Archives of The Cold Blooded News

The Newsletter of the Colorado Herpetological Society

Volume 29, Number 4;   April, 2002

Snakes Slither Back Into Ireland

by Shawn Pogatchnik

"We're finding them in attics, in people's cupboards, under the sink in the bathroom," said Gillian Bird, education officer of the Dublin Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. One lady was spotted last week dropping her out-of-favor serpent from a car parked outside Dublin Zoo," Bird said.

The half-dozen reptiles in her centre's two-year-old "snake house" include: corn snakes, bull snakes and a red-tailed boa, none native to this damp and cool land, all abandoned or on the run from their owners.

The Irish snake trade has its own murky history. Monica Roden, whose Dublin Pet Stores is the oldest such shop in Ireland, doesn't sell anything slithery these days. But her father did back in the 1930s. "We had grass snakes here, shipped over from England," said Roden, 69, whose family business dates from 1845.

Bird's veterinarians respond to every snake sighting, but on Thursday they were too late. "An old lady called saying there was a snake sitting in her garden," said Bird. "She'd seen it there basking in the sun on Wednesday, but she was scared to death of it and wouldn't go out. "She called us when it was still sitting there the next day," Bird said. "It died of the cold; a fine corn snake it was."