The Ontario Provincial Police will be conducting an "intensified" ground search and house-to-house canvass Saturday for a missing eight-year-old Ontario girl.

Victoria (Tori) Stafford of Woodstock, Ontario went missing nine days ago. The case only officially was called an abduction Friday morning.

The OPP will be conducting a search of local water ways and will be reexamining many of the areas previously searched by local police.

"This is normal procedure to ensure that we don't miss out on any pieces of evidence that will lead us closer to Victoria's whereabouts," OPP Inspector Bill Renton, who has taken over the investigation, said in a news release Friday night.

The OPP officially took over the case Friday morning.

The Oxford police have been criticized for their handling of Tori's disappearance. Some have said they should have immediately issued an Amber Alert -- an urgent bulletin notifying the public and the media when a child has been abducted.

Oxford police say they acted as quickly as possible with the facts they had. They say they were notified of the girl's disappearance at around 6 p.m. on Wednesday, April 8. Before midnight that day, police in other jurisdictions were notified, and by 3 a.m., a notice went out to the media.

Oxford Police Chief Ron Fraser told reporters Friday that no Amber Alert was issued because they had no evidence of a possible abduction on the day of her disappearance.

The day after Tori's disappearance, police obtained a surveillance video from a nearby high school that showed Tori walking with an unidentified woman in a white coat. The third grader appears comfortable with the woman and seems to go with her willingly.

No one, including Tori's estranged parents, has been able to identify the woman in the grainy video, who has long, dark hair and appears to be in her early 20s.

Mother hopeful

The mother of missing girl says she has a feeling that her daughter is alive and that something has shifted for the better in the investigation.

"I think they are closer," Tara McDonald told reporters in Woodstock, Ont. on Friday of the police's efforts. "I don't know why, I don't know what the reasoning is. But I do have a feeling that they know something. They just can't let it out ..."

Renton told a news conference Friday that after analyzing all of the evidence they have found so far, "we are now considering this case a child abduction.

"This will have no bearing on how we deploy our resources or change the focus of the investigation. Our focus remains to find Tori," Renton said.

"To the person or persons responsible for this horrendous crime, I want you to know that the Oxford Community Police are committed to finding Tori. The OPP, along with all police services across this province and nation, are following the evidence that will lead us to Victoria Stafford. I encourage you to do the right thing and bring her home."

Renton wouldn't be specific about what evidence had led his team to upgrade the investigation from a missing person's case to an abduction.

"To try and articulate to you now the evidence that has taken us there would certainly hamper the integrity of the investigation and any subsequent action we might take," Renton said.

McDonald was happy to see the case considered an abduction and to see the OPP involved, but said she didn't think the Oxford Community Police have done a bad job.

McDonald said she had "no idea whatsoever" why someone would target her child.

"In Woodstock, it's a small town, so not everyone's going to like you. But I don't feel like I have any vindictive enemies," she said.

Renton said Friday they are closer to identifying the woman in the video.

"We have a pretty substantial direction in that regard," he said, "but to say anything more would be rather irresponsible."

McDonald said: "I hope it's a stranger. Because I don't think I would let anybody into my life or into my circle that would do something like this."

Rebecca Stafford -- sister of Rodney, Tori's father -- has said her side of the family thinks Tori was taken by someone the little girl knows.

Following a massive search effort by volunteers and police, Oxford police called off the ground search Monday. 

Fraser defended his team's investigation.

"Our job is to follow every evidence and to take it where it leads us, and whether described as a missing person or abduction, it makes no matter; the investigation is the same process," he said.

"Either way, the matter has been investigated appropriately from the outset."