Did You Lose Your Emu? RivCo Animal Services Has Him

Officials say the emu was confined to a local ranch property by a Good Samaritan. Images courtesy of the Riverside County Department of Animal Services.

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SAN JACINTO, CA- An emu found wandering on an Aguanga ranch was under the care Tuesday of Riverside County animal control personnel, who believe the grounded bird’s owner may be looking for him.

“We definitely believe the bird to be a pet,” said Carra Mathewson, a Department of Animal Services employee who helped retrieve the creature.

“He’s definitely very tame. Someone owns him and somehow he got loose. Either that, or he was purposely abandoned,” she said. “But we’re hopeful that somehow the bird just managed to roam.”

Animal control officers were alerted over the weekend that the 5-foot- tall emu had been spotted on a five-acre ranch in the area of Jojoba Hills Circle and Soaring Hawk Road, southeast of Hemet.

Animal Services spokesman John Welsh said that when an officer went searching for the bird on Sunday, the emu was nowhere in sight. The ranch owner corralled the emu Tuesday after providing it food and water.

Mathewson and another officer were able to “easily place the emu inside a trailer and transport him to the San Jacinto Valley Animal Campus,” Welsh said.

He said the bird, which bears some resemblance to an ostrich and has dark brown and black feathers, will be housed at the shelter until the “rightful owner shows up to redeem their unique pet.”

Anyone with questions or information was asked to call the San Jacinto shelter at (951) 358-7387.

– By City News Service.