Animals killed at Cheshire children's charity in 'trespass' incident
Ten animals are dead or missing after a trespassing incident at a children's charity site. Staff and volunteers arrived at The Children's Adventure Farm, Millington, Friday morning (April 19) to find rabbit and guinea pig enclosures had been 'destroyed'.
Just one of the charity's eight guinea pigs was found alive but 'in shock', staff said. Another guinea pig was found dead, with six more missing, along with three rabbits.
The rabbit and guinea pig runs are protected from predators such as foxes and birds of prey, but staff said wire had been 'snipped' around the runs.
Large dog tracks and a set of boot prints were found around the site, with staff believing the incident happened in the early hours of Friday morning. The charity offers day visits and residential stays free-of-charge to children living with chronic or terminal illness, disability or social disadvantage, along with their families, across the North West and surrounding areas.
Hannah Grahame, a member of the fundraising team at the Children's Adventure Farm, told CheshireLive: "On Friday morning, staff and volunteers arriving on site found up in our woodland area, where we have rabbit runs and guinea pig enclosures, someone has come on site in the early hours of the morning, and destroyed some of that infrastructure.
"We have found only one dead guinea pig, there’s just one surviving guinea pig who is obviously in shock. We had eight to start with. The three rabbits have also gone."
The runs are located in a wooded area on the property's ten-acre footprint. Hannah describes the runs as ‘quite vast’, with protection in place to guard against predators including hawks and foxes. “Someone has chosen to break those runs and the metal protection around them. It looks like the fences have been clipped.”
Hannah said trespassing incidents at the site are not common. “Around a year ago, there was a bit of a disturbance and we lost one animal, and then previously there was a robbery, maybe six or seven years ago.”