Two people have been arrested at the B.C. farm where the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) is expected to begin culling ostriches after some of the flock was infected with avian flu about 10 months ago.
RCMP moved into Universal Ostrich Farms’ bird enclosure in Edgewood, B.C., on Tuesday where farm spokesperson Katie Pasitney and her mother, farm co-owner Karen Esperson, stayed overnight.
In a video posted to Facebook by Thundra Amo Kerr, farm co-owner Dave Bilinski tells a group of supporters that Pasitney and Esperson were the two people arrested.
Staff Sgt. Kris Clark would not confirm who was taken into custody but said the two people inside the enclosure refused to leave and “were subsequently arrested.”
He said they have been taken to the RCMP command post to be processed before they are released.
Clark said the two were arrested under the Health of Animals Act but that no charges have yet been laid.
He told reporters that RCMP are at the farm at the request of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency to enforce the law, secure the property and ensure the safety of the public and CFIA officers “as they conduct their business.”
RCMP served a search warrant on the property on Monday, where the owners of Universal Ostrich Farms have been fighting a cull order prompted by an outbreak of avian influenza in December 2024 that killed 69 of their ostriches.
A number of Mounties were on hand Monday, Sept. 22, 2025, as a search warrant was served to owners and supporters of Universal Ostrich Farm in Edgewood, B.C. (Curtis Allen for CBC)
In a video posted to Facebook Tuesday morning by Pasitney, a man wearing a jacket labeled “RCMP” tells Pasitney she will be arrested if she doesn’t leave.
“You have to leave the property…. The other option is, my compatriots here have to come in and arrest you,” the man says.
The video is filmed through the ostriches’ pen and shows CFIA officials and multiple police officers on the other side of its wire fence.
Emotions were elevated at Universal Ostrich Farm in Edgewood, B.C., on Monday, Sept. 22, 2025, as the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and police attended the farm with a search warrant. (Curtis Allen for CBC)
In a separate video posted by Pasitney, a man, who identifies himself as a CFIA inspector, tells the farmers they would be allowed to stay in the birds’ pen overnight Monday.
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.
Supporters of the farm who were at the site Monday were yelling at the officers present, with one witness yelling at police to “have a heart” and telling them that “the world is watching.”
Supporters of Universal Ostrich Farms gather in Edgewood on Monday. (Aaron Hemens/The Canadian Press)
The farmers have brought their fight to save about 400 surviving ostriches to multiple levels of court, arguing they are now healthy and scientifically valuable, while the CFIA has said the birds were infected with a more lethal strain of the virus.
The federal agency has said in court documents that its policies do not provide for additional testing.
It said the chances the birds are infected or will become infected is unknown “due to gaps in the available science regarding how long immunity to [avian influenza] viruses may last in an individual ostrich,” as well as a lack of information about how many ostriches were infected during the original outbreak.
The CFIA said a source of infection or reinfection with avian influenza can remain in the environment long after individual infected birds have recovered
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.