beams shimmered with a diamond sparkle off the loch, dazzling the eyes, while those rays facing skywards pierced the cloud like an illustration from an Old Testament Bible. I was transfixed. This is why people come here and re-settle, out on the edge of humanity, on these isles in the cold Atlantic. When you witness a moment of such elemental beauty, a spectacular lightshow greater than any made by human hand, where Nature in its indifferent majesty stops you in your tracks, it works its magic on you, you feel a pull, a yearning to be forever in a wild place like this.

My Animals and Other Animals by Bill Bailey is published by Quercus, priced £25, out now.