Three Owls - the 'Born Free' email

In July 2009 an animal welfare and conservation charity, 'Born Free', sent an email to Rochdale Borough Council that started a chain of events that culminated in the sudden closure of the Three Owls Bird Sanctuary.

With the permission of Born Free, Rochdale Online can now reveal the content of the original email and an explanation by Born Free of their reasoning.

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While we naturally understand the great concern over the closure of Three Owls Bird Sanctuary, we must reiterate that we regard this as a matter for the Trustees of the Sanctuary and for Rochdale Council. However, as there is an ongoing desire to see the original correspondence from the Born Free Foundation to Rochdale Council regarding Three Owls, it is reproduced here in its entirety:

“Dear Sir or Madam,

I am contacting you from the Born Free Foundation, the international animal welfare and conservation charity.

It has come to my attention that the premises known as Three Owls Bird Sanctuary and Reserve (Wolstenholme Fold, Norden, OL11 5UD), may be displaying wild animals to the public for 7 or more days per year, and as such may require consideration under the Zoo Licensing Act. Our records do not show this premises as currently being licensed. I would be very grateful if you could check your records and / or investigate.

I would be happy to provide more information as necessary, and would be grateful if you could keep me informed.”

This email was followed by a telephone call to the licensing department of Rochdale Council, where we provided a few examples of similar sanctuary facilities around the country, in the hope that the Council would be able to make an educated assessment of whether or not a zoo licence was required.

As I hope you can see, there was no complaint about Three Owls or its practices, nor a call for its closure, but a simple enquiry about how it stood in relation to the Zoo Licensing Act. We have always felt that consistency in application of the Act is extremely important to ensure animal welfare.

However, at no time did we assume that Three Owls necessarily required a full zoo licence – as we have indicated previously, there are numerous facilities around the country that have either been granted official exemptions from the requirements of the legislation, or have been determined by their Local Authority to fall outside the scope of the legislation.

Assuming that the legislation has been correctly applied, that the facilities are at least "on the radar" of their Local Authority with respect to animal welfare and inspections, and that the facilities do not acquire significantly more wild animals or alter their operation, we have always considered this to be a proportionate approach in such cases.

We support the proper implementation of the Zoo Licensing Act, as a means of ensuring at least minimal levels of inspection to ensure animal welfare. As part of its Zoo Check programme, the Born Free Foundation has maintained a database of premises with captive wild animals for many years. In order for this information to be kept up to date and to reflect any changes, and to enable us where possible to ask that at least minimum standards of animal welfare be guaranteed, we regularly contact all the Local Authorities in the UK about specific facilities and about zoo licensing in general.