The owner of a 200-acre organic farm and ranch in Pahoa said dozens of his sheep have recently been killed and mutilated by dogs, and he’s convinced the source of the damage is hunters trespassing at night on his property.
“We lost about 30 this past couple, three weeks or so,” said Wayland Lum, third-generation owner of the family farm. The 71-year-old Lum said the land was purchased from the Shipman family more than a century ago by his grandfather, a cowboy on Shipman Ranch.
“It seems we go one step forward and back 10,” Lum said. “We’ve got theft and all that — but the sheep, they’re animals, defenseless animals. And you don’t do that to defenseless animals. It’s heartbreaking to see this. They’re family, in a sense, and they serve a purpose here. We take care of them and they do the same for us. It’s our livelihood, in a sense.”
The property is fenced, and the sheep are kept in an area where hunting or trespassing is prohibited. The predation of the sheep occurred sometime between the night of Oct. 3 and Monday morning.
According to police, the sheep were valued at $2,500.
Hawaii Police Department Capt. Todd Pataray said an employee of Lum’s reported the crime Monday. The employee told police they believe unknown individuals allowed their dogs to enter the ranch property the night before and let the dogs attack the sheep.
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“There is no indication this was an intentional act. The dogs could have been strays, as there were signs of digging under a fence,” Pataray said.
According to Pataray, the report was made for documentation purposes and for advice, given that the suspects and witnesses could not be determined and were unknown.
“The reporting party only requested advice to prevent it from happening again,” Pataray said. “Our community policing officers will be following up with the reporting party.”
Police said the responding officer wasn’t informed of how many animals were victimized and added the case has been reclassified to a dangerous dog investigation, with Puna Community Policing conducting additional follow-ups.
Lum said he has discovered more mutilated sheep bodies since the report was made, and the Hawaii Tribune-Herald saw three dead sheep at the property on Wednesday. He added that one of the paddock gates was found tampered with and open.
“Gates don’t open like that by a dog. When my workers tell me that paddock … was wide open, that’s a human,” Lum said. “They had a pack of dogs, and they came in to do some damage. Wild dogs might travel in twos. This was quite a few.”
Lum noted that wild dogs have predated his livestock in the past.
“Once in a while, we’d see the wild dogs and so forth,” he said. “I’m up here with the crew and each gate is locked. And two little mutts are hanging on to the neck of one of my sheep right here, and I couldn’t get them. But that was wild dogs, and sometimes, they come in pairs.
“But this was a little bit more than that. This was a lot. This was a mutilation thing. We’ve had hunters along the edge with their dogs, and that’s in the daytime, when we’re here. But sometimes, they return at night. And it’s just trespassing.
“I’ve never seen mutilation like this. They’re hunting for pigs and if the dogs come in, they’re taking out the sheep,” he continued. “If we find these guys and we happen to injure them, now we’re in trouble. So, where is the protection for us?”
Lum said his livestock, which includes cattle as well as sheep, serve a purpose beyond being slaughtered for a dinner table.
“We use our sheep for all the maintenance of the fields. They go between our ulu trees and our avocados, and they weed-whack. It’s a whole organic thing,” he said. “We don’t use any kind of fertilizer, any kind of poison or anything else like that on the farm. The cattle take care of some of it and the sheep take care of the rest. The fertilizer is all manure and fish poop from the tilapia ponds.”
In addition to the fences topped with barbed wire, concertina wire also also been strung along some of the fencing.
“We’ve totally fenced in our whole farm, and at the same time, it’s never good enough,” he said. “You can’t keep them out. You can only make it difficult and hopefully, they’ll say it’s not worth it. It’s too much trouble.”
Anyone with information regarding the incident is asked to contact Puna Patrol Officer Cody Hirata at 808-961-2716, or at [email protected]. Those who prefer anonymity may call Crime Stoppers at 808-961-8300 and may be eligible for a reward of up to $1,000.
