B.C. Ostrich Farmers Say Flock Could Hold Flu-Fighting Secrets as Officers Prepare for Cull
Katie Pasitney’s Social Media
As federal officials move to cull more than 400 ostriches at a family farm in Edgewood, B.C., the owners say Ottawa isn’t just ordering a slaughter — it’s extinguishing potential scientific value and trampling constitutional and property rights in the process.
Universal Ostrich Farms has disputed the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) order since last December, when two ostriches tested positive for avian influenza and 69 birds died. The CFIA argues the remaining flock must be destroyed to prevent further spread. The farm counters that the surviving birds have shown no signs of illness for roughly 250 days and could carry genetic traits useful to influenza research.
In a livestream on Tuesday, co-owner Karen Espersen’s daughter, Katie Pasitney, accused federal inspectors of ignoring that potential and of suppressing public scrutiny — even naming an RCMP officer she says ordered a wall erected to stop cameras from filming the cull. “They’re trying to kill transparency along with the birds,” Pasitney said.
Katie Pasitney’s Social Media
Pasitney also posted a pointed accusation about the business behind disposal, questioning the priorities behind the operation: “Guess how much the disposal contract? It's worth for almost four hundred beating hearts that have no illness...... For murdering healthy animals? $188,615.70 Evidently. What we need to make the world know is that this company is corrupt. It will do anything for money, participate in taking life away in dumpsters, like it means nothing — like there is no value to the breath that they have.” Her posts, and the family’s livestreams, have galvanized roughly 50 supporters at the farm and a wider social-media outcry.
Legal and civil-rights advocates watching the case say the dispute raises weighty issues about the limits of administrative power. The family’s lawyer has asked the Supreme Court of Canada for an emergency stay while seeking leave to appeal. Supporters say the federal action amounts to a blunt exercise of state authority that conflicts with property rights and Charter protections — notably claims touching on liberty and security of the person and on unreasonable intrusion — though courts will ultimately have to sort the legal balance between public health powers and private rights.
Scientific opinion is mixed. Some researchers note ratites (ostriches, emus) may have unusual immune responses, but there’s no published, peer-reviewed research confirming these particular birds carry flu-resistant genes. CFIA maintains the strain found on the farm is highly dangerous and argues that destruction is a necessary containment measure.
RCMP officers remain on site to secure the perimeter; two family members were arrested after re-entering ostrich pens following orders to stay out. The agency says quarantine protocols and biosecurity require strict controls; the family and their supporters say Ottawa’s approach is heavy-handed and lacking in humane, transparent alternatives.
For now the ostriches remain under quarantine — and possibly marked for destruction under a disposal contract the family says is worth $188,615.70. Whether the courts intervene, or scientists get a chance to examine the birds before any final action, is still unresolved.
If the federal government proceeds, the question at the centre of the controversy won’t just be veterinary science: it will be how far Ottawa may go in overriding property, procedural fairness, and Charter protections in the name of biosecurity. In the blink of an order, thousands of years of lineage and, supporters say, the chance at a medical clue could be gone — and the public may be left to judge whether process, transparency and rights were collateral damage.
