Animals of Appalachia has many ways you get involved!
Check out our events page to see the opportunities coming up.
Book Series
Animals of Appalachia is launching our first of many book series in March of 2024. These first books follow Buddy, the red eared slider, as he travels the Appalachian Highlands meeting old and new friends. Buddy teaches kids about what he is seeing and why the animals and plants he sees are important.
Educational Material
Animals of Appalachia is producing educational aids for use in schools as well as after-school and summer programs. These educational aids provide lessons and designs for projects to instill the love of nature and animals in children.
"Not Your Normal" Animal Rescue
Cats, dogs, and even rabbits have many places they can go if the current critter keeper can no longer or in some cases doesn’t want to care for them. What about the unusal or less-than-normal animals? Lizards, frogs, hamsters, mice? Where do they go? Unfortunately more often than not they are simply thrown out. Animals of Appalachia wants to change that with our “Not Your Normal” Animal Rescue and Rehoming services.
Or you can donate through PayPal. Simply choose the fund you wish to donate to, choose the amount you wish to donate, and choose the frequency. Even a small one-time donation is greatly appreciated.
There are many ways to get involved with Animals of Appalachia. We understand that not everyone wantscan or even wants to donate to any non-profit. We want to remove any barriers from someone saying they just can’t help with conservation. Here are the non-monetary and non-time consuming ways you can contribute to conservation.
Guided Hikes
Animals of Appalachia will be organzizing two types of guided hikes beginning late this spring.
“Clean Hike”
A “Clean Hike” is a short hike, less than 6 hours, where we take a small group on one of the beautiful trails in our area and clean up as we go.
This may include trash or other debris so be sure to bring gloves. Trash bags will be provided. This may also include clearing some trails of natural debris to make the trail more accessible.
These short hikes will be fun and along the way you will learn about the plants and animals you see. They are perfect for families.
Learn on the Trail
It’s not all cleaning and clearing. We offer a variety of guided hikes for many different experience levels. These hikes focus on teaching hikers to live with nature.
We focus on “no impact” hiking and camping. This means we take out everything we take in as well as leave any area we stop better than how we found it.
Want to join us on a multi-day hike? Great! We don’t use tents. WHY?! Tents require ground space and have a huge impact on the area around camp. Hammocks are a great way to camp. Come along and give it a try!
Make A Suggestion
Animals of Appalachia produces a podcast that is all about conservation. We talk about animlas and their status, how we, as humans, impact them, and how they impact their environment.
How Can I Help?
You can help by suggesting an animal or telling us about what you have found about an animal or environment you are interested in hearing more about.
We would love to hear from you. Drop us a line and let us know how we can better serve you with the podcasts or blog or if you would like us to speak at an event you are hosting.
You can also suggest a trail that needs cleaning or a trail that needs hiking. We are more than happy to check out a new, or well worn, trail for cleaning or learning.
Donate Items
You can donate things you may no longer need like that older enclosure that is taking up room in your storage building, equipment like the pond pump you no longer use or lights for enclosures.
You can anlso donate non-animal realted things like hiking gear: backpacks, hiking poles, water bottles, hammocks, tents, etc. Not everyone that wants to go on one of hikes will have the gear they need. We try to provide the things they will need to make the hike pleasant, but we can’t always provide everything.
We do ask that if you donate hiking gear that it is in working order. We appreciate any donation however if the gear is not usable we will just have to disguard it. For the enclosures and equipment we do not require that it is fully working. We do have the experience to repair most enlcousres and equipment.