Fang God he is alright! ... Patrick the snake found in church grounds in Ireland
- 4 years ago
A four-and-a-half foot tropical snake which has eluded a wildlife rescue team in Derry for almost 18 months has been located on the grounds of a Derry church and safely taken into their care.
Clergy and housekeeping staff at St Columb’s Church in the Chapel Road area of the Waterside were stunned after local parishioners spotted the black and red ringed reptile in the grounds of the Waterside church on Thursday.
After police were contacted, officers immediately got in touch with Derry woman Niamh McManus, founder of Foyle Wildlife Rescue, and together with volunteer Gemma Havlin from Greencastle she swept into action.
And for Niamh it was a case of déjà vu, as police had twice before in 2019 contacted her following sightings of the same snake (which is relatively harmless to humans) in the walled area behind Spencer Road, but the slithery customer had always managed to evade detection - until now.
Niamh told the Journal: “When we got the call from police to say there’s a snake in the church grounds I looked and Gemma and said ‘no way’. I asked if the snake was red and black stripes and they said it was so I knew then. I just started laughing, thinking, ‘this can’t be real’.
“Police tasked me to it in February 2019 and in August 2019 but I could never catch it. For two or three days I pursued it in August and before that I’d been on it’s tail. It has been living inside these Derry walls for at least a year and half. I’m amazed it survived the winter but it managed to keep itself alive.
Clergy and housekeeping staff at St Columb’s Church in the Chapel Road area of the Waterside were stunned after local parishioners spotted the black and red ringed reptile in the grounds of the Waterside church on Thursday.
After police were contacted, officers immediately got in touch with Derry woman Niamh McManus, founder of Foyle Wildlife Rescue, and together with volunteer Gemma Havlin from Greencastle she swept into action.
And for Niamh it was a case of déjà vu, as police had twice before in 2019 contacted her following sightings of the same snake (which is relatively harmless to humans) in the walled area behind Spencer Road, but the slithery customer had always managed to evade detection - until now.
Niamh told the Journal: “When we got the call from police to say there’s a snake in the church grounds I looked and Gemma and said ‘no way’. I asked if the snake was red and black stripes and they said it was so I knew then. I just started laughing, thinking, ‘this can’t be real’.
“Police tasked me to it in February 2019 and in August 2019 but I could never catch it. For two or three days I pursued it in August and before that I’d been on it’s tail. It has been living inside these Derry walls for at least a year and half. I’m amazed it survived the winter but it managed to keep itself alive.