The animals were mauled by dogs.

Rebecca Rosales awoke at about 3:30 a.m. Friday to bellows of pain and panic coming from her backyard where she keeps her livestock.

"I never heard it before and I never want to hear it again," Rosales told The Hawk Eye Monday.

Rosales looked outside and saw what she thought was a silhouette of a person standing near some trees in the wooded area of her property. Then she heard dogs barking.

Due to mobility issues and slippery conditions in her yard brought on by numerous rounds of rain, Rosales resigned herself to staying inside to call police. Her daughter went outside to investigate. There were two dogs in the pen where Beans and Billy, two male Lamancha goats Rosales has raised since infancy, and where her two ducks, Daisy and Dewey, had been tending to their nest.

The larger of the two dogs, which Rosales described as a brown pitbull, had hold of Beans by the neck over a small pond. The smaller one, described as a black lab or pitbull mix puppy, jumped at the fence trying to get out.

"He was jumping at the fence like he didn't even want to be in here," Rosales said.

The larger one charged toward Rosales' daughter growling, at which point she went back inside to wait for police to arrive.

By the time police got there, the dogs were gone. The ducks came frantically to the front of the fence, and the goats lay crumpled on a pile of straw near a corner of the back of the fence. A gurgling sound came from Beans throat with each bleat he tried to make.

She believes someone had gotten into the pen and stabbed the goats before putting the dogs inside. A small hole beneath part of the fence may have been big enough for the puppy to fit through, but not the adult dog. Additionally, another part of the fence had been pushed down, allowing for easier entry. She found footprints and dog prints going up the hill behind her property, as well as broken glass and another object not belonging to her or her family members. That object has been turned over to police for further investigation.

Beans' trachea had been severed, and he ultimately had to be put down.

Beans had come to Rosales last May as a rescue from a farmer who didn't think he would live due to his small size. Because he was so small, Rosales had to tube feed him for two weeks and bottle feed him for two months. He came to be a therapy animal for Rosales' other daughter, who has autism. Rosales said Beans had been the leader of her five goats, as well as the father of two. The other goats were kept in a separate pen.

Billy is on the road to recovery, but it won't be an easy one. He suffered a deep cut to his side next to his leg that pulls open every time he goes to stand up.

"It's so sad, because Beans was so sweet and Billy's just a clown," Rosales said as Daisy limped around the yard, heavily favoring her left leg over her right, during a brief excursion outside her crate, where she is being kept while she recovers. "They were so friendly, you can ask anyone who came here, they would come up to the fence and just lick you."

Dewey had been bitten on the back, and Daisy has a broken leg. Their injuries left them unable to properly care for the 13 eggs in their nest, so Rosales and her daughter gathered them and put them in an incubator in hopes the ducklings inside will survive.

The incident has left Rosales, her family and their pets, the majority of whom are rescues, uneasy. It also has left Rosales with a growing vet bill.

Burlington Police Sgt. John Stirn said the attack remains under investigation. Anyone with information is asked to call the Burlington Police Department at (319) 753-8366 or Burlington Area Crimestoppers at (319) 753-6835.