A Scots farmer has been left devastated after out-of-control dogs mauled his flock of heavily pregnant sheep - leaving more than 10 dead.
Sandy Smellie made the grim discovery at Posso Farm, near Peebles, on Friday morning after the animals were attacked overnight.
The 36-year-old fears the full extent of the damage won’t be known until lambing season begins in five weeks time as the stress will likely have caused many of the ewes to abort.
He has issued a stern warning to dog owners to keep their pets on a lead and away from livestock after dozens of his animals were also seriously injured on March 10.
Sandy said: “These dogs have obviously been out for a prolonged period of time and been wreaking havoc over the whole hillside where there’s 200-300 sheep.
“There were several killed and we’ve had to have several more put down due to the severe injuries that they’ve suffered.
“The worst part is the suffering that some of these sheep will have endured due to the fact that we weren’t notified and we didn’t find them until the following day.
“There was one that we didn’t see until Saturday because it was up in the next valley. It was pretty distressing to find them like that.
“That’s three generations of work put into the breeding of those sheep. They can’t just be replaced. They’re born on that hill and they stay there their whole lives. It was really upsetting to find.
“We strongly believe that the dogs that have done this are somebody’s family pets - they’re not like wild animals.
“Anybody’s pet dog could do something like this - it’s their natural instinct. We believe it was two dogs as well which almost makes it worse because it’s pack instinct.
“The full effect of this won’t be known for a few weeks yet. At the moment, there’s financial loss in the thousands but that could potentially run into tens of thousands.
“We could potentially have a couple of hundred ewes who have aborted all their lambs. They were up there for hours and hours being chased.”
He added: “Just chasing the sheep for a couple of minutes is enough to put stress on it. The dogs don’t even have to bite the sheep.
“We’re only five weeks off lambing so they’re heavily pregnant which is maybe why so many have been bitten because they’ve not been able to get away.
“It’s fairly heartbreaking not only because of the work that went into these sheep but the devastation and suffering that they went through.
“They’ve suffered for 24 to 36 hours. Even the ones we found dead, they potentially didn’t die straight away and could have been lying there overnight.
“We just want to get a strong message across to the general public that any dog can cause severe suffering amongst livestock.
“And we’d like to remind people to keep their dog on a lead, well away from any livestock.
“This is the second dog attack on our farm in the last year. We lost five lambs and a ewe in May last year.
“There’s over 10 dead and one that’s been treated but is probably not going to make it.
“There are others on the hill that have injuries but they’re not serious enough that we can get hold of them. It’s too much stress to try and really bad terrain to try to catch them.
“We’d have to bring the whole lot in and they’re already really stressed, running wild around the hill. We don’t want to cause any more damage than what’s already been done.”
A Police Scotland spokesperson said: “We are aware of sheep having been found deceased in the Peebles area on Friday, 11 March, 2022. Officers are following a positive line of enquiry.”
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