One has been spotted flying over the car park of an Asda supermarket in Dunfermline, its 8ft wingspan and white tail clearly visible to shoppers. Another took to sitting beside a railway line until it was frightened off by a passing train.

Until recently anyone wanting to catch a glimpse of a sea eagle in Britain had to travel to the far-flung West Coast of Scotland and the Hebrides, where the birds have gradually been reintroduced since the 1970s. But thanks to a new scheme, Britain’s largest bird of prey — the fourth biggest in the world — is being seen near towns and cities for the first time in 150 years.

“There have been some funny anecdotes,” Claire Smith, an RSPB officer who helps to manage the project, said. “One caller phoned in to say that she had seen a condor, and another described it as being like a flying barn door. Another woman phoned the RSPCA after she saw a bird sitting on a fence for so long that she became concerned for its health. In fact it wasn’t injured, it was just being lazy.”

Since 15 sea eagle chicks arrived from Norway in June, details of their reintroduction to the East Coast of Scotland have been secret. For two months the chicks were held in cages in an undisclosed location in north Fife, where they were fed venison, rabbit and fish to build up their strength before being released in August.

Over the past two weeks all of the remaining birds, who are now six months old and fully grown, have left the release site and are roosting in the surrounding countryside, The Times can disclose. Two of the 15 — a male and a female — have died after landing on electricity transformers. Since August there have been 250 sightings, compared with only a few dozen each year on the West Coast, including some in highly unlikely places.

All the birds are tagged with big white letters or numbers on their wings. A male, bird N, roosted in a tree next to a graveyard; another, bird H, was so worn out after his first flight that he spent most of a day recovering on a wall next to a road.

Although most are roosting within a 20-mile (32km) radius of the release site, two have ventured farther north — one to woodland near Fraserburgh in Aberdeenshire, and one to the Montrose Basin estuary in Angus. Another has been spotted as far south as Berwick-upon-Tweed, across the Border in England. One has not been seen for two weeks. He was last sighted near Stirling.

Five of the birds are female, typically slightly larger than males, and eight are male. They are capable of flying up to 150 miles a day, but can survive on little more than 10oz of food — about 300g — the equivalent of a small rabbit. They eat carrion and small animals, including pink-footed geese, ducks and hares.

“We’ve had an incredible response from people,” said Ms Smith, 26, who tracks the birds by locating the signals emitted by radio “backpacks” — no bigger than a matchbox — attached to them. “People have been amazed by how graceful and big they are.”

On a hill above Loch Leven in Fife, 30 minutes’ drive from Edinburgh, she scanned 13 different radio frequencies yesterday, one for each of the birds. As she held a 3ft (1m) aerial and saw the results on a receiver, the roar of the nearby M90 could clearly be heard.

“There aren’t any here now, but we’ve had about a dozen sightings for five different sea eagles in the area,” she said. “Some have been seen flying low over the loch watching a flock of geese.”

The scheme, managed by the RSPB in partnership with Scottish Natural Heritage and Forestry Commission Scotland, will be closely watched by those who believe it could be a blueprint for reintroducing birds of prey near urban areas across Britain. Up to 80 sea eagles will be released in east Scotland over the next five years.

The scheme has not been without problems. One farmer has said that a sea eagle has been taking his poultry, although post-mortem examinations ruled out the possibility of a raptor. Another says that 50 of his mallards are missing; the RSPB is investigating.

A spokeswoman for the National Farmers’ Union Scotland said yesterday: “This is going to cause concern for farmers when lambing time comes and the lambs are small.”

Ms Smith said: “We can’t categorically say there won’t be a problem. because we can’t account at all times for every bird, but we’re not anticipating one.”

Police and wildlife groups fear that a “remarkably effective” bird registration scheme that prevents rare species being stolen from the wild and passed off as bred in captivity could be scrapped by ministers to cut costs.

Lost for 70 years, back and breeding successfully again

— Sea eagles – also known as whitetailed eagles – were once widespread in Britain, with Scotland the main stronghold, but there were also breeding pairs on the Isle of Wight and in the Lake District as late as the 18th century

— Persecution and egg collection gradually caused extinction, and in 1916 the last pair were reported in the Isle of Skye

— Attempts to reintroduce the birds in the 1950s and 1960s failed and it was not until 1975 that they were finally reintroduced with success on the offshore islands and on the West Coast of Scotland

— Over the next ten years more than 80 young birds were brought across from Norway and released on the Isle of Rum

— The first successful breeding took place in 1985 when a five-year-old male and a six-year-old female reared a single chick on the Isle of Mull

— Since then the number of wild-fledged sea eagle chicks has risen to about 200

Source: RSPB

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