Safaris Exotic Wildlife Sanctuary

Safaris is wonderful to visit, and life changing to volunteer. From giant cats to an adorable kangaroo named JackiLeggs to a female fox to the new bear cage (complete with swimming pool), there is too many fascinating, thrilling creatures to mention. Something for everyone. Also, the style of interaction owner Lori Ensign has developed is safe but truly close-up and exciting. Unique! Treat yourself to a day at Safaris.

omg, we were traveling thru, and just heard about this place. Hard to find, gps got us lost, but when we got there, WOW. I held a skunk! a big yellow snake, a crocodile, --oh and they have a LIGER. You've got to go there.

just went to Safaris in Broken Arrow, OK. Seemed small and "iffy", but WOW. We got a hands on tour, fed big cats, they all came to see us -like WE were on display! Then we fed an alligator. Then she brought out a lemur, a skunk, we played with huge turtles, fed monkeys, played with a kangaroo, pet a zebra..... absolutely amazing! I will never go to the Tulsa Zoo, animals a mile away, sleeping-again!!

I manager a restaurant near the sanctuary, sometimes I am allowed to donate food to a charity of my choice, and I just chose the Safari Exotic Wildlife Sanctuary! The people who volunteer here are wonderful caring people that deserve the world! You can honestly tell how much they love each one of the animals! The other day myself as well as two of my fellow staff members took food out to the sanctuary. It was not during normal visiting hours but one of the volunteers was kind enough to walk us through all the exhibits. She was not expecting us at all, it was like a surprize when we showed up but she did not hesitate to take us through. Every animal had plenty of food and tons of water. It was nice to know that even when they are not open to the public, the animals are still being taken care of. This is how you know this is a wonderful place! We also watched the volunteer pick up a Goose that laid his head on her shoulder and let her carry him around. If a goose is that friendly you know it has been treated right! I highly recommend this sanctuary to all families, even if you dont have little children it is still a blast. Myself as well as my employees that went with me the other day range in age from 21-30 and we had so much fun! We later found out that all these animals were rescue animals and the all th staff are volunteers! This seems to be a fantastic place, and my restaurant will def. donate again!

I liked the down home feeling, and was greeted with kindness. The large Lions, Tigers, cougars, and Bears, seemed more like household pets. they had a friendly look in there eyes, but yet exciting to see up close. you felt like you could just reach in and pet them. There were double safety fences, so that wasn't possible, and they made you feel comfortable. I had read a bad review of the place, and almost didn't go there, but we were suprised at what we saw, and looked for the problems, and found none. one thing had stuck in my mind about the bad review was a monkey in a room that the door was screwed shut. Well it was a storm door, inside the house, that as on all storm doors, the frame is screwed into the door opening, and it had a handle on it to open the door, that was locked to keep someone from letting the monkey out. I was so relieved to see that someone didn't look very well at things. It was the most exciting place that I had ever been to, and I felt that if I was disappointed, my admission fee would have been refunded. All proceeds go to keep the animals fed, and is run by loving volunteers, that get no pay except the love of the animals. A must see place, and more big cats than I have ever seen in one place. I will go back as often as I can.

This is a rescue, and they have many, many animals who are obviously well cared for, they all have happy faces. I understand it is run strictly by volunteers and I wish I had the time to volunteer. "It is a work in progress and always will be", they stated. "There is never enough time for all we need to do." As far as my family and I are concerned, we think it is wonderful and will recommend it to all of our friends. The bad review was a bunch over the top, any of the instances can happen and are probably cleaned up at the next clean up time. And the bunny rabbit was something that I cannot imagine happening. This isn't the Tulsa Zoo with millions of dollars in their budget. Give them a chance and it amazes me what these people do for the love of the animals as their logo states.

As lovers of zoos (big and small) my family went to this sanctuary to check it out as a regular location to visit and possibly have our 12 year old daughter (who wants to be a vet) volunteer. We were greeted by a very friendly staff member at the front office where you pay to get in and buy human snacks. From the office, we could see a playground that was a bit run down and beyond that, we saw where they had the carnivores. The carnivore area was enclosed in it's own fence with fences within fences for the animals inside. The gate had a sign stating "tour every 30 minutes" and it didn't appear to be set up to allow visitors to go into the area without a guide. We decided to not wait for the 30 minute tour and went up the hill. This is where the sanctuary really took a turn for the worse. At the top of the hill, we had a house on the left that we weren't sure if we were supposed to go into or not so we bypassed it. On the right was a rabbit hutch with about 5 rabbits inside. We all went to check them out and that is when my wife and I noticed a black furry mass on the top of the hutch with a few flies buzzing it. Turns out that it was a dead rabbit that they just pulled out of the hutch and plopped down ontop of it and left it there. Now don't get me wrong, we are very aware that death is a part of nature but to pull it out and just leave it ontop of the hutch for all visitors to see... that's out of line. We quickly moved our kids away from the hutch before they could see the rabbit on top and then saw another sign of how bad this place is. There was a row of cages with a double fence seperating the animals from the visitors. There were Lemurs and other animals to be seen along this row. We noticed a PVC pipe running from the visitors side to the bottom of the cage side in every cage. This was used to allow the visitors to feed the animals. How cute and sweet.... The problem is that there were no vending machines for healthy food and there were no employees there to prevent the feeding of gummie bears, jelly beans, or cheese crackers to the animals. These human treats (available for purchase at the front gate) littered the bottom of the cages. We went through the rest of the sanctuary and every cage had a feeding tube with the same items at the bottom. There was another house that we went into because we followed a group of people and assumed they were visitors too. Inside this house was a selection of parrots and lizards with a room to the back that had a closed door. The stench from this building was horrible so we decided to go back out the way we came. That is when we noticed a small monkey (don't know what type it was) in a room with a storm door bolted and screwed shut that allowed visitors to see it. The room had an oil radiator that was tipped over (not leaking from what we could tell) and junk all over the place. The monkey was clinging to the wall at the top of the storm door sucking it's thumbs and looking like it hadn't been looked after by a vet or a caretaker in months. This place is a horrible place and no animal should ever be "rescued" to live here. Their is an obvious lack of staff and the diet and safety of the animals is completely void. I honestly question all of the 5 star reviews below. I would place money on them being posted by the owner/employees of the sanctuary and not really guests. My wife and I are going to find out what we can do to either shut this place down or require better staffing/training/services. Wish us luck.

Yesterday was my first visit. I Loved the visit. It could sure use some volunteer work. I know it takes tremendous time and work and money to keep this place going. They are doing a great job. I am trying to figure out a way yo help. Wish I could figure out a team effort project to help them as a group. Guess I better put on my thinking cap. I do want this place to stay here for a long time. Want to give Lori and her crew a BIG THANK YOU.. Stella..............

i am totally going back! its ausome! everyone should come! according to the tour guide, their are more than 200 animals. and the cabins are sooooo cool!!!! my favorite animal was the liger! YES! a LIGER!!!!!!!! and a ring tailed lemur jumped on my back!!!! it was ausome!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It was great i loved it!!! There so many things to do! I would go again!! It would have been better later this year. So many beautiful animals!!!