All Creatures Sanctuary: Tina Lufkin, Resident Manager and President

Tina Lufkin, Resident Manager and President

Much of Tina Lufkin’s childhood was spent living right next to Manhattan’s Central Park and she remembers always rescuing animals of all sorts that people unceremoniously abandoned in the park. Tina says that she almost always preferred the company of animals to the company of people and was quite content sharing her New York City apartment with her assorted menagerie of animals.

Tina, an expert horsewoman, kept several horses of her own at a Long Island boarding stable throughout much of her youth and adulthood. Her first major large animal rescue came about when she encountered horses in a broken down trailer along the highway on their way to the slaughterhouse. Tina stopped the driver to speak with him and wound up rescuing and adopting the blind horse in the trailer bound for slaughter. Many years later, when two horses that were being boarded at the same stable as her own horses were abandoned by their wealthy owner (a famous sports star), Tina stepped in and adopted them and cared for them for the rest of their lives. One of them, a grey Arabian gelding named Swift, lost an eye in an accident and yet despite his handicap, managed to live a long and charmed life well into his 30's — and passed away recently at the sanctuary in Florida.

Tina’s lifelong dream was to one day have a large farm of her own where she could rescue, rehabilitate, house and care for various animals in need — so in 1991, Tina left New York and moved down to Florida “in a caravan of miscellaneous animals!” There she found the perfect place to begin a new life and humble animal sanctuary and called it All Creatures Sanctuary, representing the vast number of species housed at Tina's tropical farm paradise. "I found my nitch and I love that other people now want to help me help the animals."

Anyone who knows Tina describes her as an amazing, one-woman show with boundless energy. She is the mother of two grown children and a grandmother to two children, all who love animals as much as she does. At 60-something, it is truly hard to believe the amount of passion and commitment Tina has for her animals. "Personally caring for each and every animal brings me closer to them and I know them all so well — I know what they want and need. I know who gets along with who and who didn't eat today and who might have an ear infection or a belly ache. I feel like I am the mother of all of them. I love this work because to me, it isn't work — and it is never too much for me. It keeps me young!”