Nearly three-dozen endangered owls have been moved to the BC Wildlife Park in Kamloops from a property in the South Okanagan under an evacuation alert because of a wildfire.

The manager of the South Okanagan Recovery Centre for Owls Dale Belvedere says the owls were moved late at night on Sunday not long after the Eagle Bluff wildfire broke out. SORCO shares a property on Highway 97 with the Burrowing Owl Conservation Society of B.C., and Belvedere says the fire’s perimeter is a 10-mnu

“They had approximately 30 owls in their facility, mainly the babies of this year. We caught them all up and they were sent to the BC Wildlife Park yesterday, because they do have a burrowing owl site at the wildlife park,” Belvedere says.

“And what we do is we just put them in crates, like dog crates, and cover them up. And as long as they’re covered they don’t stress out. So they stayed Sunday night at one of our volunteer’s houses, in their cool garage. And then Lorne left, who’s the manager of Burrowing Owl, she left first thing Monday morning to drive into Kamloops.”

Belvedere says the owls will remain in Kamloops until the evacuation alert is lifted, and it’s not clear when that could happen. She says she spoke today with the Deputy Chief of the BC Wildfire Service who says there’s no plan at this point to lift the alert.

At time of posting, the BCWS had estimated the fire to be 280 hectares in size. It is suspected to be human caused.