“HE was just a cheeky little duck. He used to pinch the biscuits out of the dog’s bowl and chase him around the garden. We got him from the Cheshire Show when he was a tiny duckling in my hand and he’s grown up with the children.

“He’s going to be sorely missed.”

When the Normans put their beloved family pet in his pen for the night on Saturday they did not think he would come to any harm.

But after a late night dispute with their next door neighbour’s children on Densham Avenue they woke to find their six-year-old Ainsleydale duck called Duck had been battered with bricks and his neck half-wrung.

Vivienne Norman, aged 38, said: “At about 4am on Sunday my husband was woken by a group of youths in the next door neighbour’s garden playing football.

“He went down to ask them to be quiet and then they must have jumped over the wall and attacked our duck.

“They damaged his neck so severely that he could not hold it straight. He had internal bleeding and had been hit with a house brick.”

After struggling through the night Duck was finally unable to survive his injuries and was put to sleep by vets on Monday afternoon, leaving the Normans’ three young sons aged three, nine and 13, bereft.

Through tears, Mrs Norman, a senior care worker, added: “Our boys are distrught and I’m absolutely devastated.

“It’s heart-breaking – he was like one of the children.

“You don’t expect to go to bed and your pet to be brutally attacked. He didn’t do any harm to anybody – it’s awful.

“Seeing Duck go in this way is very traumatic.”

Mrs Norman is keen to see the problem with anti-social behaviour on the estate addressed.

“What on earth was going through those kids minds to attack a defenceless duck?,” she added.

“The worrying thing is the level of violence – it could be a child next time and you do worry about letting your young children play out around here.

“I want the kids who did this to be named and shamed. Someone has to be held accountable. It’s absolutely disgusting.”

The RSPCA is working with police to investigate this incident and is appealing for anyone with any information about those involved to get in touch by calling the cruelty line on 0300 1234999 and asking to leave a message for RSPCA inspector Claire Roberts.