Juniper Russo grew up in a Birmingham, Alabama, suburb feeling out of place. Unlike most kids, she struggled with social interactions, missed out on the developmental play that comes naturally to others, and felt disconnected from her peers.
Russo didn’t realize why until adulthood. After her oldest daughter was diagnosed with autism, Russo learned she’s autistic as well. But autism diagnoses were rare when she was a child, so she existed alone in a space no one near her understood.
Mercifully, there was a place where Russo felt connected to the world – where the debilitating stress and discomfort of her daily life melted away and she found relief in her surroundings: a drainage ditch close to her home.
“It was magical to me,” says Russo, 38. “There were squirrels and birds and a magnolia tree where a mourning dove would nest. It was a ditch, but when you’re a kid, you can find the beauty in those things more easily.”
A victim of childhood abuse, Russo didn’t have the nurturing family environment socially awkward children tend to need, she says, so she found solace and comfort in nature.
“I was able to understand and interact with animals more naturally than people,” Russo explains. “Animals are more predictable. They don’t lie and you don’t have to read between the lines.”
A lifelong dream
The one thing that could pull Russo away from her outdoor sanctuary was watching Steve Irwin on “The Crocodile Hunter,” a show that sparked her dream of becoming a wildlife rescuer and educator.
“I was determined to become a wildlife rescuer and teach people about animals when I grew up,” Russo says.
In 2018, Russo founded For Fox Sake, a wildlife rescue and education nonprofit with a cheeky name.
“I have kind of a crude sense of humor,” she shrugs. “More than that, I don’t want people to feel like they’re calling an institution; I want them to realize they’re calling a weirdo in East Brainerd with a bunch of animals. Maybe that will make them more comfortable.”
Nose to the grindstone
Though FFS has a board and occasional volunteers, Russo handles 99% of animal care herself from her backyard, where she focuses on rabies vector species like foxes, skunks, raccoons and bats.
These animals made up the greatest percentage of the 160 rescues Russo rehabilitated in 2024, including two endangered Eastern spotted skunks that were the first of its species to be submitted for rehabilitation in Tennessee.
Rehabilitating this biodiverse menagerie takes a yeoman’s work, with Russo tending daily to dozens of basic but restorative tasks.
“Most of the mammals I take in are healthy orphans. Perhaps someone killed a raccoon in their attic and found its babies the next day,” she begins. “The first order of business is to warm them up and raise their blood sugar. Once they’re stable, I hydrate them and then start feeding them formula.”
Few people outside of animal care understand that there’s no universal formula. Rather, each baby racoon, skunk and fox receives its own formula based on its specific needs.
“People are surprised to hear there’s such a thing as raccoon formula,” Russo says. “They think goat milk is a universal thing, but it’s not. Animals have very specific nutritional requirements.”
Consequently, Russo needs access to dozens of unique formulas and even alters the diets of her tiny charges based on the time of year.
“That’s how it is in the wild,” she explains. “Once they can have solid foods, I give them more fruits and vegetables in the spring and summer and more nuts and acorns in the fall.”
Animal shenanigans
Russo’s work comes with other challenges. She has to keep a close eye on her raccoons, for example, as they are her cleverest tenants.
“One chewed holes in the wiring of its cage and then dragged a blanket over its handiwork so I couldn’t see it,” she recalls. “I can’t begin to describe the amount of work that goes into maintaining my raccoon cages because of their shenanigans.”
In 2019, Russo also learned to be on the guard while handling skunks after one sprayed her in the mouth during its initial exam. “Hopefully, my marriage and sense of taste will recover,” she wrote in a post on the FFS Facebook page (facebook.com/forfoxsakewildlife). “But my dignity? There’s no hope for that.”
Tough love
Raccoons aren’t the only critters with the power to charm Russo, who admits to being as much of a sucker for a cuddly furball as the next person.
But the very love that motivates her to run an animal rescue also compels her to treat them in the manner that will best assure their survival once they’re back in the wild.
This means avoiding any interaction that might lead to bonding.
“I don’t want my releasable animals to like me; I want them to be wild,” she says. “If I attached to them the way you’d attach to a pet, I’d always be grieving. It’s self-preservation.”
Russo’s ultimate goal when rehabilitating a rescue is to teach it to fend for itself in the wild. So, she nurtures a mutual respect with these animals.
“I appreciate that they could bite me, and they appreciate that I could kill them, and that’s the best relationship we can have,” she says. “I don’t want to release a bobcat or a fox that’s going to run up to people asking for food. I want them to know how to be a wild animal and live in the woods.”
Education ambassadors
Sometimes, an animal can’t be released. While the ethics of animal rescue prohibit caring for a wild creature simply to keep it alive, there’s an alternative that can grant a rescue a new purpose – serving as an educational ambassador.
Russo takes to these animals to schools and youth groups, as well as support centers, where they provide therapeutic benefits to patients.
“That’s one of my favorite parts of my job,” Russo says.
During a presentation at Safehaven, a treatment facility for people with traumatic brain injuries, a resident who was struggling to move tried to pet a red corn snake named Medusa. Although he worked up a literal sweat lifting his hand, once successful, he smiled as the nurse cheered.
“Having something that engages you and keeps you looking forward to the next day is good for someone with any kind of injury or illness,” Russo says.
Russo’s mosaic of education ambassadors includes Quasimodo, a deformed box turtle; Mallow, a deaf and nearly blind albino raccoon; Calliope, who’s half captive red mink and half wild mink; and T’Challa, a bobcat who suffered a traumatic brain injury.
“I believe a hawk dropped him on his head when he was a kitten,” Russo says. “Someone found him in their driveway with signs of a concussion and a gash on his leg that looked like a raptor talon. I tried to place him with one of the large sanctuaries, but there were political issues because of ‘Tiger King,’ so he stayed with me.”
(Released by Netflix in 2020, “Tiger King” sparked broad awareness and criticism of private zoos and exotic animal ownership in the U.S.)
Staying legal
Operating an animal rescue requires more than expertise; the state of Tennessee also requires licensure. To that end, Russo has earned her rehabilitation and education licenses. Running an animal rescue with anything less would be unethical, she says.
“A lot of people do animal rescue as a DIY project. They found some baby squirrels and decided to raise them. But wildlife rehabilitation is a specialized branch of veterinary medicine; it’s not something you can do in your closet.”
Sometimes, ethical responsibility means euthanasia for rabies testing – a legal requirement that has caused tension between Russo and unlicensed rescuers.
“Many people don’t understand the gravity of what they’re doing when they take in a raccoon from the wild. People have villainized me because I referred wild animals that were in their home to the health department for testing. If you’re doing this for funsies, you could be endangering yourself or others.”
In addition to adhering to the law, Russo relies on her innate understanding of animal injuries and illnesses.
Though Russo is not a vet, her intuition and experience allow her to recognize complex illnesses and treat them with precision.
“When it comes to first aid and general troubleshooting, I have a knack for understanding what’s going on with an animal,” she says. “I can tell you when a raccoon has distemper versus panleukopenia, even though the symptoms are similar.”
FFS relies almost entirely on private donations to sustain its operations. While Russo receives a monthly stipend, she spends nearly all donated funds on animal care. Even then, every dollar counts.
“There’s a sweet older lady who sends For Fox Sake $5 from her Social Security check every month,” Russo says. “That means the world to me.”
While Russo has devoted her career to an endeavor that yields only a modicum of compensation, she credits her wife, Tristen – an IT specialist and their household’s breadwinner – with making it all possible.
“Without Tristen, I wouldn’t be able to live out my dream,” Russo says. “She allows me to do my part to fix some of the broken things in this world.”