Adam Watson was brought up at Turriff in Aberdeenshire. At age seven he became interested in snow and a year later in summer snow-patches in the Cairngorms, the largest expanse of high hill country in Scotland. Then at age nine, his life changed after reading Seton Gordons (SG) classic book The Cairngorm Hills of Scotland. Adam wrote to Seton soon after, he replied, and they corresponded for the rest of Setons life. Adam was obsessively keen on the Cairngorms. At 13, alone, he saw his first pair of ptarmigan and thought they were the most beautiful birds in the world, more than eagles, his first pair of which he saw later that day. Adam has been studying eagles in Deeside since. In the 1950s he met other eagle pioneers Charlie Palmar and Pat Sandeman, and Leslie Brown especially made a big influence on what should and could be studied on eagles. Although Adam worked as a biologist, all his studies of eagles have been in his own time.
