shelter website: www.crittercamp.biz
Petfinder listing: http://www.petfinder.com/shelters/IL412.html
Critter Camp Exotic Pet Sanctuary cares for over 200 abandoned exotic and unusual pets of 27 different species. We provide a loving, happy, healthy, safe home for the rest of their lives once they get here. Many of the animals are sick, injured, elderly, or aggressive. We do not take in wildlife, only actual pet animals.
We do not just give them shelter, we provide a high quality life including enrichments and ideal living conditions. For example, the 13 ferrets we have live in a free range room and play together all day. They have numerous tubes, tunnels, toys and hideouts. They get individual attention from volunteers everyday.
Ferrets are actually the first exotic pet that we rescued. About 8 years ago, we took in a pair of ferrets from a small pet shop that couldn’t place them, one had been returned as well. Then came the hedgehog, the parakeet, the gerbil. It kept going until we had about 30 animals and decided we had to either stop taking in the rescues or make it a full time venture. I was homeschooling the kids, we were here all of the time, we incorporated the animals into all of our lessons, and we all love animals. So we became licensed, obtained our non-profit and 501c3 tax exempt status, and registered as a charity with the state of IL. Now we have about a dozen regular volunteers to help, a board of directors, we fund raise to make ends meet and we belong to numerous rescue organizations. We are now planning a new sanctuary building incorporating state of the art green technology such as passive and active solar and wind power. The new building will hold over 600 abandoned animals. This is so needed as we are the only sanctuary of our kind in the entire country! See our plans on the website: http://www.crittercamp.biz/SanctuaryPlans.html
We have had so many special ferrets enter our sanctuary it is hard to choose any single one’s story. Karma is a little female who had been living with a homeless person in her car. It is no wonder she is our only biter, although she has calmed down immensely since coming here. New Angel came after being in the midst of a divorce custody battle. She had kidney disease due to malnourishment and lack of water. She received quality medical care and lived a good quality of life for a few years after coming here. Derm and Harley came in with advanced adrenal disease. They had received no treatment at all and were nearly completely hairless. Both responded to melatonin implants and proceeded to live happy lives for several years. Derm was about 9 years old when he went to the Rainbow Bridge. Colby came in severely malnourished and went to the Rainbow Bridge two days after arriving. The people admitted they often forgot to feed him. Anastasia is about 6 years old and she was pronounced terminal with tumors and metabolic disorders 2 years ago. Well, our primary ferret caretaker, Cassandra, would have none of that and has nursed her through bouts of illness with hand feeding, syringe feeding and medications. The little spitfire is still bounding about and playing with the other ferrets!
Our biggest challenge is raising the funds to pay the ongoing costs of caring for these animals. Unfortunately many grants and funders are eager to help spay/neuter programs and dog/cat shelters; but are not inclined to help the other animals such as ferrets that are homeless, in shelters and sanctuaries.
We have many ways to help our sanctuary: sponsorships starting at $24 per year, ebay auctions, GoodSearch, iGive, photo books for sale on LuLu.com, items for sale on Cafe Press, our hands-on educational tours, and much more. However, we still struggle and often we and our volunteers end up paying out of pocket for many supplies.
Being a sanctuary we do not adopt out the animals here since we take the older, sick, aggressive ones that need a final place to live out their lives. We do help match people with adoptable animals with folks looking for animals. And, of course, we refer people to Petfinder all of the time! Sometimes we do get a pregnant critter in and we will adopt out the babies to screened applicants and follow up with them on a monthly basis. We will take back any animals that the adopter cannot care for anymore for whatever reason. The well-being of the animals is our top priority. We also do educational presentations with the animals at schools, scouts, etc. We encourage people to learn all they can before obtaining any pet.
The positive aspects are incredible! Caring for these wonderful creatures that need us so much is a reward unlike any other! See the new video we just put up on YouTube - it expresses it best:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xvkw5TEJFy0
Please see our other videos too- we have several with the ferrets!
http://www.youtube.com/user/CritterCampMom
Please contact us at any time for information, and if you are anywhere near Northwest IL please come take a tour!
http://www.crittercamp.biz/AnimalShows.html