Image copyright Hall Farm

Three lambs bought for a primary school to be pets have been found "skinned and slaughtered" near a farm.

Remains of the lambs, and a rare Lincoln Longwool sheep, were found on land near Hall Farm in Messingham, near Scunthorpe, on Saturday.

The four-week-old lambs had been bought for a school project, farmer Jamie Quinn said.

Mr Quinn, who said police were investigating, added: "How do we tell the children at the school?"

The lambs, named Ethel, Chunk and Ugs, were triplets and had to be bottle-fed with formula milk four times a day because their mother could not feed them all.

Mr Quinn said the animals were "slaughtered in the field opposite - skins left for us to find".

"I am currently in bits," he said.

"They were bought specifically for a school project to fit in with other parts of the curriculum six weeks ago. The plan was to keep them at the school as pets for the kids."

He said the deaths came after three adult sheep, including another Lincoln Longwool, went missing four weeks ago in a suspected rustling.

"All we found was wool hanging over the barbed wire fence where they'd been dragged across," Mr Quinn added.

According to Lincoln Longwool Sheep Breeders Association, the sheep are a "vulnerable" breed and listed on the Rare Breed Survival Trust watch list because "there are very few remaining flocks of Lincoln Longwools" in the country.