Overview
- Police escorted Canadian Food Inspection Agency officials to Universal Ostrich Farms in Edgewood, B.C., to execute search warrants as disposal trucks arrived on Monday.
- CFIA told the owners to vacate by Tuesday or face removal or arrest, allowing them to remain in the bird enclosure overnight while asserting control of the site.
- Video from supporters showed at least one person taken away in handcuffs, and RCMP said their role is to keep the peace while CFIA conducts its operation.
- Roughly 400 ostriches are under a cull order following a December avian flu outbreak that killed 69 birds, and CFIA has not disclosed when any depopulation would occur.
- The farm lost bids in Federal Court and the Federal Court of Appeal and has until Oct. 3 to seek leave to the Supreme Court, as it presses for testing that CFIA says policy does not allow, citing risks from a unique, more lethal strain and potential asymptomatic shedding; international figures have offered to relocate or study the flock.