Kitsap Animal Control with the Kitsap Humane Society was able to rescue and find homes for the feathery and fury survivors of a two-alarm fire in Silverdale Aug. 20.

The fire destroyed the home along with a number of other structures on Old Cedars Place NW, but several animals were put in danger by the blaze. According to chief of animal control Chase Connolly, the number of animals rescued included two dogs, four cats and around 90 birds, including ducklings, chicks and adult chickens.

“That’s a high number for an amount of animals to take at once,” he said, “especially if you’re animal control, but given the circumstances, in the emotions of what was going on for the owners, it was what was reasonable at the time.”

Such mass surrenders of animals are rare in Kitsap County, Connolly said, with one or two a year. It’s even rarer with farm animals, with most mass surrenders occurring due to an overpopulation of a pet such as cats.

Connolly said that the first concern was checking to see how healthy the animals were following the blaze, “especially given this issue with the smoke inhalation and all that, we had to observe to make sure that these birds would be healthy for our community.”

Upon clearing the animals and putting them up for adoption, Kitsap residents were quick to jump to the rescue. As of Aug 30, all of the chicks and ducklings were adopted. The original post had been put up on Facebook just the day before.

“It is really appreciative to see how fast people can respond via social media these days,” Connolly said.

He said the Humane Society is willing to help, even in such strange circumstances.

“While this is not a typical situation that we generally see, it is something that we are equipped to handle, and we are continually looking at how we can provide community services for our community,” he said.