Franklin Farm Sanctuary

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Franklin Farm Sanctuary

Animal Rescue Service
🌱 Love animals. Eat plants. To join Patreon for behind the scenes content:
www.patreon.com/Franklinfarmsanctuary

Grow together.
🐐 Rescue
🐓 Rehabilitate
🐖 Rehome
🐄 Educate
🙏 Donations welcome:
Franklin Farm Sanctuary, 12-3052-0030360-00 ❤

01/09/2025

🐔 COMMUNITY REHOME 🐔

Edit: She has a home!!!! Thank you so much everyone!!!

It's a tale as old as time...
This black beauty wandered onto poor Ian's property (much to the delight of his dogs!) and made herself at home! He's tried door knocking and posting on his local groups, but no one seems to know where Miss Chook has come from!
The SPCA won't return his calls, and now Ian's left with a small, feathery problem on his hands.
With his dogs, staying isn't an option, so we need to find her a safe new forever home, with humans who can pick her up from Papakura ASAP!
If that could be you, please call or text Ian on 021 235 1139, or email [email protected].

20/08/2025

🐔 2000 HENS NEED HOMES 🐔

November may seem ages away, but it'll truly be here before we know it, and with 2000 hens needing homes, we need all the time we can get to process applications!!!!!

Please, if you want to adopt rescue hens in Auckland or the Waikato before mid 2026, apply now!!!!!

To apply, email [email protected] with:

🐔 Photos of your coop and roaming area
🐔 Your best contact number
🐔 Your area for collection
🐔 The number of hens you'd like to adopt

If you can't adopt, blow this post up! 🙏🥰 The areas we'll be transporting hens to are:
Albany
West Auckland
East Auckland
Franklin
North Waikato
Cambridge
Thames
Rotorua
Taumuranui

I'll now go patiently await the onslaught of emails 😉🤞

18/08/2025

🐔 HEN RESCUE UPDATE 🐔

TLDR:
The next Waikato rescue is early November, and we'll need homes for 2000 hens!! The next Northland rescue will be early next year. Email [email protected] to apply 🙏🥰

The last Northland rescue was madness. We had multiple date changes, the number of hens available to save changed 3 times, and we had major illness interfere at several key junctions.

Despite all of that, the marvelous people of Northland rallied in such a big way, and we got 260 hens safely off to their forever homes with next to no notice!!! I am SO grateful to this incredible community for pushing that post so hard and helping us to find all the homes we needed!

We have a little breathing room now, but the Waikato/Auckland rescue is going to be mammoth, with a goal of 2000 hens rescued!

If you can adopt, just email [email protected] with:

🐔 Photos of your coop and roaming area
🐔 Your area for collection
🐔 Your best contact number
🐔 The number of hens you'd like to adopt

I'll be chipping away at these after work and on Mondays, so please be patient if you don't hear back right away 😅

10/08/2025

🐓 URGENT COMMUNITY REHOME 🐓

Roo the rooster is looking to move house urgently! He was adopted as a chick with his sisters, and has been a wonderful protector to them, but sadly can't stay at his current address 😢

This beautiful boy ideally needs to find a new home this week! He is located near Whangarei. If you can give Roo the harem and home of his dreams, please contact Andrea on 021 02514599 as soon as possible!

Let's get this boy home!

19/07/2025

🐔 URGENT NORTHLAND RESCUE 🐔

Our September Northland rescue has suddenly been brought forward to AUGUST 3RD!!! 🙀🙀

We urgently need all the homes we can find in Northland. There are 400 hens, and any we don't find homes for will be culled 🥺

You have exactly one week to let me know if you can adopt, as I'll need a week to find enough drivers, etc, to accommodate all your lovely girls 🥰

TO ADOPT:

Email [email protected] with:
🐔 Photos of your coop and roaming area
🐔 Your contact number
🐔 Your preferred pick up - Kerikeri, Whangarei, Matakana or Albany
🐔 THE number of hens you'd like to adopt

If you can't adopt, please blow this post up 🙏🙏🙏 I can't fathom leaving any girls behind 😭😭😭

This will be the last Northland rescue this year, so get in while you can!!!

22/06/2025

🦆 COMMUNITY REHOME 🦆

You may remember the duck rescue we did a few months back. Thanks to you wonderful people, all the adult ducks found beautiful homes, and now the babies that were still needing extra TLC have grown up and need forever homes of their own.

It's estimated that there are 20 more ducks needing safe homes, all quite young and very sweet! If you can offer a home to 2 or more, please contact Marilyn directly on 022 365 3758. Reception is patchy at the property so text is best please 😊

Pick up is in Ngaruawahia, as soon as possible (I've been quite slack about posting this!!)

17/06/2025

🐔 COMMUNITY REHOME 🐔

If you missed this week's rescue cut off, you're in luck! Geoff is in Paeroa and needs to find a new home for his girls before he moves house. His 3 chickens are a little over 1 year old, so are still laying at a great rate, and are much loved family pets.

If you can provide a loving home for these sweet girls, please contact Geoff directly on 021651268 🙏

16/06/2025

🐮 COMMOONITY REHOME 🐮

These beautiful babies are desperately needing a new home. We know how hard it is to find pet homes for cows, but they truly are the sweetest companions! You'll need at least 3 acres of grazing for the two, unless you have a robust plan for feeding out, and decent wire fencing. One is a 5yr old pure Jersey and one is a 9mth Jersey Freisian cross. Both are friendly and halter trained and come for food. Harlow couldn't be bred again as she has troubles calving, and Coco was brought in as a paddock mate for Harlow.

They are located in Ararimu. If you can help, please contact Emma directly on 0274124436 🙏

14/06/2025

🐔 LAST CALL FOR WAIKATO HENS 🐔

Hey guys! Over the next few days I'll be doing the final processing of adoptions for the Waikato rescue next Thursday (June 19th).

If you'd like to adopt, please email me urgently at [email protected].

Include:

🐔 Your preferred pick up point - Bombay, Te Kauwhata, Thames or Cambridge
🐔 The number of hens you'd like to adopt
🐔 Your best contact number
🐔 Photos of your coop and roaming area

After this the next rescue is in October, so this is a great opportunity for those who may have been too late to apply last month 😊

10/06/2025

🐐 COMMUNITY REHOME 🐐

EDIT - the boys have found a home!!! Thank you!!! 🥳

Gary and Mango are urgently looking for a new postcode! These two boys are about 9 years old, desexed and in excellent health. They've just been wormed and have never had issues with their feet or teeth.

They're currently located in Pukekohe and looking for a home where they can live out the rest of their days together, with freedom to express their natural, charming goat-iness. Homes that tether will not be considered.

If you can help, please contact Di on 021 171 6176.

08/06/2025

🐔 CHICKEN RESCUE UPDATE 🐔

Firstly - we have a very small Waikato rescue in 2 weeks' time (June 19th). We'll be doing pickups in fewer locations and mostly on the Thursday evening for those who want chickens urgently. If you simply can't wait until October in the Waikato, please email [email protected] before the 15th to go on the list!

Secondly (minor gripe ahead) - Whenever we do a massive rescue, like the last month has seen, it becomes very clear that there's a bunch of people who don't really understand how the process works, and that's probably on me for not explaining it!

These farm rescues are a collaboration between myself and a few kind-hearted farmers who want their hens to have a happy retirement. The hens are coming off the lay for the first time and it's no longer commercially viable to keep them, so most farms would just sell them to the byproduct factory where they get turned into fertilizer and whatnot 😢 The farmers we work with sell the hens to us instead (yes - we pay for them!).

We typically have a bit of warning, so spend a month or two before the rescue advertising the coming availability of hens, vetting homes, organizing pick up points with capacity to match the demand for the area, arranging drivers to get the required number of hens to each location, and making sure each of the approximately 200 adopters have all the information required to ensure a smooth pick up and transition for the hens. Now we do have an incredible team of volunteers who do all the heavy lifting on rescue day, and I am immeasurably grateful for them!!! But all that admin, that's just little old me, frantically bashing away on my laptop before and after work.

On the day of the rescues, we go to the farm and treat all the hens for worms, lice, and mites as we load them into their waiting vehicles. They're then whisked away to the aforementioned pick up points, which have basic holding facilities to keep the hens safe and healthy until the designated pick up time (sometimes this is overnight, sometimes it's not even an hour! It very much depends on the location). Because of this, we no longer transport hens without payment as we used to get a huge number of no-shows - incredibly stressful for our fosterers and even more so when pickups are happening in a random car park!!!

These past rescues have been the worst in a long time for people deciding they didn't want hens any more after going through the whole process and simply not telling me. It took that follow up call, text and email about payment in several cases (the day before or day of the rescue) to find out, "oh yeah we decided to get babies from a breeder instead". To be incredibly frank - if you do that, those chickens will die, and it's on you. You can not wait until the rescue is hours away to pull out and expect me to have time to find a replacement home for the hens YOU promised to save. I understand as well as anyone that life happens and things change, and if it's an unforeseen emergency, that's a different story (usually we can even find a foster home until the situation has settled), but to know you're pulling out, to have been able to give me time to find another home and chosen not to.... truly nothing makes me angrier in this work than that level of carelessness.

Now, to be fair, we're talking maybe 5 would-be adopters in 500 do that - a tiny percentage! But I do think it needs to be explained how this actually works. It sometimes feels as though there's an impression that this is the full-time job of many people and that we have funding coming out our ears. In reality, it's mostly my partner and I who both also have full-time jobs in retail management and the smell of an oily rag.

All that to say - keep the applications coming, but please be patient! I will for sure reply to your email as soon as I have a chance. And for the love of all that is holy, tell me if you change your mind!!!

Is there anything I've missed? Hit me with your behind-the-scenes questions on Sanctuary life, and I'll do my best to answer 🥰

Address

Telephone

+642102209359

Website

http://franklinfarmsanctuary.co.nz/

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Our Story

In 2018 we started looking to the future, aiming to move to a lifestyle block where we dreamed of one day opening an animal sanctuary. Unfortunately we didn’t manage to move but it did start a journey of self reflection which led to the realisation that we were making a thousand excuses, and letting society dictate what was or wasn’t achievable for us!

So we stopped with the excuses and decided that if saving animals and making a difference was important, we needed to start NOW! Fast forward a year and our house looks completely different. We’ve completely switched the outside spaces up to accommodate rescue chickens, baby chicks and ducklings, rabbits and other small animals as they come in. Our weekends are now spent changing the bedding in our various animal houses/enclosures, and my days as a stay at home mum include so many more varieties of poo than they did before... and we wouldn’t have it any other way!

Our goal is still to move to more space as soon as we can afford to. There are so many more animals out there that need a safe haven, and we’d love to be able to help bobby calves in particular, being surrounded here by dairy farms. For now the biggest impact we can have is in the rescue and rehoming of ex battery/barn hens so you’ll likely see our pleas for loving forever homes pop up every so often.

If you come across a clutch of chicks or ducklings that you’re sure have been abandoned, a chicken that needs a home, or any other small furry or feathery friends in need, send us a message as soon as possible and we will do everything we can to help! If we’re not personally set up for your animal in need we will help put you in contact with the appropriate organisation. Every life matters, and working together we can make the world of difference for these innocent souls.