The injured owl Foggoa rescued is now recovering at the B.C. Wildlife Park in Kamloops.
Image Credit: Contributed
March 09, 2016 - 8:00 PM
CHERRYVILLE - It’s been a couple of months since a Cherryville family rescued an owl, and they are eagerly waiting to meet the animal again before it is released back to the wild.
Erin Foggoa says she received a call from a friend asking her to help rescue a great grey owl with a broken wing from her backyard.
“(She) saw some odd markings in her driveway, followed them and the owl was there. Its wing was very obviously injured,” Foggoa says, adding she guesses the animal was struck by a car because its wing and leg were injured on one side.
After a quick search online, the pair found the number for the B.C. Wildlife Park in Kamloops and were instructed on how to capture the animal.
'Wear gloves because it will shred you' are instructions Foggoa says she remembers receiving before chasing the bird through the woods. After tossing a blanket over it, she managed to place the bird in her dog’s travelling crate.
Wrapped in the blanket and in the crate in the back of her car, she says the bird remained calm. But once it broke free from its wrap, Foggoa says it was a different story when the bird 'started going for it' in a break-out attempt.
Foggoa says the animal's wingspan surprised her when she placed the owl in her dog's crate for transport.
Image Credit: Contributed
After a slow drive to Vernon, the owl was delivered to a park volunteer. It was 'touch and go for a while,' Foggoa says, but after checking in she learned the bird has recovered well and will soon get a chance to fly in an enclosure. Once he’s fully healed he’ll be released back in Cherryville.
“He’s a really neat bird. They are an incredibly intense animal,” she says, remembering the owl’s ‘razor-sharp talons’ and enormous wing-span.
Foggoa says she and her six-year-old daughter Molly, who accompanied her on the rescue, hope to visit the owl again at the park. The encounter made an impression on the young family. Foggoa, an artist, painted a picture of the animal and her daughter — who Foggoa says plans to be a 'cowboy animal rescuer' when she grows up — brought their pictures to school as part of a presentation on owls.
“It was a neat experience for sure,” she says.
Image Credit: Contributed
Foggoa's artwork
Image Credit: contributed
To contact a reporter for this story, email Glynn Brothen at gbrothen@infonews.ca or call 250-319-7494. To contact the editor, email mjones@infonews.ca or call 250-718-2724.
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