When Guilden and Sylvia Gilbert set out for the Bahamas to celebrate his 80th birthday with their son and grandchildren, they had no idea their home in St David's would be vandalised while they were away.

Just days after arriving in the Caribbean, Mr Gilbert, 80, received a long distance phone call from Bermuda informing him that their bird bath, sculpture and fountain had been destroyed.

To make matters worse he said, all the gold fish in the fish pond he built himself were dead.

Now he's offering a substantial reward for information that will lead to the identification, arrest and conviction of whoever was responsible for vandalism at his property.

“I was very much disappointed and hurt, but I couldn't let that disturb me to a great extent because I was on vacation to celebrate an important occasion.

“When we returned home we saw the bird bath split in half. The fish pond is about 8'x 5' with bird bath in the middle that had a sculpture with fountain.

“I built it myself, the bird bath is in the centre, it's on a column that goes up about five feet. And in that bird bath we had a sculpture in the middle with a fountain on it.

“It's been there for many years and I'm disgusted,” said Mr Gilbert.

“The police were called in because a neighbour of mine was in fact looking after my house, he had keys to my home.

“I feel very certain that it was damaged deliberately and all the goldfish had died,” he added.

He explained that prior to leaving for the Bahamas his wife had placed a Clorox tablet in the bird bath to keep it clean.

“I'm assuming when that fell into the pond the fish died; I had about 36 gold fish and this is not the first time this year that I've had troubles with that pond.

“My older gold fish had died earlier this year so I replenished that stock with new gold fish and now they're dead.

“If it was children they would have to be older children because it's heavy. The concrete is thick, solid concrete.

“We have a second bird bath that had a plastic bird on it that my wife brought in Canada and the base of that was broken right off.

“I'm convinced the damage was deliberate,” said Mr Gilbert.

“I'm offering a substantial reward for information that leads to the identification, arrest and conviction of the person responsible for this.”

Mr Gilbert's telephone number is listed in the directory.