Spanish police are investigating an attack on a herd of recently reintroduced European bison that left one animal decapitated, three missing and several more apparently poisoned.



Officers were called to the Valdeserrillas reserve in Valencia on Friday after the discovery of the headless body of Sauron, the dominant male of a small herd of bison that had been brought to eastern Spain over the past year.



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Staff and police said they believed the herd was poisoned so that their heads could be cut off and sold as trophies.

Carlos Álamo, the manager of the reserve, said he noticed something was wrong when he went to check on the animals last Wednesday. Not only were the bison in a different area to the one they usually occupied, but they were skittish and ran away when he approached. Staff put the behavioural change down to the hot weather, but two days later Álamo found Sauron’s decapitated remains.

“He was called Sauron after the Lord of the Rings character because he was the biggest and the most powerful,” Rodolfo Navarro, a spokesman for the reserve, told the Guardian. “He was a beautiful animal that weighed nearly 800kg [1,764lb]. He was sort of the symbol of the reserve.”

Officers from the Guardia Civil’s nature protection service, Seprona, have taken blood and fur samples from the dead animal to see whether it was poisoned with either spiked meat or water. No cartridges or bullet casings were found in the area.

Navarro said that as the dominant male, Sauron may have succumbed quickly to the poison, having eaten first and taken more food than others in the herd. He also said that while the reserve was fenced to prevent the animals from escaping, it was not a “prison wall” that could keep poachers from getting in.

Navarro added: “We think that they took his head as a trophy … It must have been a gang because one person couldn’t commit this kind of brutality on their own. The police are investigating and it will be difficult, but we hope they get them.”

Staff were searching the 365-hectare (900-acre) site for the three missing animals but said the operation could take a while as many areas could only be reached on foot. Other animals in the herd had diarrhoea, apparently as a result of poisoning.

European bison, which were pushed to the verge of extinction by hunting and habitat loss almost a century ago, have been reintroduced across the continent over the past few decades. The 12 animals in the Valdeserrillas reserve were brought to Spain from the Netherlands, Ireland and the UK.



Navarro said the attack on the herd had put seven years of hard work and investment in jeopardy and could threaten the reserve’s future.

“It was like a murder,” he said. “It’s just senseless and it’s really damaged not only our image and Valencia’s, but also Spain’s.”