FARRM stands for Farm Animal Rescue and Rehoming Movement, and in 2025 we're taking the rehoming part of FARRM literally - we're rehoming ourselves!
We are full of mixed emotions as we announce that FARRM has secured 80 acres in Lamont County (an undeveloped property), just 10 minutes east of Elk Island Park. It is here that we hope to start building a forever home that will meet and hopefully exceed the needs of all current and future residents. We have some pretty big plans, but our immediate focus will be building new facilities so everyone at FARRM can relocate officially by this time next year.
FARRM stands for Farm Animal Rescue and Rehoming Movement, and in 2025 we're taking the rehoming part of FARRM literally - we're rehoming ourselves!
We are full of mixed emotions as we announce that FARRM has secured 80 acres in Lamont County (an undeveloped property), just 10 minutes east of Elk Island Park. It is here that we hope to start building a forever home that will meet and hopefully exceed the needs of all current and future residents. We have some pretty big plans, but our immediate focus will be building new facilities so everyone at FARRM can relocate officially by this time next year.
FARRM became official back in 2013, but started before that in a smaller capacity, with a focus on rescuing potbelly pigs. Under the name “Potbelly Pig Rehoming Network” (PPRN), we successfully rescued and rehomed over 300 potbellies before rebranding as FARRM and broadening our reach to include other farm animals (and many cats!). The need for a safe place for farm animals has grown exponentially over the last 13 years, and our ability to help has reached its limit. This move is critical, as it will allow us to say “yes” once again to the near constant surrender requests we receive.
We are frequently approached with requests to help and more often than not have to say no. We are always at capacity, always in need of better, more equipped facilities, always wishing for more space to quarantine, treat, and separate current animals. We have known for years that if we want to continue to offer a service to the community and the animals we all know and love that we need to find more space. In addition to space for new intakes, we also hope to one day realize our dream of offering a safe space for humans in the form of programming for at-risk youth, adults with disabilities, and veterans of the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF). We have big goals, and even bigger hearts, and we want to build something that can truly make an impact. Without a new space, none of this would be possible.​​​
what does moving a farm animal sanctuary with 150+ animals look like behind the scenes?
It is terrifying. It is messy. It is filled with uncertainty. Combined with daily stressors and constant “what if” scenarios, we find ourselves facing mental exhaustion that would bring most to their knees. For the first time in a long time, the fear of failure is ever-looming. We are truly overjoyed at the prospect of fulfilling our dreams, but those feelings quickly give way to fear and self-doubt. To lay this all bare for everyone who has shown up day after day to support us, this is what we are up against…
FARRM’s two main humans made the decision to take a giant leap of faith and invest every penny of their life savings into making a down payment of $75,000 to secure a loan for a bare piece of land. That means right now FARRM’s humans are carrying the full weight of two mortgages (one for the current property and another for the new one), which they can only manage for another year (if absolutely needed) comfortably. FARRM’s operators have also set funds aside from their personal savings to cover the costs of bringing electricity onto the property for the barn (cost of $14,000), getting the barn its very own well drilled so the animals can have auto-waterers, laundry facilities, and a washroom for volunteers and visitors in house (cost of $16,000), a septic system installed for the barn so all the water and waste has somewhere to go (cost of $21,000) and a gas line ran, to be the main source of heat in the barn (cost of $10,000). As of right now, FARRM’s humans have gifted FARRM a chance to build something we never thought possible… but now we need your help. With an initial investment of nearly $140,000 to make building a new home possible for the animals of FARRM, the funds are no longer available to contribute more to this endeavour. With no savings left to further this undertaking we turn to you, our extended FARRM family, for help.​
We need to raise approximately $150,000 to buy the materials necessary to build a 40x100’ barn ourselves, and start fencing the property perimeter and interior pens. In order to make sure almost all the funds can go towards building materials and not paying for labour costs, FARRM’s humans have endeavoured to take on the monumental task of moving all the current residents to the new property as early as possible in the spring of 2025 and starting the build themselves. As the humans will be living onsite in a camper, and the animals in temporary pens and shelters, this means that if we cannot raise the money to get the barn materials purchased, and permanent fencing installed, we will have to return to the old property in the fall to spend another winter at the old (current) location. We are hopeful as a team that we can put the hours into realizing this dream and completing this build before temperatures force us to retreat to heated shelters (for both humans and animals).
The round-trip from the old property to new is 3 hours, which will take up a large portion of the day if we were attempting to travel back and forth to build. The costs of travel and the lack of supervision of the animals at the sanctuary during the day would make it impossible to start building unless we move onsite with all our residents in tow. This decision was a hard one to realize as the work and risk involved in relocating without a permanent home is huge. We do feel safer knowing that we will not be giving up our current home and it will be here if plans do not go accordingly.
The next year will be full of stressors and uncertainty but we are putting faith into the extended family we have in all of you to help us through it. We won't be able to have any in-person events in 2025 due to the move, and time needed to develop the new space. We will try and offer what we can online and do our best to attend local vegan markets, Art Walk, and VegFest. We promise to keep everyone in the loop, to update you every step of the way, and to share this journey with you as we build ourselves a forever home.​
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How can you help?
We really need everyone to interact with and share our social media posts, to try and get our page in front of as many eyes as possible; the algorithms have really been working against us and engagement has plummeted the last few years.
If you can donate any amount towards building materials or ask friends and family who may work at local hardware and building centres if they can provide discounts for materials we will be relying on this support. If you know an electrician, a plumber, a carpenter, a truss-maker, someone who has equipment for fencing, an employee at UFA, Rona, Home Hardware, Home Depot, Canadian Tire, etc please reach out and ask them if they think they could help! A discount on materials could be the difference between getting this barn built on time. We also need help from someone capable of helping us create an engineered drawing of the new barn for us to build off of and provide for permits, etc.
Get in touch with us if you have any connections you think could help! It will take our entire community.
Watch this space - there's much more info to come on ways to help and be involved as we build our forever home and FARRM's future! Keep an eye out for videos, and pictures with all the updates as we move closer to reaching our goal.
If you have read this post to the end, you have a small idea of our current circumstances, however, what you can’t know is the devotion that we have to bettering the lives of the animals currently in our care, the animals we can help in the future, and the human lives we hope to serve through this rehoming mission. Our hearts, minds, and bodies have been serving this mission to the extent we’ve been able until now…with your help we continue growing. Because every life is worth fighting for.
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