Chicks stolen, 200, from Mass. farmer who suspects animal rights activists

By Barry Leibowitz
CBS News
ASHBURNHAM, Mass. – A central Massachusetts farmer says 200 chicks were stolen from their pen, and he suspects animal rights activists are behind it, after he posted a picture of the birds on Facebook.Keith Kopley at Kalon Farm in Ashburnham says the Cornish cross chicks hatched in Pennsylvania were delivered to him on Wednesday, March 13, and disappeared the next morning.As soon as they arrived, he put them in a sawdust-lined wooden pen with two heat lamps and posted a Facebook photo of them swarming around their feeders and water dish.

Kopley tells The Sentinel and Enterprise he doesn’t think the theft was profit motivated, because expensive power tools nearby were left behind. He also says there’s no evidence a predator got in the pen.

Police confirm they are investigating the chick caper.