Burrowing owls, who boarded cruise ship in Miami, to be returned to US next month after long spell in quarantine
Two burrowing owls stowed away on a cruise ship out of Miami, and are now living the high life at a Spanish resort before returning to the US next month.
Biologists from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) said the mating pair boarded Royal Caribbean’s Allure of the Seas before the vessel’s transatlantic crossing to Cartagena in southern Spain in February. The tiny owls, a threatened species in Florida, usually prefer more rural landscapes, and may have been spooked by all the concrete around the Port of Miami, they say.
They were spotted by crew members a short distance into the 14-day voyage, having found refuge in the ship’s lush Central Park area, which features more than 12,000 plants. The biologists say they probably foraged for food, and were eventually caught by the crew using nets, then handed over to Spanish officials at docking.
They have been quarantined since the spring of this year at the Cites (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) wildlife rescue center in Murcia, 30 miles north of Cartagena, in readiness for their repatriation as soon as mid-January.
