Dieguito Discoveries
Dieguito Discoveries – Uncovering the fascinating people
and places in the San Dieguito River Valley
Deborah Johnson
Dieguito Discoveries #3
Helen Woodward Animal Center
There’s a place in Rancho Santa Fe where people can talk
to the animals and the animals, in their own way, answer back.
It is the Helen Woodward Animal Center with its dogs and cats,
horses, goats, bunnies, birds and a few lizards.
The Helen Woodward Animal Center began its life as the San Dieguito
Animal Care and Education Center. In 1971, Del Mar resident Helen
Woodward bought 12 acres of what was then farmland in Rancho
Santa Fe. Her goal was to establish an animal shelter to deal
with what she and her friends felt was a crisis in stray and
ill-kept animals. Renamed in Mrs. Woodward’s honor at her
death in 1983, the Center has grown dramatically in scope from
its beginning, now offering pet adoption and boarding, an equine
hospital, and therapeutic and educational programs where the
animals help people.
Meet Kermit the Percheron.
A former Cinderella Carriage horse,
he is one of the stars of the Therapeutic Riding Program. Children
and adults with mental, physical or emotional disabilities learn
to ride and, in the process, develop coordination, balance and
self-confidence. Some of the riders’ accomplishments are
close to miraculous. John Van Zante, the Center’s Public
Relations Manager, tells of the disabled nine-year-old girl who
had never spoken, but who learned to ride. One day she uttered
the first word of her life when she greeted her favorite horse
with an enthusiastic, “Hi!”
There’s Snacks, a miniature horse-pony mix, who helps
children learn about animals.
In programs like “First Friends” and “Critter
Camp” children often get their first exposure to animals.
Snacks and the goats, Billie and Willie, teach children animal
care and pet responsibility. Education Manager, Jaimie White
says that through these programs children learn that animals
are real, living beings and “have feelings, too.”
Want to get over your fear of dogs? The Helen Woodward Animal
Center has a program for that too.
And many of the animals at Helen Woodward provide special bonds
to troubled children and the elderly and seriously ill. Pet Therapy
animals like Buddy the Eclectus Parrot or Harriett the Umbrella
Cockatoo reach out to humans with warmth and unconditional love.
Yes, the Center offers dogs and cats for adoption, 80% of them
from overcrowded animal shelters throughout San Diego County.
They’ll all get homes because Helen Woodward only accepts
the animals it can house. The center does not put down dogs or
cats because they have too many.
In addition to the thousands of animals helped by the Center,
the Center’s animals have helped thousands of children
and adults. The spirit of Helen Woodward and the Animal Center
she created is that animals help and teach us as much, if not
more than we help and teach them.
The Helen Woodward Animal Center is located at 6461 El Apajo
Road. Their web site, www.animalcenter.org has the full information
on all their programs.
Deborah Johnson
©
December 2003
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