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A SNAKE HAS been spotted on the loose in Fordstown, Meath this week and a local animal sanctuary is trying to track it down.
Local Fianna Fáil TD Shane Cassells posted a photo of the snake to Facebook stating that a number of local residents spotted it in Fordstown.
Speaking on RTÉ Radio One’s Morning Ireland, Kevin Cunningham of the National Exotic Animal Sanctuary (NEAS) said that looking at the photographs, the reptile appears to be a corn snake.
“The snake has been seen as far as we can ascertain for a least three weeks on one or two occasions,” Cunningham said.
https://www.facebook.com/cassells4meathwest/photos/a.1614347005470460.1073741829.1613719375533223/1930002507238240/?type=3&permPage=1
He asked any local residents who spot the snake to approach it with caution, take a photograph of it and call NEAS or a local veterinary.
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“A corn snake is not dangerous, it’s a non-venomous snake,” he said.
Like most animals, if you approach it and it feels threatened it will bite you, possibly, but not in the sense that it will inject venom into you.
You would really have to be harassing it for it to retaliate like that.
“From the corn snake’s point of view, if somebody does approach it it’s just going to want to get away. We’re a lot bigger than it is, it’s only a three or four-foot long snake and if it sees a five or six-foot person coming up it’s going to want to get away and hide,” he said.
The snake is most likely to appear in warmer weather, according to Cunningham.
Snakes are cold blooded animals, so they make the most of the sunshine, like most Irish people when we get good weather, they’re out and they’re basking in the sunshine.
NEAS provides help to unwanted and neglected exotic animals needing permanent expert care and specialised accommodation.
Last month, a corn snake was found up a tree in Ballybrack, south Dublin. He was taken to the Bairbre O’Malley Veterinary Hospital, Bray for care.
If you spot the snake, Cunningham advised that you contact the organisation at 085 8465464.
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In fact I’ve a rather good idea. I’ve lived in Russia. I speak fluent Russian. I don’t know first-hand, thankfully, of the state of Russian prisons, but I’ve read a lot. Care to read this? http://www.rosbalt.ru/blogs/2013/09/24/1179492.html
I know full well that Russia is multi-ethnic and multi-religious and that, unfortunately, the regime since 2000 has been very favourable towards Orthodox fundamentalists and no other religions. Nobody needs to provoke the extreme Orthodox believers and incite hatred: they incite themselves! Remember that time they got “Jesus Christ Superstar” banned in Rostov-on-Don?
All this woman and her fellow dancers did was dance in a cathedral (not sing: the song was added to the video later). This is classed as an ‘administrative’ offence, not a criminal one (more precisely as ‘minor hooliganism’) and so should have been punished with a fine, not prison. Especially not Russia’s most notorious prison.
Vlad, every tyrant and supporter of tyrants always claims that their campaign of terror against their own people was born of necessity, a claim rarely supported by truth, are you saying that the Russian Orthodox Church is such a violent, short-tempered religion that even a minor criticism could set it off on a violent crusade.
I doubt Putin’s forces would be so quick to act if the protest was held in a mosque or synagogue but then again, unlike the Jews and Muslims, the Russian Orthodox Church has been the friend of every Russian tyrant from the Tsars, to Stalin, to Putin with only a brief hiatus under Lenin.
I wonder, when are the Russians are going to realize that Putin is turning Russia into a state with every trait of another violent, racist, homophobic regime that their grandparents fought and died to contain?
Many, many Russians have. They’re either leaving Russia en masse or they can’t have their voices heard in their own country, where 70 years of disconnecting people from any possibility of affecting the outcome of their lives under the Soviets has made for a conveniently manipulable pool of ‘voters’. The mightiest tool of the Soviet governments wasn’t brainwashing – they were actually relatively bad at that – but rather decoupling people and the fruits of their labour, so that any form of effort or activism to change the world seemed pointless. Result: mass apathy and an extremely fractured collective consciousness. Only 50% of Russians turned out to vote in the Duma elections of 2011, to illustrate the point.
Sharon, since when did someone being angry negate the substance of their message? And 53 people are as stupid as you to believe that nonsense you spouted also?
That’s worrying.
Anger is a natural response, neither good nor bad. It has absolutely no bearing on the legitimacy of an argument so put that in your pipe and smoke it you level headed boremonger.
Disgraceful the way she is being treated by a superpower you say?
Another superpower, the US, detains people for over ten years in cages without trial.
The quicker people realise that Russia does not F-about when it comes to the interests of mother Russia the better. There are no gay rights, disabled rights, rights of free expression, stop confusing Russia with the rest of Europe. They hold the power, they make the rules.
This is old news as her husband announced on Twitter today that she’s been hospitalised. The prison administration won’t give any documents to prove that and won’t allow her husband to see her.
By the way, the rules for Russian prisons (to the extent that they exist on paper) say a hunger striker has to be allowed tea, water, cigarettes and matches. As far I understand the first three-four days of the strike are the worst, so she could have been relatively (stress on that word) well had she been allowed water.
She could have protested naked on top of the alter if she wanted, it doesn’t justify in humane treatment by refusing her water. My point was that just because worse could have happened her in other countries (your comment) doesn’t make what happened to her right or just
why is she complaining? she’s put herself on a hunger strike. Is she that naïve to think they care? It’s Russia, not Rhode Island. Sorry but it’s common sense.
She’s gone on hunger strike to protest against 16-hour days, near starvation and death threats from prison guards. Yes, it’s not Rhode Island: so she shouldn’t be given any water to drink?
She shouldn’t even be in prison in the first place. Her ‘crime’ is supposed to be classed as an administrative, not criminal, offence, according to Russian legislation, and so she should have been fined or perhaps given some community service, but not a prison sentence.
Get on with serving your sentence…no sympathy whats so ever for her..you can not desecrate a place of worship for your own gain..well done to Putin for laying down a marker with this
I can only hope you are a troll Linda. Such treatment of prisoners or the very act of incarceration for voicing descent has no place in the 21st century.
I agree with you Linda, she shouldn’t have gone into a church to do that. Have some respect! Hope this little kid learned her lesson. Ok lets see the red thumbs do gooders!
Linda has commented many times on other articles with any reference to homosexuality and she does seem to genuinely have no sympathy for anyone who is gay or stands up for gay rights
Oh linda, Jesus wouldn’t want you for a sunbeam with that attitude. What happened to hate sin love the sinner? Shouldn’t you be volunteering to wash her feet?
Linda is a legend. I agree that this persons behaviour should not be tolerated, the problem in this part do the world is that everybody is too afraid of offending the next person if they say something others may find controversial. Half of it is PC nonsense the rest is just appeasing the others.
Why should people be allowed to perform a protest dance on an alter in a church, the church is a place of worship for millions and the altar is where the liturgy is celebrated,
It’s an insult to people who have faith. But I’m sure many of you here will have something against the church, perhaps you’ve been seduced by Richard Dawkins
She didn’t break the kind of law that calls for prison. Russia has two types of offence, administrative and criminal. Her dancing in the cathedral was really what the legislation calls (or used to call before they introduced that ridiculous law on “Insulting the Feelings of Believers”) ‘minor hooliganism’ and is traditionally punished by a fine.
Ian, ‘traditionally’ not punished by jail time is quite a hollow statement. The offense either is or is not legally punishable by jail time. Which is it? If the offense is potentially punishable by jail time then that’s that.
Sacrilege may not mean anything to you but unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on the viewpoint) you are not the lawmaker in Russia. There are plenty of laws in Ireland I would gladly trample all over but that’s not the way things go. The Russians, just like any other state, are allowed to have their laws whether they fall in line with Ian’s viewpoint or no.
This type of one-sided post by you know it alls makes me feel like Putin
has impregnated me with his angry seed and the young’un is suffering from some severe restless leg syndrome deep in my dark, damp places.
I see VLad has a lot of respect for women ? Seems a lot if hatred in what you wrote for your country and women in general and we do have the right to comment here if we wish !!
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