White-tailed Eagles on the Isle of Mull

Eagle-Eyed

Visual Acuity
White-tailed Eagles have a highly developed sense of sight. This extremely sharp eyesight enables them to locate prey from a very long distance. The eyes of a White-tailed Eagle are not only large in relation to their head, but larger than humans. It is said that an eagle’s sharpness of vision is up to six times greater than that of a man with perfect eyesight.

The eyes of a White-tailed Eagle are situated at the side of its skull and have two centres of focus, allowing them to see both forwards and sideways at the same time. This overlapping of vision gives the White-tailed Eagle binocular eyesight which helps them gauge distances more accurately.

Like other birds, the retina of a White-tailed Eagle is made up of cones (to recognise colour) and rods (to distinguish light). The eye of a White-tailed Eagle has more cones than rods, as is befitting of a diurnal raptor.

Like the pale head and white tail of adulthood, the eyes of White-tailed Eagles lighten with age. Immature birds have dark, brown eyes as illustrated in the photograph, above right.