Jeremy Clarkson reveals thieves rustled 11 sheep from Diddly Squat farm as ‘p***ed off’ star demands: ‘Put them back’

FURIOUS Jeremy Clarkson tonight revealed 11 sheep had been stolen from his farm.

Police are investigating the suspected late-night raid at Diddly Squat in Oxfordshire, featured on TV show Clarkson’s Farm.

In a message to the rustlers, 66-year-old Jezza said: “Put them back.”

The Sun columnist and TV star discovered he had been raided when he tried to count his flock this week with his Clarkson’s Farm sidekick Kaleb Cooper.

Only 16 of his 27 Easycare sheep were still in their remote field on his Diddly Squat farm in Chadlington, Oxfordshire, well known to viewers of his hugely popular Amazon Prime Video show.

Police were tonight investigating the theft of the livestock, which feature in series five.

Most read in TV

POP DIVA

80s pop legend unrecognisable as she walks her dogs in Notting Hill – guess who?

SHOCK DIAGNOSIS

ITV host, 62, reveals he’s been diagnosed with gut cancer & cancels work

SAD REALITY

Ex On The Beach’s Chet & Helen finally address feud with Casey & Marnie Simpson

BIRTHDAY DISASTER

Kirstie Allsopp rushed to hospital in an air ambulance after horror fall

Clarkson made no secret of his anger at the raid, and told the thieves: “Put them back.

“It’s a farm. We’re armed. Just so they know.

“It p***es me off. Honestly, it just p***es me off.”

Clarkson said the stolen sheep would sell at market for more than £2,000, and he fears some in other fields on his farm may have been taken too.

He told The Sun: “I don’t even know when it happened.

“We came down yesterday, Kaleb and I, and actually counted sheep, which is quite difficult to do without dozing off.

“There are 11 that have gone missing from this field, and we think there are some missing from the other field – there are 140 or so in a field a mile or so away.

“Nobody else has got Easycares, which is what these are. They’re supposedly easy to care for.

“I just sold 24 of them at the sheep market the other day, and they went for £205 each, so it’s over £2,000 of sheep gone missing.”

They had been intended for breeding, not eating, though it is believed they will be sold for their meat, at a higher price.

The raiders also pounced at a time — probably late at night — when the farm was not being filmed for the next series.

Clarkson went on: “If you’ve been in a butcher’s recently and looked at the price of lamb . . . this is a crime you can commit with literally nobody (seeing).

“There are woods on three sides of this field.

“I don’t know how they knew we’d got sheep in here. You can’t see it from anywhere and there’s no way of monitoring it.

“We have a film crew here all the time . . . a drone in the air.

“But obviously, they did it on a day or a night when we weren’t working here.”

He said the sheep were in a secluded part of the sprawling 1,000-acre estate “which we rarely come to, because it’s just grass”.

Clarkson continued: “I walk the dogs through these woods a lot.
“And you say, ‘Oh, there are the sheep’, so the dogs don’t go in that field.

But you don’t think, ‘Are there fewer sheep than there should be?’ Only yesterday, when we came and did the count, there were fewer. So we scoured the woods yesterday. We looked everywhere. They’re not here.”

Officers from Thames Valley Police’s Rural Crime Team arrived at the property, after the presenter returned from a premiere screening of Amazon’s new Grand Tour series in London.

Clarkson, who was seen speaking to the officers, said: “The sheep are going to be eaten. But it’s not our butchers that can sell it. They’re very good sheep. It’s upset me . . . you can’t ever form a bond with a sheep. Anyone who has anything stolen, it’s awful.

“But to have animals stolen, it’s really galling.

“They were happy here. This is my favourite field on the farm.

“There’s nothing, you always feel like you’re alone in the world. I did drive by three days ago, and noticed the gate was open.

“They have been taken, realistically. There’s no other explanation. There are no carcasses.

“We’ve been through the woods and there are no sheep droppings in there. They’re not in the woods. They’re not on the neighbouring farm. The only option left is that they’ve been taken.

“It just feels like we’re in the 17th century here . . . sheep rustling.”

Clarkson does not think he was targeted because of his hit TV show, which first aired in June 2021 and has made him the country’s best-known farmer.

He said: “It’s more likely to make you a target than less, but I still don’t think they’ve been stolen because they’re on Diddly Squat.”

He asked: “How can you (stop it) if someone’s determined to steal your livestock?

“This is a thousand acres, it’s a big farm. Anyone could be anywhere and you wouldn’t know.”

Asked what he would do if he caught the rustlers in the act, Clarkson replied: “I’ll be pretty cross. I would lock the gate, lock them in. Then they can’t get their car out.”

The theft was initially reported to police by farm contractor Kaleb and land manager Charlie Ireland.

Kaleb, 28, said filming there almost every day should deter would-be thieves, but he acknowledged how easy it was to do. He said of the sheep:

“We must have counted them maybe 30 times, and the majority of the time we did get it wrong, but there are definitely 11 missing. It’s weird to think that they would do it here because we’re filming literally every day.

“But at the same time, it’s not uncommon.”

He said sheep rustlers normally target fields at night because “who’s watching them at 11 o’clock?”.

He went on: “All they’ve got to do is put a few lights up, or a torch, run the dog around them, put them into a bunch, load them up, and off they go.”

Charlie added: “There are a few cases where people were actually slaughtering them in the field. There’s no evidence that happened here.”

If sold for their meat, the animals may have been worth up to £8,000, and it is feared they may already have been butchered.

Charlie said: “They haven’t even stolen the fat lambs — they’ve stolen the breeding stock, which is just frustrating.”

He added: “There will be a sense of violation. There’s a theft, it’s like somebody breaking into your house.”

Diddly Squat had a security scare in March last year when five men were caught on camera “checking out” the site.

At the time, Clarkson said: “The police say it does look like we are being recced by wrong ’uns and that we should ensure our security systems are up to scratch.”

In 2023, his farm shop, which can attract up to 1,000 customers a day, was targeted by two men who stole £80 worth of goods by stuffing them into their jackets.

Last September Clarkson also revealed his pub — The Farmer’s Dog in Burford — was hit by cyber criminals who stole £27,000. The latest theft has come at a time when farmers across the country are struggling to cope following the summer heatwaves.

Clarkson said he had spent “thousands and thousands” of pounds rearing the sheep, which are “very expensive” to care for.

He added: “This year, there’s been no grass at all, so it’s a lot more than usual.

“All farming’s been a nightmare this year because of the drought.”

Livestock theft costs farmers £4.5million a year, according to the National Farmers’ Union.

Dog attacks and livestock killings set them back another £1.95million. NFU vice-president Robyn Munt called the surge in livestock crime “worrying”.

She said: “Behind every statistic is a farmer, a family and a livelihood under strain.

“Farms are not just workplaces, they are homes, and while the effects of rural crime are felt financially, for many farmers, the real cost is the fear, the stress and the anxiety they are left with.”

Police flew a drone above the area to see if the missing sheep had gone to a nearby forest, but none was found.

TV crews are currently filming at Diddly Squat for season six of Clarkson’s Farm, which is expected to air next year.

A police spokesman said: “Thames Valley Police is investigating the theft of a number of sheep from a farm in Chadlington.

“The theft has occurred at some point over the last ten days and was unwitnessed.