Post by lilysplace

Fun fact: Time flies when you’re caring for someone as sweet as Annie! As of today, we’ve had the pleasure of caring for Annie for 1710 days 🥰.

Annie has a home here for life - something we talked about during our live presentation last week.

Thank you to everyone who attended! We had such a great turnout, and I truly appreciate each of you spending your evening with us.

For those who missed it, we discussed a harsh reality: over 840,000 homes across Canada have farm animals as “pasture pets”—animals people genuinely care about and want to help but often have nowhere to turn when they need support.

Shelters usually can’t help, and across Canada, very few organizations provide long-term refuge.

Many of these animals—whether injured, aging, or abandoned—end up suffering or are put down because there are no safe housing alternatives.

🚨That’s the gap Lily’s Place was created to fill.

We exist to ensure safe refuge for displaced farm animals, whether here at the sanctuary or by connecting them with homes that can meet their needs.

But here’s the truth: the need is much greater than we can meet right now.

It’s easy to feel discouraged when animals in need are turned away because there are no options left to offer.

However, when I remember where we started, I don’t let discouragement turn into despair.

When we started in 2019, there were
❌ no donors,
❌ no volunteers,
❌ no grants,
❌ not even a single fence post. 🛑

We didn’t win the lottery, we weren’t independently wealthy, and we didn’t stumble on some hidden money tree.

We just did what we could, as we could.

How could we not when we knew the consequences of doing nothing?

Fast forward to today:
🫶 Many of the animals have donors dedicated to their care and safety.
🫶 The animals have a board of directors, key volunteers (like our volunteer coordinator, HR specialist, and outreach coordinator), and event volunteers ready to share their stories.
🫶 A few dedicated folks who don’t mind the dirty, tedious, or administrative tasks required to operate the sanctuary are ensuring almost 40 animals receive daily compassionate care.
🫶 Generous grantors have funded housing and habitat improvements for the animals.
🫶 Oh, and we’ve got hundreds of fence posts in the ground—ask me how I know 😅.

But more importantly, more than 60 animals have come to the sanctuary—a safe place to turn to—when they needed it most.

And we’re just getting started. 💪

If you missed last week's presentation and want to learn more, you can check out our website—the animals’ individual stories (like Annie’s) are a great place to start. While you’re there, sign up for our emails for news, events, and perhaps an encore presentation 😉💌. #animalsanctuary #canada #kindnessmatters