A magnificent bird of prey ended his flight of fancy almost 24 hours after disappearing from his Perthshire home earlier this week.
Pilgrim, an eight-year-old bald eagle, had been driven out of woods near the Phoenix Falconry in Auchterarder by resident buzzards on Monday afternoon.
His distraught owners, Lynn and Adrian Hallgarth, spent several fruitless hours searching for him, before issuing a heartfelt plea to the public.
Following his return late on Tuesday night, Lynn said, “You wouldn’t believe the sigh of relief we all made when we found out he was safe. He has never done this before and it was just amazing to see him again.
“What happened is that Pilgrim landed in the territory of the buzzards while they were nesting and he obviously got a little bit too close for comfort.
“The other birds have basically booted him out of their area and he had to move on somewhere else.”Big softieConcerns were raised about “big softie” Pilgrim’s ability to survive in the wild, as he was hand-reared and is unable to hunt for his own food.
Fortunately, a surprised birdwatcher came across the giant bird on Tuesday evening on Sheriffmuir, just 10 miles from the falconry.
The team were contacted and rushed to the scene to collect their tired and frightened bald eagle.
“He was very pleased to see us,” Lynn said.
“He saw the vehicle and, obviously we didn’t want everybody climbing out and scaring him because we weren’t sure what kind of reaction we would get.
“We just let Tom go out of the car with his glove, which he held up.
“Pilgrim looked over pretty quickly and flew around the farmhouse before flying straight down to Tom. He was pretty hungry because he had been out all night without any food.”
After recovering, local celebrity Pilgrim will be returning to his role as one of the stars in the centre’s bird handling lessons.
Lynn continued, “I just want to thank everybody who called in while he was missing, because it was so nice to know that they were aware of it and were looking out for him.”