Questions have been raised in County Cork about who – or what – is responsible for the theft of stones from graves.

On Lunchtime Live, Lucy from Crookstown in Cork said that when her parents’ grave was vandalised recently, she was shocked at the suggestion that crows could be the culprits.

She said stones that had featured on her parent’s grave disappeared overnight recently.

“They’re a black, shiny stone – I think it’s a marble stone,” she said.

“Now, they’re six years on mam and dad’s grave anyway, and there’s a little bit of a rant going around at home, you know - ‘The crows took them, the crows were trying to take something shiny’.”

Crow at the beach picking up a large stone in its beak. Sara Sadler / Alamy. 14 March 2016

However, Lucy said she is highly sceptical of this theory.

“I said, ‘Well, unless the crows work at night, and unless that can manage shovels – because obviously, there was something scraped back you know, because there’s a cement base underneath of where the stones were and the stones were put on top of that,” she said.

“Then we had our little ornaments and things like that on the stone. Now, the little ornaments was threw around the place.

“They weren’t broken, but they were threw around, and I have a little planter there on it, and it was turned over – and even Storm Darragh wouldn’t have been able to turn over the planter.”

According to Lucy, a neighbouring grave was also found in a similar state. She said the experience gave her an ‘awful shock’.

“It was like someone gave me a slap in the gob now, to be honest with you - I felt sick,” she said.

'It happens quite regularly'

Funeral director Colm Kieran said that while it is hard to believe, he has seen birds cause similar damage before.

“Unless you saw it with your own eyes, you wouldn’t believe it, but it does happen, and it happens quite regularly across the country,” he said.

“I’m not sure in this circumstance though, what this lady is describing sounds as though it could be a theft. Because, what’s typical about where the crows actually do take them off graves – and we’ve seen video evidence of it – is that the stones will be left remaining underneath heavy objects.

“So, you’ll see a grave totally cleared over the space of about two weeks by crows, but they will leave behind the ones that they don’t get access to because they can’t lift, obviously, heavy objects.”

Mr Kieran said damage caused by crows on gravesites can easily total over a hundred euro.

Listen back here: