Dog gangs feared to be behind savaged ewes find

The animals, which were snatched away from their lambs on mixed arable and sheep farm The Gables, in Micklebring, Rotherham, had suffered horrific injuries, which it is believed were inflicted by dogs being trained for fighting or deer poaching.

Farmer Richard Spencer said: “They all had puncture marks around the head, face, throat, back legs and udders. It was dogs that killed them – there were no other marks on them.

“There were four ewes and a gimmer-hogg – one of last year’s lambs that we save for breeding next year.

“That was only with those sheep because it was recovering from a dog attack in January. This is the fourth dog-related incident we’ve had since last August.

“We’re just all devastated. It’s been the hardest lambing season we’ve had for years, we’ve got to the end of it and now something like this happens.

“It just makes you feel downhearted when you have had a hard year.”

The incident has left nine lambs without mothers and having to be hand-reared.

“We are trying to give the bottle to them but when they are just two to three weeks old it’s hard to get them on it,” he said.

“It would have been not as bad if they had taken sheep that didn’t have lambs but this has such a knock-on effect.”

As well as the cost of hand-rearing the orphaned lambs, Mr Spencer has also been hit with the expense of having the carcasses of the dead sheep recovered from the quarry they were found in between Carr and Brookhouse.

The incident is thought to be the work of criminal gangs operating in parts of South Yorkshire.

“We’re hearing on the grapevine different reports that there are groups in Conisbrough, Edlington and Thircroft,” said Mr Spencer.

“There seems to be a few like-minded people. You just wonder what sort of planet they are on, what sort of members of society they are.

“I imagine they will be bragging about it, these people, if somebody overhears them in a pub.”

Mr Spencer’s daughter Elizabeth also appealed to anyone who may have heard anything about the incident to contact police.

Photos of the dead sheep and their injuries, taken as evidence, were deemed too distressing to publish.

“I find it hard to look at them myself as it makes me think of how frightened they would have been and what a slow and horrible death they must have had,” said Ms Spencer.

“I love working with the sheep and am often teased for calling them my ladies so you can imagine how it makes me feel to see what happened, especially after spending so much extra time with them over lambing time.

“It makes it worse that they were taken from a field that was clearly home to mothers and their lambs.

“I now have nine little extra mouths to feed every day to go with the four cade lambs that I already had – not a quick task to carry out twice a day.

“Hopefully if this type of crime is made more public something might be done to try and prevent them in the future as well as making people more vigilant to what is going on in their area.”

The incident is being investigated by South Yorkshire Police, which has been warning other farmers in the area to be vigilant. Anyone with information should call 101.