This article is from page 13 of the 2014-11-25 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 13 JPG
A BURREN girl, whose pet goat was stolen more than three months ago, is to write to Santa Claus asking for her safe return.
Nine year-old Rosa O’Dea has been searching for her pet goat, Hazel, since she was stolen from a farm close to Carron in mid-August.
According to Rosa’s mother, Regina O’Dea, a number of goats have been stolen in the area in recent month and her daughter is still hopeful that her pet goat may be returned.
“She is still really upset, but she is mad as well. She is quite cross that anyone would think of stealing her goat. She has written to Santa Claus, asking will he be able to help and bring Hazel back,” said Regina.
“We are just hoping that someone will recognise Hazel and get in touch. It’s a long shot we know, she could be anywhere in the country by now. She may have been passed on to people who wouldn’t realise that she has been stolen. Rosa is still really bothered about it and still speaks about it all the time.”
Hazel and a male goat Bill, were both bottle reared by Rosa since they were kids. After searching locally for months, the family are hopeful that someone may recognise the goat and return her before Christmas.
“Rosa bottle reared both the goats. Hazel and Billy, and now Billy just follows everyone around the farm, he just misses Hazel so much.
“He has even followed walkers and gone off the road looking for her. He has never done that before,” said Regina. There is no way that Hazel would have roamed off. She has been there for the past four years with Billy and they stay together all the time. When goats are bottle fed and kept as pets, they don’t tend to stray.
“They took the female goat and left the male – the male would not have been much use to them. We are convinced that she was stolen, this has happened to a lot of people in the area. We’ve heard from a lot of the local people. Besides, she would not have gone on her own – the two of them have been together since they were born and they probably really miss each other now as well.”
Anyone with any information about Hazel’s whereabout is asked to ring Regina on (087) 4143598.