Badgers who have taken up residence in one of Ireland's oldest graveyards are exhuming the bones of the dead and causing extreme distress to relatives. But it emerged yesterday that the relatives of those buried at the Yew Tree graveyard near Monasterevan, Co Kildare, cannot legally interfere with the sett, which is protected by law.
The cemetery, which is on the site of the old monastery founded by St Evan in 570 AD, is off the main Monasterevan/Bracknagh road and local people still bury their dead there.
The last funeral to the cemetery was over a year ago but many local people own graves there which are being systematically dug up by the badgers.
Each night a fresh haul of human bone is taken to the surface. This, according to Richard O'Rourke, who lives in Monasterevan, has been going on for several years.
He became aware of the problem when he brought a friend to visit a grave there and they found human bones littering the graveyard.
"It was a horrible sight. I was very shocked and my friend was very disturbed at what we had seen," he said.
Mr O'Rourke said he subsequently learned that a state of "war" has existed between local people and the badgers for several years.
"There is an annual Mass held there and the locals have been trying to block up the holes to drive the badgers away but they have not succeeded," he said.
It was extremely distressing to local people to see the bones of their ancestors being brought to the surface of the graveyard by wild animals, he added.
Yesterday, Ms Angela Tinney of Badgerwatch, an organisation dedicated to the preservation of the badger, appealed to the people of the locality not to disturb the sett until May next.
She said the badgers are currently breeding and if they were allowed stay until May she would get a licence from Duchas, the Heritage Department, and move the badgers on.
"People should know that badgers are a protected species and they or their habitat cannot be touched without a licence. This has happened before, in Co Mayo, and it was dealt with," she said.
A spokesman for Duchas said that this was a highly unusual case; the badgers are protected under the 1976 Wildlife Act but could be moved under Section 34 of the Act under licence.