We are at a crossroads of two paths and we need to decide collectively how the rescue will continue in the future. Let me explain in detail how this all works.

As a family we agreed that it would be best if the rescue had its own building on our property that was separate from the boarding guests and separate from our business entirely.

Let me explain all of the benefits that would give us if that was to exist, and let me tell you all the reasons it is so difficult for us to continue operating out of the Lone Star Dog Ranch building.

We discussed a building that is off of the Ranch property but it would be too expensive just to purchase the land and it would not be affordable. It just doesn’t make sense for us to have to drive away somewhere to tend to the dogs we have saved and it would further complicate things as opposed to making them easier.

What you might not know is that the Lone Star Dog Ranch has lost clientele due to rescue dogs being allowed at our facility. Even though we do not allow sick dogs to be at the Ranch some of our clients did not want their dogs to be among the rescues at all and therefore we have lost them as clients which of course has cost us income that cannot be reclaimed.

It's very, very difficult to please everyone and it gets more and more difficult to operate everything under one roof. During peak times with holidays and summer we are at capacity for boarding clients, and we have to plan for that and scramble with all of our rescue dogs to get them all moved to foster homes so that we can make sure we have room for our paying clients.

When you don't have enough foster homes this can be very, very challenging and very stressful. We are always looking for more foster homes but we don’t feel it’s the solution for all of the problems that we deal with.

If we had a separate building the rescue dogs would have their own building, they would have their own yard, we could have our own isolation room for dogs that might be sick with an upper respiratory infection. We would have a place to have intake days from the mill auctions with the 20 dogs or so we take in from there and not try and do that in the Ranch building while trying to conduct business as usual. We would have a place for adoptions to happen and a place for volunteers to come and pick up and return dogs from vet appointments - once again without disrupting our daily business on a regular basis.

It has become more and more difficult to do and has become more and more stressful to accomplish both things - running a successful boarding business, and a successful rescue at the same time - in the same building.

If we had a rescue building we could plan to go to an auction to rescue mill dogs on a regular basis regardless of how busy the Ranch is with boarding guests, it wouldn’t matter. We could pull from shelters regardless of them being sick with upper respiratory infections because we have an immediate place for them to go where they can be isolated. We would be able to rescue many more dogs on a regular basis.

We could have volunteers come to the building to help take care of the rescue dogs and this would not cause a conflict like it does now with volunteers stepping into the Lone Star Dog Ranch building because our insurance doesn’t allow that. All of us who live on the property would be able to walk over and visit with the rescue dogs, photograph them and work on any and all behavioral issues that are happening in real time and not try and do it over the phone with foster families or by sending Travis out to homes to try and help which costs him a great deal of his own personal time.