A LITTLE BIT OF ALL OUR LIVES 

Hello and welcome to the wonderful and horrible world of an animal rescue, we have just over 200 animals we live in a very small apartment and we are now forced to live in one room, well I say forced, I am sure some people out there would say we had other options like have some of the animals put to sleep, having watched over them nurtured them and brought some of them back from the brink of death, there is no doubt in our minds there is no other option, even though we have lost close family and friends over our opinions we still have no doubt.

 In an ideal world we would have rather have had a better life some kind normality would have been nice, even an holiday thrown in once every 10 years would be nice, or to eat regular meals and not have to work until we drop just to feed the animals. Unfortunately we don’t live in an ideal word and we have to suffer the consequences of other people’s mistakes. Then we are forced to watch all these mistakes die one by one. These poor beautiful innocent creatures, it’s hard to lose one beloved animal, so can you really imagine having to go through it time and time again, just because some selfish bastard decided they no longer have any more time to give their so called pet. A living breathing being that was probably coldly picked from some horrible decrepit pet shop. None of these people can possibly imagine how we must be feeling, I would love to make them go through the heartache over and over again. Alas it doesn’t get any easier only a hell of a lot worse, then as each one departs this terrible world, a piece of us goes with them, and each time they go we pray that we were going with them and then with each passing day we just grow colder.

We have no more love to give to humans how can we, when thoughtless people have forced us into this living nightmare, if it wasn’t for these selfish people these animals would have perhaps been brought up in a loving caring environment, where their lives weren’t under constant threat or even better perhaps been born in another world, somewhere there is no starvation for animals or for humans, somewhere neighbours weren’t killing each other because of religion or the colour, somewhere the whole planet was equal no one higher than the next, where animals and humans can live as one, perhaps they would never have been born at all. Anything would have been better than what they got.     

A LITTLE BIT ABOUT THE ANIMALS

We've been rescuing animals for most of our lives. In February 1999 we decided to start a small rescue and re-homing service. We are not a registered charity but we rely on people's generosity and mainly on our selling skills - we wouldn't be able to continue otherwise and the animals would die.

We re-home a mixture of animals but we concentrate mainly on rodents, rats in particular, because we haven't the room for any bigger animals in any great quantity, unfortunately rats need a 101 % and we don't have enough pairs of hands and never enough time in the day to tend to all their needs, but we do make sure we have the time to feed them 3 times a day. Unfortunately this is not enough rats need a lot more human contact and to be able to run free outside of the cage each day, with so many it is impossible to fulfill their needs and this leaves us bitter and sad with the world and for the fact there are still thousands of unwanted and abandoned rats out there and probably always will be.

Most of the rats and other animals we see are in appalling conditions, due to ignorance, neglect and a lot of the time pure evilness.They need immediate veterinary treatment - the cost of that can range from £8 upwards (last month we took a cruelty dog case on which cost us  £850 for only two vet visits and now she will need medical treatment for the rest of her life) The last large rat rescue we done cost us over £20,000 in that year alone, we still have well over a hundred of those rats left, most of them have some degree of behavioral problems and all will need on going vet checks.

We are always inundated with telephone calls, mainly to take in rats or by people with questions about rats. We've finally been able to set up this site again to help answer some of the questions. perhaps find good kind loving homes for them. A lot of the rats we see are very badly neglected. People buy them because they look cute. Often they are mistaken for gerbils or even hamsters, and left in very small cages, forced to live solitary lives where they pace back and fore like a demented lion in a zoo. This results in them becoming ill, and` often lead to permanent behavioral problems and more often than not, we are simply called by the annoyed owners to go and collect the animal from them. Many of the calls we've had are where rats were bought from pet shops and were soon found to have multiplied! The babies were having babies and so on. By far the most common calls are from parents whose children have become "bored" with their new pets. We have also had a few parents who have threatened to "let them run loose in the wild" if we do not turn up to collect them. This leaves us with no other option. These people automatically assume that we have the time, money and space to take in their castoffs. 

There have been some genuine cases such as an allergy in the family if you can call them genuine, they may get a few itches and scratches when the rats run over them or an irritating cough due to the sawdust and a build up of urine. People will give any excuse to get rid of their animals. I, myself, have a genuine allergy, my life is threatened on a daily basis by the very animals I try to save. I need oxygen and the last time I got bit I spent several months recovering most of which was in hospital, so now I have to be very careful as the next time I get bit could be my last. 

The worst thing is that some of these people actually believe they are doing us a favour giving us their cast off animals. We had one woman who thought that we would earn money from the lone rat and small cage she gave us. We had to explain that there was a possibility her rat may never get re-homed, and would have to live out its life with us, so with feeding and veterinary treatment the cost would be far greater than any donation and far greater than a small cage that is so tiny we  have to crush up to prevent anyone else from putting poor animals in.  This is the case of many of the rats which are brought in to us. 

If and when a rat gets re-homed, and if a donation is made, it hardly covers the food and bedding, let alone the vets bills. We don't always get donations though - some people are poor and cannot afford to give. We would rather re-home to good loving homes, to people who can and will give the love and attention that they crave. Most of these people do give their animals a good home with a spacious cage and the right veterinary care. Many a time we have gone without food to enable our rats to have the care they desperately needed.

We have no foster homes in the West London area but we are in dire need for people to come forward . If there is anyone interested, please PLEASE do not hesitate to contact us. We have approximately 200 animals who are waiting for places in foster homes. Unfortunately most will never have a chance of a loving caring home. These rats really do deserve a chance. 

Our long term plans are to buy a farm with land and extend the rescue and re-homing project so some of these animals will have a sanctuary to go to. Without help and funding I'm afraid we face an impossible struggle.

If you can help with fostering or anything else, please email us