The owner of a sixteenth century castle in Co Laois fears two large doors which were stolen at the weekend may be bound for export.

David Butler said it was first noticed that the heavy wooden doors of Ballyadams Castle near Ballylinan were missing on Saturday morning.

A number of people would have been needed to remove the distinctive heavy red doors, which are believed to be from the seventeenth or eighteenth century.

Mr Butler explained that the ruins of the castle - built on the site of an old wooden castle thought to have been home to the O'Moore family - has featured in blogs and occasionally used as a backdrop for wedding photographs.

"You can climb up to the top of it and I have no problem with that," he remarked.

****THEFT FROM BALLYADAMS CASTLE #LAOIS****

The large wooden doors of Ballyadams Castle were stolen on May 26th. If anyone is visiting architectural salvage stores please be on the lookout. If you have any info please contact Abbeyleix Gardaí (pic of doors © IrishStones) pic.twitter.com/ClInJJYvuV — Neil Jackman (@JackmanNeil) May 29, 2018

He fears that the doors may have been stolen to order after a visitor, or someone who may have seen the doors online, decided that they wanted them.

"There is a couple of blogs on the internet and the doors are widely shown on that," Mr Butler explained.

While there has been some incidents of vandalism and minor theft at the site of the old ruined castle, Mr Butler said, "this is the first time that something that big has gone - it's sad."

As the theft is attracting attention, Mr Butler now thinks that "what may happen is that they get too much publicity and they get too hot to handle so they might get dumped."

However, as they would be easily recognisable here, he is concerned there may be an attempt to export the doors.

Mr Butler described the doors as irreplaceable and asked anyone who has seen them, or noticed anything suspicious to contact gardaí.