I had the pleasure of interviewing one of my vegan heroes—Lindsay Kibler, the founder of Henry’s Haven Animal Sanctuary. Henry’s Haven (named after her and her husband, Nate’s, little son) began in 2023 and is a pastoral 40-acre paradise for more than three dozen rescued farmed animals in Pennington, New Jersey. As one of the regular volunteers there, I get the chance to interact with some of the most gentle, loving animals I have ever encountered. It still amazes me to see how even the animals who came from places of neglect or abuse can still be so kind to humans.
I hope that this story will encourage you to support your favorite animal sanctuary. In addition to providing shelter, love, and care to animals in need, animal sanctuaries give us humans an opportunity to meet animals as individuals. While learning about the suffering and harm animal agriculture causes is an essential part of “waking up” to a compassionate, vegan way of life, it is equally crucial to experience the reality that animals are wonderful, intelligent, and emotional beings—including and especially the ones thought of as “food” by some. It’s never too late to fall in love.
Elana: Let’s start from the beginning—what’s your vegan story?
Lindsay: I have had a long journey. I went vegetarian in 2018. When we moved to NJ, I worked at an SPCA where I met and became friends with some amazing vegan people.
I was one of those people who started out saying, “I respect it but I could never do it…”. But, I just started cutting things out one by one. Once we cut out all the meat, we realized how easy it was to be vegetarian. Last year [2023] I finally went vegan. It really clicked for me once we started our own animal sanctuary.
Dairy was the hardest thing for me to cut out but I just came to realize that it’s a choice we make for the animals, the environment, and things that are much bigger than ourselves. For some people, veganism is a diet, and I think those are the folks who tend to go back to eating animal products, but when you make the choice for ethics, you just figure out any pitfalls, you take supplements if you need them, and you stay vegan!
Elana: Can you pinpoint that moment when you ‘woke up’ to the suffering of animals?
Lindsay: I grew up next to a black Angus farm in rural Pennsylvania. My family would go out on the deck and grill hamburgers while watching these cows and I remember when I found out what actually happened to those cows I found it so upsetting and it didn’t feel right.
Also, every summer that same farm had pigs, they would walk them in a single-file line every night. We called it the pig walk! It was amazing and cute and as kids, we would look forward to seeing them every night. Then, one day, the pig walk stopped. My parents didn’t want to tell me why and finally when they did, again, it just didn’t sit right with me.
I think growing up in a farming community forced me to make the connection at a young age. But, I will say, not eating meat isn’t a choice every kid gets to make. I grew up in a hunting family—I even went hunting with my grandfather, all the grandkids were expected to, although I never shot anything.
Since my family loved hunting, and fishing and was just very meat-eating, I didn’t feel like I could have made the transition to vegetarian—let alone to vegan—while I was living at home. It wasn’t until I was older and surrounded by people with a similar mindset and in my own house that I felt empowered to make a change.
Elana: That’s a good point. I also grew up omnivorously and didn’t go vegan until I was an adult too. What was it like when you finally told your family you wanted to be vegan?
Lindsay: Honestly, not knowing how my family would react is what held me back for a while. I was so afraid I wasn’t going to be accepted. Sometimes my family still questions it. I do wonder when they’ll just fully accept it.
My husband Nate has also been super supportive. We both stopped eating meat together. We maintain a vegetarian household. He’s on his own vegan journey and I’m really proud of how far he’s come. His going vegetarian wasn’t something either of us ever thought would happen. Having an animal sanctuary did that for him. You meet the animal that your “food” was made from and then you can’t eat it anymore.
Elana: How did Henry’s Haven start?
Lindsay: I mentioned earlier that I started working at an SPCA animal shelter with other vegans and it was through them that I learned that vegan farm sanctuaries even existed. I’ve rescued rabbits, cats, and dogs but I never really thought about farm animals.
The first animal sanctuary I ever interacted with was one close to where we lived at the time. I started following them on social media. I learned a lot about running a sanctuary and why we should be vegan. It all just made sense to me.
Also, I have a background in psychology and I love working with people, but they started to burn me out. So, I started working with animals at the SPCA and it was the animals that filled my cup. It just became clear to me that I wanted to start my own sanctuary and it became a goal of mine.
Elana: Since Henry’s Haven is still fairly new, would you mind talking about how you keep it operational?
Lindsay: It’s a good question. Henry’s Haven is a registered 501c3 nonprofit so we do get donations, but something people don’t realize is that you have to be very self-funded in the beginning.
We were planning on opening Henry’s Haven for YEARS. You have to rescue animals before donors are even interested—and you have to have money to rescue animals. We did get some one-time donations in the beginning from friends and family who believed in us, but building a regular donor base takes a long time. We prepared for that.
Right now, we’re about 50% self-funded and 50% donations. We have to take that into account as we look to grow, for example, if we grow the number of animals we take in, can we afford it personally and are we able to grow our donor base in parallel?
The second part that is essential to us being able to grow is our volunteers. There is only so much I can do in a day, and keeping a high level of care and cleanliness requires a lot of time. As we get more consistent volunteers, we can get more animals, but I know if something like a blizzard hits, Nate and I still have to be able to do everything ourselves.
One of the things other excellent sanctuaries have taught me is to be as transparent as possible. We want people to see the work we do. We post vet receipts to our social media to show that we do get our animals professional veterinary care. We show the animal living conditions because we want people to feel confident that their donations are going towards what they care about—giving animals the life they deserve.
Elana: Finally, what’s the vision for the future of Henry’s Haven?
Lindsay: I would love to see our fields full of different herds of animals across our 40 acres. I want to spread out our operation and build another barn. We’ll need to rescue and train some more dogs to protect our properties and our animals.
I also want to do more cat rescues. I used to foster kittens with the Feline Leukemia Virus (FeLV). FeLV is contagious to other cats so they are hard to find homes for or often just euthanized at shelters. I would love to build a cattery that allows us to save FeLV cats and keep them separate from our other barn cats. In general, there are just so many cats that need a place to go and I think we can help more.
The second part of our mission is to make Henry’s Haven a place for humans to feel accepted. I would like to bring humans with developmental disabilities and animals together. We’ve done some volunteer days with these amazing individuals, and I would love to have a more regular and accessible program for that. I want them to have the opportunity to do meaningful work while also developing important social or vocational skills that will help them thrive in other areas. There are so few opportunities for adults with disabilities after they leave the school system and we just want to be an inclusive and therapeutic space for them. Animals only care about kindness and we can all make a positive difference in each other’s lives.
Elana: It makes sense that compassion for animals goes hand-in-hand with compassion for people! Finally, can you tell me about a time you were particularly proud of your lifestyle now that you’re vegan?
Lindsay: Honestly, anytime I’m with my animals, I’m so proud that I’m no longer a part of the system that uses and abuses them and I know I’m doing my best to do the least amount of harm.
LINDSAY FAST FACTS:
Plant milk of choice: I like regular old unsweetened almond milk for just about everything. I will make my own cashew milk for sauces.
Favorite vegan dish or restaurant in NJ: The Lady and the Shallot in Trenton! Their stuffed sweet potato is the most delicious thing.
One vegan food/product/recipe you think everyone should try at least once?: The Violife spreadable cream cheese is so good—it’s the first brand I’ve liked for cream cheese.. Also, tofu in the air fryer is underrated. I’m inspired to make a tofu scramble just like the Lady and the Shallot! They air fry theirs and it is AMAZING.
If you would like to contribute to Henry’s Haven consider…
…making a tax-deductible donation here!
…purchasing something from their Amazon or Chewy wishlists here!
…grabbing some of their adorable merch here!
…filling out the form to volunteer here!
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