Mr Jones phoned at 10 o’clock in the morning to inform me that he had discovered a dead ewe with unusual injuries. I had called at his farm a few weeks earlier as part of my investigation of mutilations in his area and I had left with him a leaflet describing the type of injuries to look for that is why he had now contacted me.
Mr Jones said the animal had most of it’s throat and neck tissue missing and odd holes in it’s stomach area I told him I would call to examine the animal before 12 o’clock that morning.
When I arrived at Moss Farm Mr Jones told me he had already contacted DEFRA to inform them that the animal was dead, he had done this mainly as he is co-operating with DEFRA in research connected with the scrapie in sheep.
I asked him to elaborate on this research. He told me about 4 years ago he was at a sheep show and he saw a poster asking for farmers to come forward and take part in research concerning the spread of scrapi in sheep flocks. The main objective of the work was to try and find a way of identifying scrapie in live animals before they showed signs of the disease. Mr Jones's farm is one of 20 in the country that is taking part in the project, if he finds a dead animal he has to offer the carcass to DEFRA for examination. If he finds an animal showing signs of scrapie while alive he must contact DEFRA and a team from London will come to his farm to collect the animal.
All the sheep have been genetically tested and documented by DEFRA, when a animal death occurs he must notify them immediately and then they will decide if any samples should be taken by their vets. If they decide to sample an animal they usually remove 17 different organs such as the brain, tonsils, and tongue, these organs are then sent to 26 different laboratories around the UK.
Four years ago Mr Jones's flock was split in to 2 half's, one flock has became a very new flock bred from outside stock and the other half is called the old flock, the original flock before DEFRA started their research.
The dead animal that was found that morning was a 6-year-old ewe it was discovered approximately 250 metres from the farmhouse on the side of a low hill, the other side of the hill was a now disused quarry. The farmer took me to the animal location, the animal was lying on its back, and it had a 60 mm elongated hole on its left groin and another similar hole on the right groin.
The removal of tissue on the head was very extensive particularly on the animals left side lower jaw, it had been cleanly excised and sharp straight cuts were clearly visible. Both eyes wee missing, the tongue, the whole of the throat leading down the neck in to the spinal column was stripped bare, the end of the snout was also missing and there was not so much as one drop of blood on the ground.
The extent of the tissue removal looked very similar to the cattle mutilations seen in the U.S, there were no apparent signs of secondary predator attack and both ears were intact and with the ear tag still in place.
It should be noted that a high voltage power line runs through the field were these animals and others have been found in the past. No fleece or soil samples were taken due to the heavy recent rainfall.