RESIDENTS told of their disgust after a cygnet was found beheaded in Marshfield on Sunday afternoon.

A woman who lives nearby said: “The person who did this is either insane or sick and if they are capable of doing that they are capable of anything."

It was found floating in the Drenewydd Reen between Pentwyn Terrace and Broadway at about 3pm.

Peter Martin from Swan Rescue South Wales recovered the headless bird after being called by residents.

Mr Martin was expecting to find it had been attacked by a fox.

But the cygnet’s head had been severed from the base of the neck and Mr Martin said the cut was too clean to have been done by another animal.

He took the cygnet's body from the reen to be disposed of. Its head is still missing.

Most birds are protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 and the Queen has a prerogative over all swans in England and Wales.

Mr Martin said this is the first time in 35 years caring for swans that he has ever seen anything like it.

Police were called at 4.15pm by a woman who lives on Pentwyn Terrace and they attended the scene at about 8pm.

She said saw the cygnet at about 3pm but was too upset to call them immediately.

She said: “The person who did this is either insane or sick and if they are capable of doing that they are capable of anything. What’s to say that they are not capable of doing it to someone’s cat or dog?”

Another Pentwyn Terrace resident, Lisa Clark, said of the cygnet: “People would whistle and it would come along. It had been there for months and the rest of its family had left.

“To find it floating in the reen was just not on.”

Swan Rescue South Wales, originally called Gwent Swan Rescue, was established in the mid-1970s to provide rescue and promote the welfare of swans in South Wales.

It is the only group of its kind in the region.

And the group was once a contact for the RSCPA when their officers were unavailable but now it works on its own.

Anyone who has information on the cygnet’s beheading is encouraged to phone Gwent Police on 101 and quote incident number 329 1/12/13.