A wallaby has been returned to safety after it found itself in a Co Cork tillage field last week.
The marsupial had gone hop-about from its home in the Araglin Animal Sanctuary on the border of counties Cork, Waterford and Tipperary.
After being alerted by Donal O’Leary of the Irish Farmers Journal, Andrew Boyle of sanctuary went to re-capture the marsupial.
“He was in the same field that Donal spotted him in,” said Boyle.
He was quite easy to catch
“I just walked up behind him, caught him by the tail and brought him back.”
The wallaby had been missing for two weeks when he was found. It wasn’t his first escape from his enclosure.
“When we got him, every few days he’d hop over the gate and hang around the garden,” said Boyle.
Since being returned home on Tuesday, he “hasn’t budged”.
Araglin Animal Sanctuary has 11 wallabies and this one came to them when he was caught wandering around by Boyle with the help of the Gardaí. They have no idea where he came from, but they suspect a pet farm.
The sanctuary’s population consists of rescue animals, some non-native – such as wolves, raccoons and the wallabies (which were bred on pet farms during the recession) – and some which are native to Ireland, as well as domestic species.
“We always try to release native species that come to us,” says Boyle, but those that cannot return to the wild, such as a blind fox, are given a home at Araglin for the rest of their lives.
The adventurous wallaby is a red-necked wallaby, the same species as those that make up wild colonies on Lambay Island, Scotland and England, where they seem to be doing well.
Read more
Waiting for spring crops and sunshine
Profits fall in 2016 for NPA
A wallaby has been returned to safety after it found itself in a Co Cork tillage field last week.
The marsupial had gone hop-about from its home in the Araglin Animal Sanctuary on the border of counties Cork, Waterford and Tipperary.
After being alerted by Donal O’Leary of the Irish Farmers Journal, Andrew Boyle of sanctuary went to re-capture the marsupial.
“He was in the same field that Donal spotted him in,” said Boyle.
He was quite easy to catch
“I just walked up behind him, caught him by the tail and brought him back.”
The wallaby had been missing for two weeks when he was found. It wasn’t his first escape from his enclosure.
“When we got him, every few days he’d hop over the gate and hang around the garden,” said Boyle.
Since being returned home on Tuesday, he “hasn’t budged”.
Araglin Animal Sanctuary has 11 wallabies and this one came to them when he was caught wandering around by Boyle with the help of the Gardaí. They have no idea where he came from, but they suspect a pet farm.
The sanctuary’s population consists of rescue animals, some non-native – such as wolves, raccoons and the wallabies (which were bred on pet farms during the recession) – and some which are native to Ireland, as well as domestic species.
“We always try to release native species that come to us,” says Boyle, but those that cannot return to the wild, such as a blind fox, are given a home at Araglin for the rest of their lives.
The adventurous wallaby is a red-necked wallaby, the same species as those that make up wild colonies on Lambay Island, Scotland and England, where they seem to be doing well.
Read more
Waiting for spring crops and sunshine
Profits fall in 2016 for NPA
SHARING OPTIONS