There’s a heavy police presence at the Universal Ostrich Farm in Edgewood, where CFIA officers are at the scene to carry out the cull order on a flock of 400 ostriches. Klaudia Van Emmerik reports.
An ostrich flock that has garnered international attention in the Kootenays has yet to be culled, but it is likely to happen soon.
Staff Sgt. Kris Clark with BC RCMP confirmed that two people were arrested on Tuesday afternoon, but would not confirm names.
The RCMP moved into the ostrich enclosure, where Katie Pasitney and her mother, Karen Esperson, had been staying overnight.
There were originally three people in the enclosure; however, Dave Bilinski, Esperson’s partner, left of his own accord shortly before the arrests took place.
“The reason that I come out this way rather than get arrested in there is we needed a lot of stuff out of our trailer,” he said.
“We needed to get this vehicle out, so the only way is if I come up peacefully, was that I got the truck out and all the stuff out, our trailer computers and stuff.”
Police and officials with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) arrived at the Universal Ostrich Farm in Edgewood on Monday.
Dozens of protesters met them in support of the birds and the farm’s owner.
RCMP conducted a search warrant and set up a perimeter around the property on Monday.
“I believe they know there’s no virus in these birds now,” Bilinski said on Monday.
“That’s how nature works. We’ve got the animal with the strongest immune system of any animal in the world, is the ostrich.”
Pasitney, whose mother is a co-owner of Universal Ostrich Farms, posted a video to her Facebook page Monday evening showing a CFIA official telling the farmers they would be allowed to stay in the birds’ pen overnight.
However, the unnamed man says the CFIA has control of the property and there would be “consequences” if the farmers did not leave voluntarily overnight or on Tuesday.
The farmers have repeatedly called for testing to determine the birds’ status, and Pasitney told the media Monday that the farmers’ lawyer was filing paperwork in an attempt to have the case heard by the Supreme Court of Canada.
The farm lost bids to stop the cull in Federal Court and the Federal Court of Appeal, and last week was denied another stay of the cull order while it prepared to apply for leave to go to the Supreme Court of Canada, an application that must be made by Oct. 3.
source & photo: Global News
