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Little Bluestem Sanctuary
Little Bluestem Sanctuary

Farmed-Bird Focused 501(c)3 Nonprofit Sanctuary

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Little Bluestem Sanctuary

Farmed-Bird Focused 501(c)3 Nonprofit Sanctuary

Four years ago today, we met Baby Clementine and h Four years ago today, we met Baby Clementine and her soon to be sisters for the first time. Anyone who has been following us for a while knows the story by now of the tiny yellow chick who liberated herself from the tractor supply tanks, inspiring us to start a farmed bird sanctuary in her honor. But did you know that that same day, literally simultaneously to Clem's rescue, Scott rescued two tiny gray chicks from a co-worker at his previous job? Those chicks were Tater and Bean, two beautiful hens who grew up alongside Clem. Our very first rescue chickens. The birds that taught us everything we know, and who changed our lives forever. Our perfect little angel babies, who I love with everything in me. We lost Bean two months ago. She had intestinal cancer, and declined rapidly. As I sat with her in my lap in our vet's office, saying goodbye to my beloved Beanie Baby, I reflected on my life with her and her sisters Tater and Clem, who had already left us. I told her how much her and her sisters meant. How important they all were, how special, how fiercely loved. How she was the funniest, most independent chicken who probably ever lived. Bean was always the wild child of the bunch. The veggie burger bandit who didn't allow anyone to pick her up without a fuss, but would come visit with you on her own terms. We miss her terribly. Our last, first chicken. I haven't known how to come on here and talk about her loss. I never do. How can I possibly express just how precious these birds are? How desperate I am for the world to see them how we see them? How utterly and completely devastating it is that Bean is no longer with us? So today, on Clem, Tater, and Bean's gotcha day, I wanted to honor my baby Bean. Her loss feels like closing one of the most beautiful chapters of my life. I would give anything to go back in time and be sitting under the honey locust with these three again. Clem nestled on my lap, Bean and Tater alternating between perching on mine and Scott's legs and getting the zoomies... Goodbye, my baby Bean. Goodbye, my sweet Clementine and Tater. Thank you for bringing so much light to our lives. We will love you always, always, always.
We want to thank our anonymous donor(s) who have b We want to thank our anonymous donor(s) who have been sending us Chewy gift cards! In addition to feed for the birds, we also purchase the majority of the meds we use at the sanctuary through Chewy's online pharmacy. Dot's monthly medication costs alone are just over $100 a month. This month, your generous gift card donations covered all of Dot's medication! Thank you so incredibly much for your support, and for helping us keep Dot and his friends healthy and comfortable.
Ziggy and Bean received their preventative veterin Ziggy and Bean received their preventative veterinary care this month. As two of our original founding residents of Little Bluestem, they have become very accustomed to going to the vet. Bean has known her veterinarian since she was only two weeks old! As our residents age, their medical needs and costs increase. As an older hen, Bean requires more and more frequent visits for care aimed at preventing reproductive disease, something hens of every breed and age are at high risk for, but older hens and high volume egg laying breeds in particular are at the highest risk. Roosters are not immune to their own problems as they age, and are prone to heart problems. Luckily, Ziggy and Bean had a great check up and no issues were found. ********* Everything feels *very* heavy. And getting increasingly heavier. On top of the current catastrophic sociopolitical climate and the ever increasing threat of avian influenza, we lost seven of our absolutely beloved residents in 2024. The grief has been so compounding, so totally unrelenting, that I haven't been able to stomach posting about them yet. We know that the reality of rescuing animals, especially animals with disabilities and/or backgrounds of abuse and neglect, means that regardless of our commitment to individualized care for each bird, many will leave this Earth far too soon. What I haven't figured out yet is how to stand the losses. The loss of these incredible beings who were our family, and who we love so very much. Even during periods that we are quiet on socials, we want you to know that we are still here, caring day in and day out for our residents and giving them the individualized care that they deserve. We are just two humans, working full-time jobs in addition to running the sanctuary in order to keep a roof over our heads and support our residents. Our mental and emotional capacity is at 1,000%. But even when the grief is too thick and the stress too high for us to have the capacity to be active on social media, we are always here for the birds and the other beings in our care. And we thank everyone for the support we are given and for the love and care that you have for the birds of Little Bluestem.
It's the first day of real fall weather and we are It's the first day of real fall weather and we are all so relieved to finally get a break from the heat and humidity, but unfortunately as soon as I got the birds settled into their aviaries to play outside, it started to rain. So enrichment for Scout and Star today is patrolling the kitchen!
2 weeks out from her emergency visit- ✔️ whit 2 weeks out from her emergency visit- ✔️ white blood cell count back to normal ✔️ inflamation markers going down ✔️ finished with antibiotics ✔️ eating and pooping like a champion ✔️ full molt now because the universe is unkind and won't let Honey catch a break 😪 ✔️ still feeling well enough to return to her usual chaotic personality and conquer laundry mountain 💪
Friends, sorry for not making a more immediate upd Friends, sorry for not making a more immediate update- directly after Honey Hawk got sick, I came down with a respiratory infection and have been very sick as well. We've just been a couple of sick girls hanging out! But I do have a good update on Honey Hawk to share. First, I want to thank every person who donated to Squid and Honey's medical bills. Because of your generosity, we were able to cover all of Squid's care at her appointment last week, and made a dent in Honey's emergency vet bills as well. Thank you so much for all your help with this!! The last slide shows Honey's emergency vet bill. What diagnostics found was that Honey was suffering from a GI infection, and the open mouth breathing we were seeing was not from an upper respiratory infection as predicted, but due to how severely uncomfortable and in pain she was from this GI distress. She was given an injection of pain meds, and another injection specifically for GI discomfort. After a week on her antibitoic and anti-inflammatory medication, Honey had a recheck appointment with our vet where we found her WBC was back in normal range! She is now eating completely normally and is no longer showing any signs of distress. We are not completely out of the woods yet however, because honey is still showing markers for inflamation (although these too have come down) and despite having all totally normal liver values- her liver appears a bit enlarged on rads. This is encoraching on her air space a bit. We have started liver meds, and will be rechecking her progress with our vet in two weeks to see if the liver size and inflamation markers have reduced. We will be keeping you posted. In the meantime, honey is resting comfortably and eating plenty of snacks. On top of everything else she has going on, she also stated molting this week! Our poor girl can't catch a break. But at least her WBC is back to normal, indicating her infection is under control, and we caught her GI issue so early that she recovered before even losing any weight! Her vet noted that she weighed exactly the same as she did at her last appointment earlier this year.
Our Honey Hawk woke up this morning gurgling, open Our Honey Hawk woke up this morning gurgling, open mouth breathing, lethargic, and very very sick. We are currently rushing her to the emergency vet. Honey was one of the very first chickens who ever came to live at LBS, she has lived here since she was rescued as a tiny baby. Honey is extremely special and is a central part of our family. Please keep Honey in your thoughts. We can absolutely not lose her. And please, if you are able, any amount donated toward what is likely to be a very high emergency vet bill would be so helpful and deeply appreciated right now. I am sorry for not making this more detailed, but I am honestly in a state of total panic. Our Honey Hawk is our baby, and seeing her this suddenly sick is just absolutely terrifying. The emergency fee alone just to get her in the door is $190, and will go up from there for diagnostics or possible hospitalization. Every dollar counts and makes a huge difference. The links to where a donation can be made toward Honey Hawk's emergency bill can be found in our bio. Little Bluestem Sanctuary is a 501c3 Non-Profit, and donations are tax deductible. We will do absolutely everything and anything necessary to make sure our girl is alright. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your continued care and support of the birds at LBS, we would not be able to do what we do for them without you.
Friends, after an incredibly hectic first half of Friends, after an incredibly hectic first half of 2024, with literally one crisis after another and no end in sight, we really dropped the ball with social media updates and we truly appologize. We were essentially putting out fire after fire non stop for a few months, and when things get that chaotic I become just laser focused on coordinating and implementing care, and I get a mental block about doing updates. It's something I really want to work on, as I know so many of you are invested in the lives and wellbeing of our residents. I want to catch everyone up about how things have been going around here, and we are going to start with Squid. Squid was diagnosed with and then hospitalized for reproductive masses this Spring. As you can see from the x-ray, there is just a ton of them. The masses were causing her to fill with fluid and be very uncomfortable. The intial plan was for Squid to undergo surgery, but after a lot of deliberation with her team, it was ultimately decided that the likelihood of her surviving surgery was poor, and that it was in her best interest to come home and receive palliative care. The plan was that she would receive daily pain and anti-inflammatory medications, as well as medication to make her reproductive system go dormant so that the tumor in her reproductive system would shrink and she would hopefully get some relief. And it has been working incredibly. Squid has massively improved, her respiration is great, and the masses have shrunk and are not crowding her organs and air sacs so much anymore. When she was first diagnosed, her prognosis was very poor. We were told we were taking her home for hospice care, and that she likely wouldn't have much time. We were just hoping she would make it long enough to get to enjoy the Summer. We were hoping beyond hope that she would at least make it to the Summer- and now here we are in the middle of August, and she is doing great! All the palliative care has kept her so comfortable that she has been able to have a great quality of life again, where she is active and social. Continued in comments:
It's thunder storming here today. The storm is dir It's thunder storming here today. The storm is directly overhead, and the thunder is shaking the house. For the most part, the birds are unbothered. But Charlie is anxious. He was pacing and vocalizing. The most vital aspect of our care philosophy is prioritizing the individual, which means that other chores are on pause for the time being, and currently my most important job is to sit on the couch with him and give him company and comfort until he is feeling secure again. He is currently pecking the back of my phone case while I attempt to post this, so I think it's safe to say that he is being successfully distracted from the scary thunder. We love you Charles ❤️
We want to thank everyone for their love and kind We want to thank everyone for their love and kind words on our post about Ralphie's passing ❤️‍🩹. He was so special and so loved, and we are just grateful we got to spend the time with him that we did and share his story with all of you. Yesterday, we got the results of Ralphie's necropsy. They weren't 100% conclusive, but here is what we know. Ralphie was in fantastic physical condition. He did not have a heart attack, or any type of heart failure/disease. He also did not have another common issue I suspected, which is fatty liver disease. In fact, our veterinarian said his all of his organs and insides all looked "absolutely perfect and healthy". She could not see any reason that he would have died. But by the process of elimination, she offered us two possible explanations, based on the lack of evidence of disease and the suddeness of his passing. The first possibility is that he had a clot somewhere. She did not find one, but said she wasn't ruling out the possibility that he had one that she wasn't finding. The second possibility is that he had a heart arrhythmia, which can occur without any apparent signs of heart disease or defect. And since Ralphie had never shown any clinical symptoms of heart problems, and his heart always sounded normal during exams and looked normal on x rays, we never had a reason to pursue advanced heart diagnostics that may have revealed an arrhythmia. Continued in comments*
Rest peacefully, Ralphie. You've left a giant, cor Rest peacefully, Ralphie. You've left a giant, cornish cross roo sized hole in our hearts, and I know we will be telling stories about your shenanigans for the rest of our days. We love you so, so very much. Yesterday morning, our Big Guy abruptly passed away during breakfast. We believe from a massive heart attack, although can not confirm until necropsy results are back. The suddenness of his passing has left us reeling, but we are comforted that the instantaneousness meant that he did not have time to feel any fear or pain. One minute he was happily and enthusiastically chowing down on breakfast, the next moment he was gone. I liked to clean Ralphie's house while he ate breakfast, so I was with him in his final moments. It was very fast. Accepting that Ralphie was really gone and there was nothing we could do to bring him back was a much longer experience, and I am very grateful to my friends, colleagues, and family for being available to me yesterday. Ralphie was the second cornish cross that came to live at LBS. He was a whopping 24 lbs on intake- and miraculously still completely mobile. Whatever happened to Ralphie before rescue - he detested humans with the fire of a thousand suns when we first met him. He would actually run us down to kick our butts when he saw us. It took months of respecting his space and consistently being non-reactive with him no matter what he did, but eventually Ralphie came around. Some birds will never become human friendly and that is completely ok, and understandable. But Ralphie did. Ralphie became a *cuddler*. A lap chicken. Did he still nip sometimes when you tried to change his water bowl? Sure. He had to remind the humans who really ran the sanctuary after all. But he loved his humans, and loved to snuggle us and get his little cheek pets. When Clementine died, Ralphie was my biggest comfort and spent hours cuddling me while I cried on the couch. I miss my Big Guy. The sanctuary feels smaller and emptier without him. Life without Ralphie is an adjustment I don't want to have to get used to. But he will live on through his many stories, through rooster advocacy and cornish cross advocacy. We love you Ralphie!!!!
Today is Clementine's third gotcha day. Every year Today is Clementine's third gotcha day. Every year on this day, we share Clementine's liberation story and how she changed our lives forever and inspired us to found LBS in her honor. Clem touched so many lives, and we still receives comments and messages from folks who were impacted by her story, her incredible personality, and how much she loved and was loved. Clementine was the embodiment of pure love. Unconditional love. She would seek me out, hop in my lap, and literally give me hugs. She would place her head right into the crook of my neck and snuggle in and stay there for ages. She would look me right in the eyes and I could see the depth, intelligence, and love behind them. She was, and always will be, my angel. After she came into our lives and we learned more about the plight of her kind- that chickens are deeply complex and emotional beings, and are also the most abused and exploited land animal by a margin so wide it's hard to wrap your head around- we knew we had to dedicate ourselves to caring and advocating for them. She is so incredibly missed, but her legacy lives on in all of the birds that have been rescued and cared for at LBS. It all started with one tiny, yellow chick named Clementine. ****************************************** *Clem's gotcha day story in comments!
Two years of snuggling with the goodest boy. My ta Two years of snuggling with the goodest boy. My tall and lanky, socially awkward, cuddly bby Dove love 🕊🧺. Just one more week until Dove's rescue-versary! #houserooster #snugbug #rescuerooster #cornishcross #littlebluestemsanctuary #birdrescue #birdsanctuary #roosterlove #babyboy
Friends, we have to appologize for the lack of upd Friends, we have to appologize for the lack of updates recently. We have had a LOT going on here in the last few weeks, including three major emergencies which we will be making a seperate post on shortly. But for today, I just want to focus on giving an update on Baby Grace, because we have SUCH good news! Grace had her recheck appointment, and her blood tests came back significantly improved- notably her white blood cell count came down from a whopping 120 to only 20, and she is officially no longer in liver failure!! In fact, her liver values are now perfect. Her WBC count is still higher than it should be, but she is clearly responding to treatment, which will be continuing until she is totally in the clear 🎊🎉 She's improving drastically. What we are doing is working. She will stay on her current regimen of antibiotics and liver meds, and we will be retesting next week. In the meantime, she is growing. She has gained two lbs since rescue. Her favorite food is green lettuce and she will jump in the air for it. You can literally see her eyes go wide when the lettuce container comes out! She loves to dusbathe in blankets and explore the kitchen. She loves watching cartoons and cuddling with her snuggly. She loves hanging out with her humans on the couch. Grace gets to love things, she gets enjoy her life. We are so, so happy for her. Everyday with her is a miracle. When she was first discharged from the hospital to try this last ditch effort treatment, we knew it was a hail mary. Her WBC was so unbelievably high, and getting rapidly higher despite antibiotics. We knew that meant it may very likely be cancer and not an infection that we were dealing with. That Grace may very likely be a hospice case. But our last ditch effort did work. She pulled through. She's a healthy, vibrant, bossy, sassy cornish cross hen and if you met her now, you'd never guess what all she has overcome. So many people came together to support Grace. So so many. We need to give a huge thank you to the Chicago Roo Crew for their collaboration in Grace's rescue, for arranging hospitalizations, and for providing mutiple transports. Continued in comments:
We have a happy update on Baby Grace- she is home We have a happy update on Baby Grace- she is home from the hospital and back at the sanctuary! And she is very clearly feeling much, much better. She is bright, alert, interactive, and talkative. We are still battling a very elevated white blood cell count, and while her liver levels have inproved, they are still too high. An ultrasound performed at the hospital additionally revealed that Grace has a very enlarged liver. She is on agressive antibiotics, liver support, and pain management. We are not out of the woods yet, but I truly feel we are making headway. Yesterday I witnessed her dustbathing in her fleece blankets for the first time, a chicken behavior indicating she is feeling comfortable and relaxed. We are cautiously hopeful. And we are just so relieved to have her home. We still are working on raising enough money to cover her hospital bill, and the cost of her follow up visits to keep her on the right track. If you are interested in supporting Baby Grace's care and recovery, you can donate to our website or Gofundme! Thank you so much to everyone who has given support so far, and to everyone following Grace's journey 🧡🐔 https://littlebluestemsanctuary.org/donations/donate/ https://gofund.me/1f0cb540
Urgent support needed for Baby Grace‼️ Last w Urgent support needed for Baby Grace‼️ Last week, we took in two adorable new friends who had been rescued by Chicago Roo Crew. One of those birds was a baby cornish cross who had been found wandering the streets of Chicago, bleeding from a predator attack and with a severe upper respiratory infection. Her name is Grace. The crew triaged her, got her into the hospital for treatment where she began healing and improving, and soon she was cleared to come home to the sanctuary. Sadly, only a few days after coming home, Grace suddenly crashed. We brought her to our vet, who quickly determined Grace needed to be re-hospitalized. We received an update from the hospital that Grace is hanging in there, but her decline is due to a worsening infection that is not responding to the antibiotics she was on, and that appears to be causing significant liver damage. We are doing absolutely every possible thing to bring her back from this- trying every possible treatment and having her receive round the clock care in the hospital. She is the sweetest, snuggliest little baby bird you can imagine despite having faced such a difficult life. She has been through so much, and we desperately want to see her come out on the other side and get to live out her life in sanctuary. Grace's current estimate is $1,500. This could end up being more if longer hospitalization becomes necessary. Any donations would be beyond appreciated. Shares, comments and likes to help the algorithm show more people Grace's post also help us out so much. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your continued support of the birds. Let's give Grace the best chance possible of beating this! https://gofund.me/f835cce8 https://littlebluestemsanctuary.org/donations/donate/
Squid wanted to drop in and give the biggest thank Squid wanted to drop in and give the biggest thank you to all of you incredibly generous folks who donated to our Valentine's Day fundraiser!!! While we were just shy of our goal, with the match we still raised enough money to make a big dent in our spring vet bills and projects! We can not wait to share our progress on the new duck house with you all. Thank you to everyone who supports the birds through donations, sharing posts, and engaging with our content. It means the world to us to have your help making it possible to provide the highest standard of care to these deserving birds that we possibly can. We are just so grateful to you all 🐓💛🐥🌻
Thank you SO MUCH to everyone who has made a donat Thank you SO MUCH to everyone who has made a donation to our Valentine's Day fundraiser so far! Your generous support means the world to us and ensures we can continue providing the highest quality of care to these incredible birds. We are a little over half way to our goal, with only tomorrow and the 14th left to donate in order to have your donation matched. Our anonymous donor has informed us that if we do meet our goal, they will donate an additional $100! Can you share our fundraiser to help us meet our goal by the 14th? Link to the fundraiser in bio! #donationsneeded #valentinesday #fundraiser #littlebluestemsanctuary #farmanimalsanctuary #animalrescue #farmanimalrescue
Hello friends, Kate and Scott here. We recently ha Hello friends, Kate and Scott here. We recently had an anonymous donor reach out with a Valentine for our birds- a match of up to $1,400 dollars for any donations received by February 14th! This could not possibly have come at a better time, because in addition to some costly upcoming veterinary visits for our hens' preventative reproductive care, we are about to start some very expensive projects for the birds come spring! Last fall, the entire sanctuary moved to a new property. This was a huge milestone for us, but everything for the birds has to be re-built from scratch! Soon the ground will begin to thaw, and it will be warm enough to start building predator proof and HPAI conscious enclosures for everyone- starting with a brand new duck house and covered run! Please consider a donation towards these upcoming expenses for the birds at Little Bluestem, and remember that through the 14th your contribution will be doubled! Will you be the birds' valentine this year? Donation link in bio!! #donationsneeded #supportsanctuaries #littlebluestemsanctuary #DonationMatch #animalsanctuary #animalrescue
Foot soak time for our little angel boy, Dove. You Foot soak time for our little angel boy, Dove. You may remember last year that Dove had an accident involving leaping down a staircase when he got a little over excited about food, resulting in significant injury to one of his legs. Although he healed up beautifully and is now fully ambulatory, he has persistent foot issues on that leg. Additionally, he is a cornish cross, and even being slim for his breed still weighs 12lbs! Which is a lot of weight to land on a little chicken foot when he's jumping off couches or stomping around demanding snacks. In the past, we kept our large breeds from ever getting bumblefoot by using interlocking foam mats- but unfortunately, one day, they discovered that foam mats are really fun to shred and rip up. After brainstorming with colleagues, we believe we have found a solution that we will be posting about soon! Meanwhile, Dove will continue getting daily spa treatments to keep him healthy and comfortable 🛁🐓
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