MARLBOROUGH, Conn. — The owners of The Farm at Carter Hill woke up on what they thought was a regular morning to feed their ducks. As they approached the duck pen there was nothing but silence.
The husband, Mitch Iichatz stopped his wife, Hazel Iichatz, from going any further. He had a feeling it was unsafe.
"Every morning and wife we feed them and in the morning Hazel and I, my wife, to go feed them and didn't hear anything from them," he said." Usually, they're quacking like crazy because they know it's feeding time. Even the goats and sheep were quiet."
He said he went down to open the duck pen and all of a sudden he saw a bobcat inside.
"At the same time I see all of the cats stacked up like cordwood," he said.
25 of his ducks were dead. The owner said it killed 25 but only ate two of them.
"Disgust" and "devastating" was how Iichatz could describe the feeling after seeing his ducks killed.
"You raise them as pets, as companions when you're around the farm," he said.
Iichatz added a video to The Farm at Carter Hill Facebook page showing the aftermath.
Iichatz said he shut the door, made some phone calls to the constable in town, and was told he could kill the bobcat because it was in his livelihood. He decided the best decision would be to take the bobcat somewhere else with the help of his friends.
"We put a dog crate at the door, forced it all around by going in and pushing it and it went right inside because it was a pretty big bobcat," he said.
Iichatz said he made the decision not to kill the bobcat after seeing comments on Facebook but decided not to do that and relocate it.
This isn't the first time he has spotted a bobcat in the area. He also suspects that his other ducks may have been killed by a bobcat over the summer when they mysteriously disappeared one night. He recalled going from 35 to 25 ducks in one night.
This incident led them to keep the ducks inside and no longer free-ranging them.
The farm also has goats and sheep that went unharmed at the farm.
All of the animals at the farm are rescues. For the past 14 years, Hazel and Mitch Iichatz have run the farm hosting events and selling animals.
FOX61 contacted the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection for comments but has not heard back.
Jareliz Diaz is a digital content producer at FOX61 News. She can be reached at jdiaz@fox61.com
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