Celebrate compassion over cruelty with six of the luckiest turkeys alive! Cypress, Oak, Juniper, Persimmon, Cedar, and Pine were dropped off at our front gates. It was clear they came from a large farm - portions of their beaks had been cut off.

It will take time for them to recover. You can be a part of their recuperation. Join us in celebrating compassion by donating toward their food (plus treats, like grapes!), bedding, and ongoing medical care.

Donating is easy! Visit our website and donate! 

Celebrate awesome today with Basil by keeping turkeys off the table. Because Basil is a friend not food. Fact.

Put your compassion on canvas! Join artist Jennifer Swift at Garden to Grill​in Sacramento on Saturday, November 14th, 4-7pm to paint Bogart or Dakota and raise money for @center for an

Get your tickets here!

Party-time with turkeys! Join us for Animal Place’s 6th annual Thank the Turkeys on Saturday, November 21st for a celebration of life, love, and compassion.

Our guest speaker at Thank the Turkeys this year is best-selling author Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson​! Tickets on sale now! http://animalplace.org/thank-the-turkeys/

Party-time with turkeys! 6th annual Thank the Turkeys celebration coming soon to an Animal Place near you. Or at least the one in Grass Valley, CA.

http://animalplace.org/thank-the-turkeys/

Cuddle time. Give turkeys sweet potato pies time. Hear Jeffrey Masson time. Get your photo taken with a turkey time. Eat delicious catered vegan food time.

This soulful face belongs to Jude, who belongs to himself. Jude survived a massacre, a wiping out of every single turkey he knew. 40,000 turkeys captured on a pasture-based farm, painfully thrown in transport crates, and violently killed...for a holiday celebrating gratitude. Flying over a fence is what saved Jude from unimaginable terror. That's it, a wooden barrier separating death from life. See Jude. See who he is, not how he can be used. By doing so, you see the soul of the matter - that other animals are not here for us, that they share the world with us and should have our respect and compassion.

Today is the last day to order your limited edition turkey t-shirt from compassionco! While 10% of sales go directly to Animal Place, 100% of your advocacy while wearing your t-shirt goes to animals everywhere!

Order today!

Only 2 days left to order your special edition "Go Vegan" turkey-themed t-shirt from compassionco! Orders will ship in September so you'll have plenty of time to show the world how incredible turkeys are before Thanksgiving!

Order Now!

Franny is living peacefully at Animal Place. Now that is something to give thanks for!

All animals have different backstories just like humans do! Unfortunately, many of the animal stories are unhappy ones… Oppose animal cruelty in any form.

"While visiting Animal Place, a farmed animal rescue sanctuary in Grass Valley, California, I met Dakota, who puffed up his large arc of white feathers as we approached. Dakota’s snood and waddle (the wrinkly skin around his beak and neck) were a brilliant bluish purple. As we got closer and started talking to him, the folds of skin turned a dazzling red! This amazing talent can be an expressive indicator of his mood. What an incredible being and so beautiful! But poor Dakota’s feet were terribly deformed. His toes looked like swollen stumps."

http://freefromharm.org/animal-products-and-culture/thanksgiving-turkey/#sthash.msyvJvqh.dpuf

Day 27 of Turkey Talk - Hope

Hope was rescued when she and a hen named Esperanza were confiscated by Santa Cruz Animal Control in a cruelty case where all of the other birds starved to death. As one of the only two survivors of a rough situation, Hope has come a long way.

She is a sweetheart on most days, but doesn’t shy away from expressing some sass from time to time. She’ll be 4 in January.

Now that we’ve had the time to get to know her, it’s sad to think that her personality would never have had the opportunity to flourish, like so many others who are lost at the hands of humans. After all she’s been through she still has it in her to find love and friendship with humans and other turkeys. She lives up to her name every single day and hopes to inspire others to recognize turkeys for the special beings that they are. Happy Thanksgiving!

Day 26 of Turkey Talk - Interview with Ashley Alderson, Animal Care Intern

Do you have any Thanksgiving traditions? My Thanksgiving tradition used to consist of my entire family getting together making pies, jokes, watching football, and just enjoying each others company the entire day. Now that most of my family members have passed on I've decided to start a new tradition: surrounding myself with friends and like-minded individuals and spending the day putting positive energy into volunteering. The holidays are especially tough on people who have lost important loved ones so I've decided to make the most out of these specials days by giving back what I can with hopes of making someone else's gloomy day brighter.

Are your friends and family accommodating to your vegan diet over holiday meals? Absolutely! Even though I do get some laughs out of bringing my own Tofurky (BYOT), they have and always will be supportive because that is what they do. Hopefully my mad kitchen skills will one day convince them that veganism is the way to go!

How do you handle non-vegan Thanksgiving dinners? I haven't really had any issues with this particular situation partly because everyone in my life has been so accommodating. I always bring something to a gathering so I can eat that, eat nothing at all, or just drink all of their wine and enjoy everyone's company.

Who is your favorite turkey at Animal Place? That is a tough question. I have two: Sass and Wyatt. Sass, because she is the lowest ranking of all of the girl turkeys and gets picked on (literally) by the majority of the group. She is the sweetest, most timid one and reminds me of myself growing up and dealing with the struggles of being bullied. Wyatt, because he is dealing with some inner struggles and has some repressed issues. I just want to be his friend and help him through his angry past turkey life. I know there is a sweet turkey somewhere in there and want to bring out the best qualities in him. Wyatt has potential and deserves a second chance, like all of our other turkey friends.

What is your favorite Thanksgiving dish? I'm going to go with the old classic, green bean casserole. I recently tweaked my Mother's favorite recipe and it is just crazy good vegan style.

Thanksgiving means different things to different people, what does it mean to you? Well, to me it means expressing your thanks to loved ones and giving back to what or who is important to you in your life. Spending time with relatives that you don't really get to see as often as you would like, donating your time to a good cause, and just surrounding yourself with love and positivity. Even though this is something that should be done more than once a year it is a great time to take advantage of these holidays when everybody has time off from work. Give thanks for that!

What advice would you give to vegans who have to eat Thanksgiving dinner at a non-vegan household? Bring your own vegan dish and make it so spectacular that everyone else will be like "Oh dang, that's better than whatever I made that's loaded with butter, cheese, and animals that had to suffer and die." Then share your recipe with them and drink all of their wine in exchange. There is always a salad around somewhere too. Eat that. Be polite because it's Thanksgiving and just enjoy the company of your loved ones. It's not all about gorging yourself. Interested in doing an Animal Care Internship with us? Check it out! http://animalplace.org/animal-care-internship

This Thursday, make your Thanksgiving meal less violent with these Sanctuary Sweets recipes from I Love Vegan:

http://www.ilovevegan.com/favourite-vegan-thanksgiving-recipes/

Day 24 of Turkey Talk - Clementine: The Cutest Turkey There Ever Was

Clementine was rescued last December after an activist found her with a woman who was carrying her around the streets of Los Angeles trying to sell her for food. After convincing the woman into giving up the turkey, the activist managed to get Clementine to us to be cared for. Clementine shines at the sanctuary as an incredibly sweet and gentle soul. She is also the most talkative turkey we have here! Somewhat on the small side for a domestic turkey, she fits in quite well with the chickens. In fact, she even fits into the chicken nesting boxes. She loves spending time there, to the point that during springtime she was nesting so much that it was clear that she longed to be a mom! We had to ask her to come out to spend some time outside.

Day 23 of Turkey Talk - Tortured Turkeys

Turkeys are typically killed between 4 and 8 months of age. The process of catching, transporting and killing them is as brutal as it sounds.

They’re grabbed by catchers or swept up by plow-like machines that scoop them up, often injuring many in the process. They’re jammed into crates and travel without food, water or protection from the elements. There are no welfare laws in the U.S. to regulate the treatment of birds, so they are treated as nothing more than feathered rocks.

Once they arrive at the slaughterhouse, they’re removed from crates and hung upside down by their feet, a form of torture to birds that have been excessively fattened in such a short time. Some of the larger plants are switching to gassing. If they are not gassed, they are run through an electrified water bath. This aids in relaxing the neck of the birds for mechanized blade cutting. Though they may be made paralyzed through these methods, they are still fully conscious. This means that they feel their throats slit, they feel the boiling water and their feathers plucked.

It is important to realize that the purpose of stunning is not humane treatment – to the contrary, stunning renders the bird paralyzed, but fully conscious, which assists in smoother plucking and killing. On smaller farms or in mobile slaughterhouses, turkeys may be hung upside down and their throats slit while fully conscious.

This is all pretty horrific, right? So much so that most of us will avoid learning about these practices at any cost. But we might consider, if we don’t even want to read about it, then why continue to pay for it to happen?

There can be nothing humane about the unnecessary killing of animals for human use. With an ever-growing array of plant-based alternatives, it’s time for the world to follow the lead of sanctuaries and protect animals as friends, not food.

Day 21 of Turkey Talk - Preparing to Thank the Turkeys

Social media and outreach coordinator Becki, advocacy intern Patti, and education director Marji (offscreen, coveting her marvelous camera) working hard to create 200 mini pumpkin pies for guests to feed to the turkeys at tomorrow’s Thank the Turkeys event!