The usually tight-knit population on a small island in the west of Ireland is being split by an issue no-one saw coming only a few weeks ago, when the community came together as usual to celebrate St Patrick’s Day with the annual Féile Fiach Nathair (Snake Hunt Festival).
And the cause of the conflict on Clare Island in Clew Bay, County Mayo couldn’t be more pertinent: it revolves around the mysterious recent arrival of a real snake on the isle (a whistling one, no less, known scientifically as snakus avirilfolus), and the question of what to do about it.
Less well-known than big celebrations such as Puck Fair in Killorglin, County Kerry (when a wild goat is captured, crowned as king and put up on a tall pillar to reign over the town for three days before being released), Clare Island’s traditional snake chase and céilí is a colourful carnival that’s also been celebrated for centuries.
Each 17 March, one person (typically someone who has made themselves a bit unpopular during the preceding year) is nominated as ‘the snake’, painted green and then pursued around the craggy island by the other participants (most of the island’s 130-strong population take part). When caught they’re hurled into sea.
The event invokes the legend of St Patrick, who famously chased a slither of snakes into the sea during the 5th century, after they rudely attacked him during a 40-day fast on Croagh Patrick (the ‘holy mountain’ that towers over Clew Bay), and then banished the beasts forever more from Irish soil.
The story about the saint sending serpents packing is, of course, apocryphal. In truth, the island of Ireland never had any snakes for St Pat to pursue into the waves in the first place, having become detached from the rest of Europe 10,000 years ago, during the last ice age (a full 2,000 years before Britain too broke away), leaving no land bridge for cold-blooded reptiles to get across once the ice had melted.
Snake in the lobster pots
Still, the irony of a real snake suddenly being sighted in the immediate aftermath of St Patrick’s Day, on place so close to Croagh Patrick, is not lost on customers at O’Malley’s Foodstore and Post Office, one of the few places that remains open year-round on Clare Island.
Once home to the fearless pirate queen Gráinne O'Malley, the usually quiet island may just have found another claim to fame and locals are bracing themselves for an onslaught of reporters and social media influencers.
"The last thing I thought I’d have to worry about this spring was checking my fecking wellies for snakes,” grumbles Aoife Kelly, who has come to collect her groceries. This inconvenience aside, the 46-year-old admits she’s glad to be out of the house, because it was Aoife’s husband who first spotted the serpent, and the phone hasn’t stopped ringing since.
"The last thing I thought I’d have to worry about this spring was checking my fecking wellies for snakes.”
Last Tuesday, while preparing to put out to sea, as he has done most days for the last 30 years, Finton Kelly noticed an odd movement around the lobster pots in the harbour. Looking closer he was startled to see (and even more surprised to hear) a snake.
Quick-thinking Finton managed to get a (slightly blurry) photo of the animal, later identified as a kind of ribbonsnake usually resident in North Africa, known to the Bedouin as the Saharan singing serpent because it makes a melodic sound, somewhere between a whistle and a hum.
What to do about the visiting viper is a vexatious issue, causing debate and division in households across the island. Some residents are demanding the reptile be cast into the sea. “We’re good at that,” says Aoife, who is among the anti-snake contingent. Others, including Finton, want to extend a warm Céad Míle Fáilte welcome to the serpent, and can see a commercial benefit of having him around.
“People say that snakes aren’t from here,” says Finton. “But sure neither are wallabies, and look at what they’ve done for tourism on Lambay.”
He is referring to Lambay Island, off the coast of County Dublin, which has been home to a thriving (although presumably shivering) colony of wild red-necked wallabies since the 1980s. The incongruous marsupials have indeed become a big attraction, with guides leading trips to see them.
“Bobby – that’s what we’re calling him – could put us back on the map, as Ireland’s snake island,” enthuses the fisherman. “It’ll make the place 'edgy’ again, a bit sexy and dangerous, like when Gráinne was around. And he can hold a note! If I can catch him, I might even be able to teach him a traditional tune or two.
“We’ve just got to hope he survives the Irish weather. He’s a long way form home, and must be freezing his fangs off, the poor fella. One of my daughters is knitting him a jersey, and we’ve had people donating their old odd socks for him to wear.”
Nuala Flanagan from Ireland’s National Parks and Wildlife Service doesn’t sound so sure. “Wallabies are one thing,” she tells us by phone. “But snakes are a whole different kettle of fish.”
Almost as contentious as what to do with Bobby, is the question about how he (if it is a male) came to be here. There are several competing theories, from the prosaic (it’s an escaped pet no one is owning up to, or the result of yet another misguided attempt at guerilla rewilding) to the far more fantastical.
One story doing the rounds claims the snake must have hitched a ride on the back of a bird. The west of Ireland does see significant numbers of migrant species arriving every March, including wheatears, blackcaps and sand martins, many of which overwinter in Africa, and it’s not unheard of for predatory animals to accidentally piggyback a lift, as this remarkable image of a woodpecker carrying weasel shows. (We’re currently seeking comment from BirdWatch Ireland about the plausibility of this idea.)
There has even been speculation that it might have arrived in one of the ferocious storm fronts that have battered Ireland this winter, having been taken up into the clouds by a tornado or waterspout in its homeland, as has reportedly happened to frogs and other animals in the past.
Before any of these questions can be resolved, however, someone will have to actually locate and catch Bobby, or as some would prefer, chase him off the island. “In the absence of St Pat, we’re thinking of getting hold of that wombat-worrying influencer from America,” says Aoife. “She’s looking for redemption, and we’ve got a wild animal that needs manhandling.”
Disclaimer: this is an April Fools' Day article. It is not factual and some of the people and institutions quoted in it are not real.
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Main: Clare Island in Ireland. Credit: Getty
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