Is sheep attack proof of big cat?

Sarah Cliss
25 February 2009
Fenland Citizen

OWNERS of a favourite Fenland family attraction have been left badly shaken after they found one of their pregnant sheep badly mauled.

Sam and Kim Flint, of Woodhouse Farm Park, Friday Bridge, are convinced the ewe, which was due to give birth any day, was attacked by a big cat after a local vet admitted it was unlikely the dead sheep was killed by a domestic animal.

The gruesome discovery was made when Sam went to check on a flock of pregnant sheep in a field off Redmoor Lane."

I could see a bit of fleece as I pulled up near the field.

When I got out of the truck I could see the sheep lying in a dyke outside the field and it was horribly mauled," said Sam, who called in a local vet to give his expert opinion."

The vet did not want to commit himself, but he did say he didn't think the attack had been carried out by a domestic animal," said Sam.

The sheep had huge bite marks around its throat and head and the flesh had been torn off the back end of the animal right down to the bone.

Sam managed to find a footprint in the mud and following advice previously printed in the Citizen from former South African animal tracker Fiona Timms it was clear the mark had been made by a cat rather than a dog.

Fiona came forward to offer her expert opinion last April when Chatteris woman Joan Peacock found footprints in her garden.She explained that dog footprints clearly show claw marks, but cat's don't.

The footprint found by Sam was not only large – bigger than a large dog's – it did not have claw marks at the end of the pads.Kim said it was the second time in just a few weeks that one of their flock had been attacked.

"Whatever attacked the sheep must have been very big and powerful because it hauled the ewe up and over a four feet high fence and then dragged it down into the ditch," said Sam, who spent Thursday morning moving the ewes from the fields to a barn in a bid to protect them from further attacks.

"It is really worrying.