Koi carp collector devastated after fish lost in ‘otter massacre’

The 75-year-old’s wife, Yvonne, discovered the dead fish beside the pond in the couple’s back garden on her way to work.

She then alerted her husband, who said the scene was “horrendous”.

He said: “The first thing I saw was what I thought was a bunch of leaves. When I got closer it turned out to be one of the koi.

“As I stepped over the wall I noticed there were a couple to the left, more to the right, and when I looked in the pond there was no movement at all.”

He said the scene got worse the further he walked.

“I took a walk around the pond and almost every fish that I had was lying there headless, fins ripped off them, faces ripped off them,” he said. “It was just a massacre as far as I was concerned.”

At first Mr Smith thought it had been an attack from a heron.

But after posting his discovery on social media, friends said it could have been otters or mink.

“As far as I believe,” he said, “it was otters.”