Our Mission
We are committed to providing rescue, rehabilitation and new loving homes for dogs and cats that have been living on the street or abandoned and at risk in high kill shelters, and to educate the public on the importance of fixing their pets to reduce the overwhelming pet overpopulation problem.
Our Vision
To continue to reduce the pet overpopulation problem with the help of volunteers, donors and adopters to rescue, vaccinate, sterilize and re-home over 1,000 pets each year.
About Us
Our focus is to rescue and find homes for as many family-friendly pets as we can. In general, we take in dogs and cats that are good with other animals and people of all ages. We have dog playgroups throughout the rescue, but especially in our front yard where we have 10-15 friendly dogs out to interact with people.
Since we began in March 2015, we've worked on adding improvements each year to make life as good as possible for the dogs and cats during their (hopefully) short stay with us. We have buildings with heat and air conditioning, as well as high powered fans throughout our kennels to ensure our dogs stay cool in the hot weather.
About 1/3 of our dogs and cats live on the rescue property while the rest are in foster homes. Our fosters are an essential part of our volunteer team and are the main reason we’re able to rescue and find homes for more than 1,200 animals every year. We have a few full time staff and about a dozen part time staff that are able to keep our facilities going and support the huge volunteer numbers we have out every week to care for our animals. The dedication of each member of our staff and volunteer team have made our incredible rescue what it is today.
Area Served
We serve Boerne and San Antonio, but focus on Kendall County abandoned pets. We take pets from: owner surrender, stray off the street, or from kill shelters including Animal Care Services (ACS), Guadalupe County Shelter, Seguin Animal Services and Kerrville Shelter. We also have partnerships with other no-kill rescues like Maddie's Dog Rescue to save more animals.
Adoption Numbers
Shelter Animals Count Stats for 2023:
Total intakes includes all animals brought to or born in the rescue. Live outcomes includes animals adopted from the rescue, but outside of that we also have animals that are returned to owner, transferred to another rescue, and in rarer cases animals that die while in care. The "Other Outcomes" number includes animals euthanized due to medical or behavioral situations as outlined in our Euthanasia Policy below or in the rare case an animal escapes.
Live Release Rate = 96% [LRR = (intakes - euthanasia or death)/intakes]
2023: Found homes for more than 1,226 animals
2022: Found homes for more than 1,018 animals
2021: Found homes for more than 650 animals (2 months we couldn't do any intake)
2020: Found homes for more than 680 animals
We've been in operation since 2015, but didn't keep clear records until 2020. We're proud to have found forever homes for thousands of animals over the years, and we continue to improve all aspects of our rescue facility and how we operate. Our adoption numbers have steadily increased every year with a dip in 2021 due to a distemper outbreak many other rescues were also experiencing. We expect to break our record each year!
Programs
Hospice fosters: We have 8-10 dogs in hospice at a time. These are dogs with ailments we cannot treat or due to old age, we're keeping them as comfortable as possible until they pass or until their suffering becomes too great and we choose humane euthanasia. A hospice home is a permanent foster where we take care of the cost of all supplies and vetting.
Euthanasia Policy
We are a no-kill rescue, so we don't put down animals just because they're old or take a while to get adopted. We are committed to reducing the kill rate at local shelters and working toward making San Antonio a no-kill city. Pets are only euthanized if it is deemed medically or behaviorally necessary as outlined below.
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Medical Mercy Euthanasia: The pet is deemed to be suffering due to medical ailments as judged by the rescue Director and our partner vets at Fair Oaks Ranch Veterinary Clinic. We do not believe in prolonging life just because we can, so we carefully evaluate a pet's quality of life when making this decision, and we do not take it lightly. We consider any potential treatments available and determine the likelihood of improvement to the animal's quality of life.
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Behavioral Risk Euthanasia: The pet is deemed to be a risk to others after demonstrating aggressive behavior (bites a person unprovoked, severely injures or kills another animal), and it would be irresponsible to re-home the animal. We make every effort to find the right home for an animal that might need a unique situation due to fear or behavior, but when an animal consistently displays behaviors that will directly put others at risk, we humanely euthanize the animal. These cases are evaluated and outcome determined by the rescue Director and our partner vets at Fair Oaks Ranch Veterinary Clinic.
Any pet under our care that meets one of these criteria is humanely euthanized by the staff at our veterinary partner, Fair Oaks Ranch Veterinary Clinic.
