Thank you for visiting the Shadows for Life web-site! Shadows for Life was founded on 01 January 2006, and is located in Mansfield, Texas. The primary mission of this 501(c)(3) non-profit agency is to identify Special Needs individuals in our community who will benefit from having a Service or Therapy Dog. These highly trained canines not only enrich their “teammates” lives, but they also allow more independence for the individual. The Therapy Dogs are intended to socialize with and help multiple individuals at any given time, including assisted living establishments and special education classrooms at our schools.
We are also involved in K-9 Rescue activities, and have successfully rescued and placed over 20 dogs in the past six months alone! Please reference our site on Petfinder.com for information about the current dogs that we have listed as up for adoption. At Shadows for Life, we give each of our rescue dogs a specific Temperament Test in order to possibly place them into the Special Needs training program. This results in a win-win situation when we place a rescued dog into the Special Needs program!
All activities required to select, train, match the “teammates” and follow-up in the home are provided at no charge to those individuals. The agency relies on donations, fund-raising and proceeds from rescue activities and family pet counseling/training to supplement the costs associated with the Assistance/Therapy Dog Programs.
Please contact the agency to find out how you can help.
Latest News
On-site training/rescue activity
June 05, 2008
We are currently cycling all of our dogs in Special Needs training through our on-site training program, one at a time. Each dog spends approximately 10 - 14 days with us in order to work on obedience, public access and the retrieve. This has proven to be very beneficial to our clients, and will continue until all of these dogs have been with us for a few weeeks. We currently have Luke (Denise Lanier) with us from Hollywood, Florida, and have recently worked with Caleb (Becky/Kersten Harmon from North Richland Hills) and Bailey (Barrie/Ryan Yarborough from Fort Worth). We have an additional five dogs in training which we will work with through the summer. Since our inception in January 2006 we have certified an additional five teams, and this brings our 2 year total to thirteen teams which we have assisted in obtaining their dog training goals.
The volume of K-9 Rescue activity has really picked up during the past few months, with an average of one - two rescue/placements per week. Almost all of this activity can be attributed to the internet, specifically from our web-site and membership with Petfinder. In most cases we ask the current owner of the dog to hold on to them while we post them on our Petfinder site. We require that these dogs be current on their shots at the time of release. We then screen the inquiries to assure that the dogs are in fact being adopted into a good situation, and then we place them respectfully. We fully expect this activity to continue as we grow as an agency. The procurement of a facility will further enhance our ability to house dogs in training and rescued.
Please address inquiries for information as to how you can help to the agency through the contact page accordingly, as all of our services are provided at no charge to our Special Needs clients, as well as our rescue clients.
