The Best Friends Animal Sanctuary at Angel Canyon, at the heart of the Golden Circle of national parks in southern Utah, is home on any given day to about 2000 dogs, cats, and other animals, who come from shelters and rescue groups ...

 

"It's not just a sanctuary - it's Dogtown! Dogtown is the most welcoming place on earth. They may have been homeless, but none of the dogs here are sad and forlorn. Everywhere you go, you're greeted with wagging tails, whelps of excitement and big, friendly eyes. This is truly a neighborly, all-American town.

Best Friends Animal Society is guided by a simple philosophy: kindness to animals builds a better world for all of us. In the late 1980s, when Best Friends was in its early days, roughly 17 million dogs and cats were being killed in shelters every year. Despite the commitment of shelter workers to the animal in their care, the conventional belief was that little could be done to lower that terrible number.

Best Friends' No More Homeless Pets campaign created a new vision: A grassroots effort to place dogs and cats who were considered "unadoptable" into good homes, and to reduce the number of unwanted pets through effective spay and neuter programs. Since then, the number of dogs and cats being destroyed in shelters has fallen to approximately 5 million a year. There has been much progress, but there is still much more to do.

The next phase of this work – bringing the number down to essentially zero – will take more work and some bold new initiatives. Shelters are crowded with pit bulls, dogs abandoned after being bought from pet stores, stray cats rounded up on the streets and not looking their very best when they’re brought in, and other pets abandoned or neglected. As the flagship of a grassroots network of people and organizations that care about animals, Best Friends continues to lead the way towards this future. And that's why our purpose remains: A better world through kindness to animals.

The Best Friends Animal Sanctuary at Angel Canyon, at the heart of the Golden Circle of national parks in southern Utah, is home on any given day to about 2,000 dogs, cats, and other animals, who come from shelters and rescue groups around the country for special care they can only receive at Best Friends.

Most of the animals who find their way to Best Friends have special physical or behavioral needs, and our expert staff of veterinarians, trainers and caregivers offer them all the help they require. Most of them are ready to go to good new homes after just a few weeks of special care. A few, who are too old or too sick, or who have suffered extra trauma, find a home and haven at the sanctuary, and are given loving care for the rest of their lives."

"Many people need desperately to receive this message: 'I feel and think much as you do, care about many of the things you care about, although most people do not care about them. You are not alone.'"

"Let me tell you why you're here. You're here because you know something. What you know you can't explain, but you feel it. You've felt it your entire life, that there's something wrong with the world. You don't know what it is, but it's there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad. It is this feeling that has brought you to me. Do you know what I'm talking about?"

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