\n\t\t\t\t\t\tA video shows a pair of kids riding bikes through owl nest territory in southeast Cape Coral, and now FWC is investigating.In the footage, you can see a child on a dirt bike and a kid on a bicycle driving straight over marked burrows on the corner of Southeast 10th Avenue and 43rd Street, yesterday.The neighbor who shot the video says it went on for nearly 20 minutes until he yelled at them to stop. \u201cIt looked like it was on purpose,\u201d said neighbor John Kinnett. \u201cThere\u2019s an awful lot of open ground to ride on…it didn\u2019t have to be right there.\u201dThe clip quickly spread online, with people pointing out the threatened species is protected under both state and federal law. Disturbing or damaging their burrows can lead to fines or even jail time.Janet Windisch, the corresponding secretary with Cape Coral Friends of Wildlife, met Gulf Coast News at the lot marked with PVC pipes and wooden perches.”We can see that these burrows are active. There’s some in there right now,” said Windisch. “Per state and Cape Coral regulations, you need to stay ten feet away from the burrow. It causes stress to them. It causes them fear. It could have collapsed the burrow or injured an owl.”A 2019 city ordinance that allows Cape Coral Police to act on wildlife harassment cases concerning burrowing owls. Neighbors say it’s a tough situation, but not one without a lesson.”They’re not supposed to be on the private property anyway,” said Diane Dramko, another neighbor. “We need to punish the kids, but educate the kids. And that’s the first step. I think we do need a lot more education that’s out there.”Gulf Coast News talked to the mother of the children in the video. She says, “They’re aware and have disciplined the kids.”As the investigation continues, at least a couple of owls were spotted returning to their burrows Tuesday. Wildlife experts say that’s a positive sign and a reminder that in Cape Coral, sharing space with wildlife comes with responsibility.DOWNLOAD\u202fthe free\u202fGulf Coast News app\u202ffor your latest news and alerts on breaking news, weather, sports, entertainment, and more on your phone or tablet. And check out the Very Local Gulf Coast app to stream news, entertainment and original programming on your TV.\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\tCAPE CORAL, Fla. \u2014 \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
A video shows a pair of kids riding bikes through owl nest territory in southeast Cape Coral, and now FWC is investigating.<\/p>\n
In the footage, you can see a child on a dirt bike and a kid on a bicycle driving straight over marked burrows on the corner of Southeast 10th Avenue and 43rd Street, yesterday.<\/p>\n
The neighbor who shot the video says it went on for nearly 20 minutes until he yelled at them to stop. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt looked like it was on purpose,\u201d said neighbor John Kinnett. \u201cThere\u2019s an awful lot of open ground to ride on…it didn\u2019t have to be right there.\u201d<\/p>\n
The clip quickly spread online, with people pointing out the threatened species is protected under both state and federal law. Disturbing or damaging their burrows can lead to fines or even jail time.<\/p>\n
Janet Windisch, the corresponding secretary with Cape Coral Friends of Wildlife, met Gulf Coast News at the lot marked with PVC pipes and wooden perches.<\/p>\n
“We can see that these burrows are active. There’s some in there right now,” said Windisch. “Per state and Cape Coral regulations, you need to stay ten feet away from the burrow. It causes stress to them. It causes them fear. It could have collapsed the burrow or injured an owl.”<\/p>\n
A 2019 city ordinance that allows Cape Coral Police to act on wildlife harassment cases concerning burrowing owls. Neighbors say it’s a tough situation, but not one without a lesson.<\/p>\n
“They’re not supposed to be on the private property anyway,” said Diane Dramko, another neighbor. “We need to punish the kids, but educate the kids. And that’s the first step. I think we do need a lot more education that’s out there.”<\/p>\n
Gulf Coast News talked to the mother of the children in the video. She says, “They’re aware and have disciplined the kids.”<\/p>\n
As the investigation continues, at least a couple of owls were spotted returning to their burrows Tuesday. Wildlife experts say that’s a positive sign and a reminder that in Cape Coral, sharing space with wildlife comes with responsibility.<\/p>\n
DOWNLOAD\u202fthe free\u202fGulf Coast News app<\/a>\u202ffor your latest news and alerts on breaking news, weather, sports, entertainment, and more on your phone or tablet. And check out the Very Local Gulf Coast app<\/a> to stream news, entertainment and original programming on your TV.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A video shows a pair of kids riding bikes through owl nest territory in southeast Cape Coral, and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":24693,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[18830,2351,18828,209,211,210,104,4329,18831,1175,213,267,18829,18832,914,1045,4624],"class_list":["post-24692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cape-coral","tag-awful-lot","tag-bike","tag-burrow","tag-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral-headlines","tag-cape-coral-news","tag-entertainment","tag-gulf-coast-news","tag-janet-windisch","tag-kid","tag-late-news","tag-neighbor","tag-owl-nest","tag-southeast-10th-avenue","tag-state","tag-video","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24692","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24692"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24692\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24693"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}