Giving Your Time

Windwhistle can only continue it's work due to the extraordinary amount of help given by it's loyal supporters. They regularly give hours of their free time to help clean and look after our animals, especially on Saturday and Sunday afternoons.

"I was introduced to Windwhistle by Sally when she came to do a home check at my house. I decided to come along to see what it was all about and was hooked. Although I work full-time during the week, I have been coming almost every weekend ever since. I really enjoy spending time with the animals at the rescue, giving them care and affection that they would not otherwise get. I've even rescued another rabbit from Windwhistle since and would take more if we had the space at home. When several people each give a few hours, it really makes a difference to the rabbits. Please consider helping!" - Tanya - Windwhistle Helper

If you think you may be able to give some of your spare time, please contact us to find out more about it and to see what you could do to help.

Why We Need Financial Support

Windwhistle Warren is a totally independent organisation and does not receive any monies from any other sources. All of the helpers are unpaid for the hard work carried out here. When some people visit they truly believe that there is a Government department that supports rescues. If anyone knows of it, we would love their telephone number! Scratch that, we want their address, we want their names, do they have a website, are they on Facebook, do they use Twitter!?!

The following information is here because unless it is down in black and white, you will not know how much it actually costs to run a rescue. The donations we ask for during the adoption process are very small compared to our expenditure and provide great value to prospective owners...

Actual costs we incur per animal...

All of our rabbits are neutered, which costs us in the region of £60 - £80 per operation.

All of our rabbits are fully vaccinated with the combined myxomatosis/VHD1 vaccine and the newer VHD2 vaccine, costing £50 per annum.

So, if you are lucky (and we are lucky) enough to rehome one of our orphans, you will be getting an absolute bargain. And, if you do not believe me, just ask your vet for their costs.

Here are some examples of more general figures...

Our vet bills are over £1,000 per month.

Dried food bills over £2,000 per year

We use 100's of bales of hay each year, at £5 per bale. If we are lucky these are sometimes delivered.

We use an excellent vet who may not be the cheapest in the area, but I prefer to give our money to someone who tells me the truth and cares. So, any animal who we can save by additional treatment/hospitalisation will receive it.

We also have a rabbit specialist vet who understands the complexities of these vulnerable animals.

'Hidden' costs are taken from our own (er, whoops, Alice's husband's) bank account to cover electric, oil, fuel, fresh food. He does a lot of maintenance work etc, an absolute little treasure! He has no financial gain from this and buys all of the materials himself.

As much as possible, we do not want to save an animal just to put it to sleep without a chance. There are occasions when we have to let them go, this is a very sad part of rescue life, but I see it as the last gift of kindness (and sometimes the only one they have known) that we can give. Obviously, we pay for this too! (Nothing for free, even to put a poor animal out of its miserable existence of a life).

Basically, nothing is cheap, but the rescue runs on the principal that if something is done, it is done as well as it possibly can be! We truly believe that rescues have a responsibility to rehome these poor animals to the best of their abilities or their lives may continue to be cheapened. We can only continue to do this if we have money to do so. Please help us!