The Federal Court of Appeal has denied an application for another stay order to delay a cull of about 400 ostriches at a British Columbia farm that was hit by an outbreak of avian influenza, removing a legal block against the slaughter proceeding.
Katie Pasitney, the spokesperson for Universal Ostrich Farms, said Friday’s ruling means an interim stay granted last weekend to give the farm in Edgewood, B.C., time to make legal submissions “no longer exists.”
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) ordered the slaughter on Dec. 31, 2024, during an outbreak of H5N1 avian flu that killed 69 ostriches.
Pasitney, whose mother co-owns the farm, said in a video posted to Facebook that they were “trying to figure out the next steps” while facing an “open cull order.”
The farm has been fighting the cull order ever since, but it lost its case in Federal Court and the Federal Court of Appeal.
It had been seeking another stay to mount a challenge at the Supreme Court of Canada.
The CFIA has said there are ongoing risks posed by the flock and the conditions in which the ostriches are kept, while the farmers argue the birds are healthy. They also claim the birds have acquired herd immunity, which, they say, makes the flock scientifically valuable.
The farm’s situation has drawn attention from those concerned about government overreach and the U.S. administration of President Donald Trump, whose health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has called for the birds to be spared and studied.
Supporters of the farm have been camping out at the property, staging music concerts and other events to draw attention to the case, and on Friday, Pasitney called again for supporters to converge.
“We need cameras, and we need bodies, and we ask you to come here in peace and no violence,” she said.
The Appeal Court said that in denying the stay application, Justice Gerald Heckman disregarded affidavits filed by the farm in response to submissions by the CFIA, in line with what it said were court rules.
A B.C. ostrich farm has lost its case to save its birds from a cull order issued by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) in January. A federal court has rejected the farm’s appeal to prevent the culling of its flock, which had been infected with avian flu. The farm’s owners say they will not be giving up, and have called on supporters to gather with them this weekend to “stand against destruction and shine a light of love.”
The CFIA submissions this week included an affidavit by Canada’s deputy chief veterinarian saying new analysis had confirmed the ostriches were sickened by a unique and more lethal strain of the avian influenza virus.
Dr. Cathy Furness, with the CFIA, said in the submission that further investigation of samples taken from the birds revealed that the “novel reassortment” of the virus at the farm had “enhanced the pathogenicity” of the strain.
The strain was “among the most virulent” tested at Canada’s National Microbiology Laboratory and even low doses killed mice within a few days, the affidavit said.
But Furness said the CFIA didn’t know how likely it was that the ostriches at the farm remain infected, or would become infected.
