A pair of burrowing owls that hitched a ride on a Miami cruise ship bound for Spain are safely back in the Sunshine State following a complex year-long handoff between wildlife officials.
After a series of quarantines and a mountain of permitting, the owls were released in a field Thursday afternoon at the 21,000-acre Dinner Island Ranch Wildlife Management Area, south of Lake Okeechobee. The ranch, a rambling landscape of pineland, swamp and prairie, draws a menagerie of birds including roseate spoonbills, wild turkey and, yes, burrowing owls.
For Florida wildlife officials, it was a first…