Amid the enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) to contain the spread of Covid-19, enforcement officers from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources Provincial Environment and Natural Resources Office (DENR Penro) and the Biodiversity Management Bureau’s Task Force Philippine Operations Group on Ivory and Illegal Wildlife Trade held an operation on May 5 to confiscate a serval cat (inset) after it escaped from the care of its owner in Antipolo City, Rizal.
Serval cat is a threatened exotic species under the endangered category of the CITES Appendix II listing.
The owner’s neighbors filed a complaint on the incident which led to the confiscation of two serval cats, one Ducorp’s Cockatoo and one blue-and-gold macaw after the owner failed to immediately present the necessary permits to justify his possession of the exotic pets.