Mom and me took a walk down
to Rainbow Bridge. We were
talking and she started telling me about the times before me at Rikki’s
.... what it was like in the early days
.... and how many wonderful folks came together to make it possible .... and
about what it takes to keep making it possible ....
..... I ran inside and got my note book and
started scratching out notes ..... I’m
gonna share the story of Rikki’s Refuge ....
15 Years in the Making ...
If you know mom, you know
how she can just start talkin and tellin stories about Rikki’s. I think she loves to talk about Rikki’s. I think she loves Rikki’s! I know she loves me !!
Anyway, I’m gonna break up
the story into parts, cuz she shouldn’t get more space in MY Good Morning Good
News than I do, now should she? Can’t
be havin the hoomans taking over now can we?
Rikki’s Refuge ....
15 Years in the Making
.... Part I
November, 2013 .....
The work to turn this piece
of rural land into a sanctuary for thousands of animals all began this time of
year in 1998.
In November of 1998 a few of
you were there, by my side, helping to clear the thick hairy vines of poison
ivy that had taken over every building on the property, every tree, every pile
of junk and garbage that lay in mounds all around.
Who knew what we’d find
under the mound we tackled? We found
the great big purple barn under the biggest one.
But it wasn’t purple yet,
and it had oodles of holes in walls.
And once cleared, it became the home to the stray dogs and cats and
chickens who roamed the property. These
dogs and cats and chickens would become our first official residents as we
caught them, got them vetted and healthy, and they learned what it meant to be
taken care of.
Remember all that itching
and scratching we did uncovering pile after pile? I don’t think there was a volunteer in the early days without
some form of poison ivy patches .... the official ivy, the poison sumac that
itched 10 times worse. And yet you kept
coming back. You could see that dream
of a home where thousands of animals would find love, peace and happiness.
How many of you wielded your
first hammer at that land known as the sanctuary-to-be? Smashed your fingers there?
Cut your teeth on power saws
and your hands on fencing?
Tired, frustrated, wet from
the rain, sun-burnt on blistering days, your hands and feet frozen on cold
days.
Yet day after day you came
back. Yes, you were the minority. I know you remember the frustration of
meeting that new volunteer wannabe, the one so excited about saving animals;
the one you spent valuable work time showing around and telling all about the
dream, about how we were getting there; about the hard work ahead to make it
real; just to have them turn around and laugh and tell you what a waste of
time, you’d never be able to do it, it was too much work.
I remember your dedication;
to wash up, to bandage up, to get back to work ... and to smile and to see that
your effort was making the dream for the animals materialize. You knew something as wonderful, something as
vast as we had planned, wasn’t just going to happen, it had to be created, it
had to be worked for. And so day after
day, no matter how tired, how achy, how itchy, you worked on.
I remember celebrating our
100th animal saved. Our
1,000th. Today, at our 15
year mark, we’re very close to having saved 5,000 animals.
........
We’ll hear more from mom
next time about the old old days .....
And in the mean time would
you help me by making a donation in honor of those early souls who helped build
Rikki's literally from the ground up. I
mean Rikki’s is MY home .... so you
know what most shelters would have done to me? And without these folks .... well .... I wouldn’t be here writing to you.
Your donation TODAY will
enable the Refuge to move past that 5,000th animal … toward 10,000.
Thank YOU for saving lives
-- we absolutely cannot continue to save lives without YOUR support !!
On line donations are easy
at www.RikkisRefuge.org/Donate you can even sign up for a life saving monthly
recurring donation!!!
I’m always happy to hear the
check is in the mail! Rikki’s Refuge,
PO Box 1357, Orange VA 22960
Credit cards are accepted on
line at www.RikkisRefuge.org/Donate
or over the phone.
You can call me directly at
540-854-0870 x5 to make sure your credit info is kept confidential.
THANK YOU
FOR HELPING ME TO SAVE SO MANY LIVES
... with your support we’re
able to help so many into their new furrever happy homes .... and to give that life long home to those not
quite so fortunate ... Thank you for
your support
Without YOU none of us would
be breathing today !!
Mom and me were snuggling
the other day and she was telling me about the times before me at Rikki’s
.... what it was like in the early days
.... about all YOU wonderful people who made it possible .... about all the
animals saved .... I’m sharing my
scratches about Rikki’s Refuge .... 15 Years in the Making with you as much as
I can paw in at one sitting ..... if
you missed Part I .... you can catch up
here http://rikkisrefuge.blogspot.com/2013/12/rikkis-refuge-15-years-in-making.html
and read from the beginning.
LAST TIME .....
We ended up last time
hearing mom say, “I remember celebrating our 100th animal
saved. Our 1,000th. Today, at our 15 year mark, we’re very
close to having saved 5,000 animals.“
Rikki’s
Refuge .... 15 Years in the Making ....
Part II
But that number is really
misleading. That’s not just
saved, but almost 5,000 residents who lived and made Rikki’s their home. Animals who lived because of Rikki’s Refuge.
During the dark nights of
the winter of 1998-1999, while we often worked by the headlights of our
vehicles long into the night, while we itched, ached and dropped into
uncomfortably hard and lumpy sleeping bags, we dreamed of the animals we’d
save.
Those whose last chance we
were creating. Those who would escape
death, torment, abandonment, abuse, to come live in what we were creating,
those who would be loved again or loved for the first time.
No, not JUST those
nearly 5,000 residents have been saved by your dreams. Just as many wild animals have come through
the gates of Rikki’s Refuge. Working
with wildlife rehabilitators and animal control officers all over the state,
our woods and wetlands are home to many wild animals who would have otherwise
died. Would have been left on the road
to die. Trapped in someone’s house or
yard and sentenced to death for trespassing.
Lost their home to “development”.
Your dream saved these wild
animals too. Gave them 350 acres they
can live in, happy, secure, knowing it will never be bulldozed, never destroyed
by humans.
Wow, now we’re talking
almost 10,000 animals’ lives saved in 15 years! And it doesn’t stop there.
So many animals have been
saved, have had their homes saved, when we stepped in and helped them. They didn’t need to come to live at
Rikki’s. They needed us to make it
possible for them to stay in their loving homes. People and animals who loved each other, who were going to be
separated, the animals facing death.
Your dream made them able to happily and safely stay together.
Sometimes that’s helping
with an illness. The animal’s or the
owner’s. No place for an animal to go
while the owner is hospitalized or convalescing. Time and time again, we’ve been called in by authorities in
several counties to help. Usually it’s
an elderly or handicapped person on a fixed income, with a beloved animal they
are risking losing. An animal whose
life would be lost if they were taken to a typical pound or shelter. The need is simple, but beyond their
means. A dog house, a damaged fence
repaired, vaccinations, a speuter. So
simple and human and animal live together happily ever after.
We’ve saved hundreds of
those animals.
Every day we help people we
never actually meet or visit, find a way to keep their beloved animals. Sometimes they just need resources. How can I find an inexpensive way to speuter
this stray, and then I’ll give them a home?
Where do I turn for help? How do
I handle this or that situation? I’m
afraid, what do I do now? Finding the
answers, working through the situation with the people, hearing the good
results. A handful of these are
resolved everyday. Handful a day, times
30 days a month, times 12 months a year, times 15 years .... counting the times we’ve successfully saved
a life, a home ..... you can easily add
another 20,000 animals saved by Rikki’s dream !
Wow .... so now we’re talking about 5,000 who found a
home, 5,000 released wildlife, 500 touched and helped in their home, 20,000
saved through long distance assistance .....
30,500 lives saved, since we first started clearing up that poison ivy
....
WOW -- that’s a lot of
animals, domestic like me, that means cats and dogs and bunny rabbits and
guinea pigs, and farm animals like Petunia the Piggy and Calvin the Cow, and
wild animals who live in the woods and go bump in the night too .... AND ... hoomans !!! I guess I never realized how much Rikki’s
helps the hoomans too. But till we win
the right to vote, there seems to always be a hooman behind each of us animals,
doesn’t there?
We’ll hear more from mom
next time about other things Rikki’s Refuge does to help animals everywhere
.....
And in the mean time could I
please beg you to make a donation to help one of us? You pick, donate to help a domestic animal, a farm animal,
wildlife or hoomans in need .... just
let me know where to help YOU spend your donation!
Your donation TODAY could
enable the Refuge to help one more person keep their beloved animal friend out
of a pound or shelter.
Thank YOU for saving lives
-- we absolutely cannot continue to save lives without YOUR support !!
On line donations are easy
at www.RikkisRefuge.org/Donate you can even sign up for a life saving
monthly recurring donation!!!
I’m always happy to hear the
check is in the mail! Rikki’s Refuge,
PO Box 1357, Orange VA 22960
Credit cards are accepted on
line at www.RikkisRefuge.org/Donate
or over the phone.
You can call me directly at
540-854-0870 x5 to make sure your credit info is kept confidential.
I Love you bunches,
Opie
I love snuggling with Mom and hearing the stories of how Rikki’s came to
be ... what it was like in the early
days .... about all YOU wonderful people who made it possible .... about all
the animals saved .... I’m sharing my
scratches about Rikki’s Refuge .... 15 Years in the Making with you as much as
I can paw in at one sitting .....
We ended last time hearing mom say, “... 30,500 lives saved, since we
first started clearing up that poison ivy.“
Rikki’s Refuge ....
15 Years in the Making
.... Part III
But it doesn’t stop there either.
We work with other shelters, rescues, organizations, to help them save
more. We teach the things we’ve learned
about managing so many animals. How to
manage feral cats in a shelter instead of euthanize, why TNR is THE way to go,
how to get them home or to good colony situations. In the animal world what people fear, people kill. When we teach understanding of ferals, we
dispel that fear, we give them options, we give them a chance for life.
We teach management of fiv, feline leukemia, acceptance of elderly and
handicapped animals for the adoption roster, not the euthanasia list. We teach rescues to work well with pounds
and shelters. The contention between
the two so often leads to the death of animals. When they understand and respect one another, they can work
together towards saving more lives.
We teach disease management in large groups of animals, quarantine
control, cleaning protocols. Every new
animal group will go through the same problems, they can reinvent it all,
losing lives in the process, or they can learn from the experienced. When you’ve been there, you know what works
and what doesn’t. I thank God every day
for the valuable insights I learned from others, from spending time at Best
Friends Animal Sanctuary, from visiting sanctuaries across the country, from
the long, long lists the really outstanding Directors told me of things NOT to
do ....
Yes, you’d think what TO do might be more important? I mean taking care of animals is pretty
obvious anyway, isn’t it? Yet so many of
those obvious things lead to disaster.
Disaster and lives lost that will happen if you keep learning from
scratch. I took those lists of DO NOTs
to heart. So often the plan warned
against would come up in plans and designs and I’d remember, “Oh they said
DON’T” .... Sometimes I wouldn’t
really see why this or that was a real no-no.
Later I’d always learn and see, had I not listened and not learned from
those who’d gone before me, someone would have been injured or died.
How many animals have been saved through information we’ve shared with
others working to save animals? I have
no idea. There’s no way to compute
those numbers. But I can tell you it’s
thousands and thousands. No doubt tens
of thousands over the years.
.....
WOW -- so that means YOUR support helps save the lives of domestic
animals like me, farm animals like Mikey the Goat, all kinds of wildlife AND
animals that end up in other shelters in close by and far away places.
Whose life would YOU like to save today?
Isn’t it wonderful to be a part of Rikki’s and know that YOU are helping
others to create the same kind of paradise on earth AND avoid mistakes that can
ruin it!
Your donation today WILL ENABLE ANOTHER LIFE to be saved.
Thank YOU for keeping Rikki’s alive and helping others stay alive too!
On line donations are easy at www.RikkisRefuge.org/Donate you can even
sign up for a life saving monthly recurring donation!!!
I’m always happy to hear the check is in the mail! Rikki’s Refuge, PO Box 1357, Orange VA 22960
You can call me directly at 540-854-0870 x5 to make sure your credit
info is kept confidential.
THANK YOU
FOR HELPING ME TO SAVE SO MANY LIVES
... with your support we’re
able to help so many into their new furrever happy homes .... and to give that life long home to those not
quite so fortunate ... Thank you for
your support
Without YOU none of us would
be looking forward to Christmas this year
!!
Love you bunches,
Opie
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Mom’s been telling me about the times before me at Rikki’s .... what it was like in the early days ....
about all YOU wonderful people who made it possible .... about all the animals
saved .... I’m sharing my scratches
about Rikki’s Refuge .... 15 Years in the Making with you as much as I can paw
in at one sitting ..... if you missed
Part I or II or III .... you can catch
up here
http://rikkisrefuge.blogspot.com/2013/12/rikkis-refuge-15-years-in-making.html
and read from the beginning.
We ended last time hearing mom say, “...How many animals have been saved
... ?
... I can tell you it’s
thousands and thousands. No doubt tens
of thousands over the years.“
Rikki’s Refuge ....
15 Years in the Making
.... Part IV
But that’s still not enough.
The world has become such a small place. Through social media we know animal rescuers on almost every
continent and in many, many countries.
And through social media we can help these people help more
animals. We can help them with their so
badly needed fundraising. How huge to a
tiny organization in Italy, to have us advertise their fundraising event. How huge to the animals to spread the word
of speuter clinics, vaccination clinics, free services and low cost services
available.
Feral cats are everywhere on the globe.
The “problem” is the same. They
are breeding unchecked, they’ve gotten in somebody’s way, and we don’t want to
see them trapped and killed.
The solution is the same everywhere on the globe too. TNR (Trap Neuter Return; with a huge
emphasis on Return). Stop the
reproduction. Make sure they are cared
for as the Community’s Cats. So often a
single person just needs some guidance, some resources, to be able to start a
TNR program in their community. It
doesn’t matter what language the caretakers speak. To the cats, it all says LIFE !
By helping people all over the globe with ideas, resources, knowing they
aren’t alone, more and more are able to go forth and help the animals. And each one of them helping, draws in
others who want to help. It’s a real
domino effect.
A few of you have been around long enough, or were isolated enough to
invent rescue when you saw a homeless animal.
For most of you it rubbed off from someone you know. You went to an adoption day and learned
about the number of homeless animals, you went on a tour of a sanctuary and
never before had thought about the elderly and the handicapped dying every day in
shelters, you heard about a community “cat problem” and you read up on TNR and
the solution, you had a friend who fostered for a rescue and you were talked
into trying “just one”.
For me, it happened something like 35 year ago. One specific cat came into my care. I needed help. My vet referred me to “a lady I bet you’ll really hit it off
with”. She ran a humane organization. I’d actually never even known about such a
thing. Though I’d take in strays and
get them “fixed” and pass them off on friends and co-workers; I had no idea
there were organizations, groups of people banded together, to do this. How cool!!
I went to an adoption day. I met
really great people. People who felt
like I did about animals and life and death.
This was cool !!
At that first adoption day, I listened and I learned that many, many
animals were killed in shelters, were abandoned, had horrible things happen to
them. I was so stunned. It was an eye opening experience I could
happily have gone through life without.
How different that life would have been! Sometimes I dream of it ....
but then I see the eyes of somebody who is alive because of me ... and I
come back to reality.
Anyway, I went home that day with A foster cat. How long that A didn’t last !!! Soon it was lots, and soon I specialized in
the handicapped, the elderly, the problems ... the ones that would have so much
trouble finding a home and so likely end up dead without me. You can see the seeds of Rikki’s forming
here can’t you? Well that’s another
story for another time.
Point here being, that for each person we help bring into the rescue
world, they will bring in others. And
when everyone has brought in everyone and everybody is a rescuer ... it will no
longer be acceptable to kill off the unwanted.
There won’t even BE any unwanted !!
Everyone will be loved and wanted and have a home.
And yes, we have a long way to go.
But dog-gone it, look at how far we have come? Rikki’s Refuge and all the others out there working tirelessly
for all the animals.
And so through helping others with advertising, advice, just sharing
that they aren’t in it alone, we’ve helped to save thousands and thousands
more. Just imagine if only one person
in one country that we lend a paw to each year starts up a successful rescue or
TNR program .... saving “only” 100 animals a year, over 15
years, that’s another 1500 animals ....
and I seriously bet the numbers are much closer to 100 people each
inspired to save 100 animals ...... and
that’s 150,000 more over the last 15 years .....
It’s a snowball effect .... a
domino effect ..... and it takes a lot
of us to make it happen.
All of us working to save all of them
.... one animal at a time ....
will you join the Rikki’s Family and help us make it happen?
Remember: Your donation does mostly go to support our animals ... for
food, housing, medical care, day-to-day facilities cleaning and maintenance,
etc. But, it also reverberates around
the world, as we spread our philosophy of love and life through various social
media outlets and supportive help to other caring individuals and organizations.
Rikki's believes that an animal helped
is an animal helped,
no matter which organization does it.
Isn’t it wonderful to be a part of Rikki’s and know that YOU are helping
here at the sanctuary and all across this wonderful planet of ours?
Especially at this time of year ....
it really brings our mission home ...
Peace on Earth ... Goodwill to all Animals !!
Your donation today WILL ENABLE SOMEONE to be cared for, to be loved, to
have a home.
Thank YOU for keeping the animals of Rikki’s alive and happy this
holiday season!
On line donations are easy at www.RikkisRefuge.org/Donate you can even
sign up for a life saving monthly recurring donation!!!
I’m always happy to hear the check is in the mail! Rikki’s Refuge, PO Box 1357, Orange VA 22960
You can call me directly at 540-854-0870 x5 to make sure your credit
info is kept confidential.
THANK YOU
FOR HELPING ME TO SAVE SO MANY LIVES
... with your support we’re
able to help so many into their new furrever happy homes .... and to give that life long home to those not
quite so fortunate ... Thank you for your
support
Without YOU none of us would
be looking forward to Christmas this year
!!
Love you bunches,
Opie and Timmy
