The Animal Rescue League of Iowa is expanding its capacity to care for rescued horses and other barn animals with the purchase of 21 acres in north central Polk County.

The nonprofit animal shelter, the largest in Iowa, bought the acreage at 3296 N.E. 54th Ave. for $2 million in a transaction that was recorded July 2. The property includes a single-family house, stables and utility buildings.

The ARL, located at 5452 N.E. 22nd St., has limited space to care for large animals like horses, said KC Routos, ARL’s director of development and communications. “We’re landlocked at our main campus.”

In recent years, the nonprofit has seen an increase in the number of calls about improperly cared for barn animals, Routos said. In 2023, the ARL cared for nearly 100 horses, a 114% increase from the previous year. The horses included 50 rescued from a single property, she said.

That rescue “underscored a longtime need that we knew we had – to find the second-chance ranch a new home,” Routos said.

In addition to horses, other barn animals the ARL cares for include chickens, goats, pigs, donkeys and peacocks. “Really, there’s no animal that we don’t serve,” Routos said.

The newly acquired property includes several pastures in which horses can graze, a feature not available at ARL’s main campus where the animals are currently cared for, Routos said. The second-chance ranch’s new home will also allow the ARL to accept donations of hay, she said. The current facility has limited space for which to store hay bales.

The facility at the ARL’s headquarters where horses are now kept will be remodeled into a rescue intake facility focused on staging and quarantining animals acquired from large-scale rescues, Routos said. Part of the remodeled facility will include an area to provide long-term medical and behavioral care to animals rescued from natural disasters and inhumane living conditions.

The stables and other buildings at the new ranch will be winterized in the coming weeks, Routos said. When that work is completed, horses the ARL is caring for will be moved to the new facility, hopefully by October, she said.

Other plans for the new property include remodeling the house to be used as a place in which companies can hold corporate retreats and meetings. “It will be a fun place to hold a meeting,” Routos said.

The ARL has launched a fundraising campaign to help pay for the acquisition, development of a rescue intake facility and remodeling of the house. The group has a goal of raising $6 million in the campaign, called Transforming the Future of Animal Rescue, Routos said. The ARL Foundation has donated $1 million to the campaign, she said.