PACT Animal Sanctuary is one of the largest in East Anglia, taking in and rehabilitating injured and abandoned animals since 1995 at their 15 acre site at Woodrising.

2020 has left the charity in turmoil. Covid-19 has meant shutting the gates to the sanctuary and closing their charity shops – both are vital to meet their running costs of £2,500 each day so they can continue to rescue and help over 2,500 animals and birds, both wild and domestic this year, as they do every other year, from hamsters to horses and canaries to peacocks.

As well as taking in and rehabilitating animals, the charity also has a dedicated, secure wildlife site for animals and birds that have recovered from injury but could not survive in the wild, alongside its own wildlife hospital and veterinary nursing unit. PACT has a ‘no kill’ policy. With their ongoing costs, the Sanctuary were therefore dismayed to learn that as an ‘animal only’ charity, they weren’t eligible for the Government’s charity assistance in the summer.

So instead of taking part in Black Friday sales, Eliza Nellie is donating 10% of profits from orders taken during the Black Friday sales period to the PACT Sanctuary. That period will run from Saturday 21st to Saturday 28th November. We’re calling it PACT Friday. So while you shop for Christmas presents, you’re also helping a charity in need of support.

We’ve also created this page so we can help raise awareness of PACT and the work they do.

PACT also has a mission to improve the quality of life for socially disadvantaged and disabled people alongside rescuing animals. Some volunteer at the Sanctuary, some come in just to sit and cuddle a cat for an hour. PACT says that being with the animals has proven to be an excellent way to help people regain self-confidence. Sadly that side of their work is on pause for now, but PACT say “they can’t wait to get back to normal and restart that side of our work too”.

Here’s a few more words from the charity about the ongoing struggle they’re facing in 2020:

“For the fifth year running, we are caring for 450 hedgehogs who arrived too small to survive the hibernation period and they will all be released in early May, when the summer comes and we then rescue over 500 fledglings and other birds needing help. We rehome over 750 domestic animals every year. We also have an ambulance, which collects some 5-10 injured or unwanted animals every day, often working well into the night.

“Here at PACT Animal Sanctuary, Covid-19 has been a hurricane of turmoils. It started with the sanctuary shutting its gates, volunteers were no longer able to help us care for the animals, customers were no longer able to visit to rehome animals. And then the shops had to shut. We hit a real low point then, what do we do, how can we survive; we had a lot of questions but got no government help. But what we did get is some amazing supporters helping us out, our drop off point has had food, bedding, toys etc for the animals, places like Natures Diet donated pallets of food and we set up a GoFundMe which reached £10,000. But still it nowhere near covers the expense of caring for our animals, for bedding, food, vet costs and everything else. Our world as we know it has been turned upside down! Here at PACT Animal Sanctuary our mission is to rescue, rehabilitate and, where possible, rehome neglected, injured, and abandoned animals.  We are clinging on, desperately trying to make it through each month that passes, wishing for normality again, determined to not fail, to protect and care for our animals and to make Chris, our deceased co-founder, proud.

We ask for help, for support and for donations. Without our supporters we would collapse!”

December update: Eliza Nellie donated to the PACT Animal Sanctuary on 1st December, topped up with a personal donation. Thank you to everyone who helped me support this much-needed charity by placing an order at the end of November.

If you’d like to make a donation to PACT yourself, you can do this directly via their website:

www.pactsanctuary.org or through Paypal