Your Furry Friend is made entirely of real fur, Nature’s most beautiful, effective insulator! Real fur is not only gorgeous to look at and to hold, but is also ... Long-lasting. Fur is one of the most durable natural fibers known. With loving care, a fur garment or teddy can stay in your family for generations! Environment-friendly. Farmers feed their animals the leftovers from human food production, keeping it out of landfills and transforming it into a beautiful fiber. Farming also helps stabilize prices, protecting wildlife from market forces. Wildlife managers and trappers, meanwhile, ensure populations do not exceed the carrying capacity of their habitat. In this way, animals stay healthy, and the risk is minimized of disease being transferred to humans and livestock.

Recycle your surplus furs as fabulous Furry Friends!

Furry Friends is a project of Fur Commission USA, representing more than 400 families raising furbearers on 300 farms in two dozen states.

Seven Christmases have come and gone since FCUSA donated its first Furry Friend to a fundraiser at the Children’s Hospital in San Diego. But now the program is so popular, we can’t keep up with demand, no matter what the season!

Over the years we’ve said goodbye to almost 200 of these adorable teddy bears and bunnies made from mink and other furs from donated garments. Furry Friends have gone to worthy causes in the United States and Canada, and our friends the Countryside Alliance in the United Kingdom.

The Furry Friends program takes surplus pelts - damaged, dressed or not, leftovers from recycled garments, it doesn’t matter - and transforms them into gorgeous cuddlies.

These are then donated by farmers to their favorite charities and groups working to protect the quality of rural life. Funds and smiles are generated, and new friends are won for the fur-farming community.

Educational tags attached to each teddy also explain the merits of fur, how fur farmers help recycle the waste from human food production, and the role of fur farming in reducing pressure on wild populations of furbearers (see right).

Calling all farmers and fur lovers: please make an extra special effort to donate a pelt or two, or any old fur garments that no one wears anymore. These small donations add up, and when you’re ready for a fundraiser, don’t go empty-handed - take a Furry Friend!

Grateful recipients who have auctioned off Furry Friends include:

Alice in Dairyland Festival of Light, Alliance for America, American Agri-Women, California Biomedical Research Association, California Farm Bureau - Young Farmer & Rancher Program, Children's Hospital San Diego, Countryside Alliance (UK), Community Recreation Association (Dalton, MA), Curtis Elementary School (Los Angeles), Empress Chinchilla, Epilepsy Foundation, Executive Women's Golf Tournament, Farm Bureau of San Diego County, FCUSA Annual Meeting, Fishermen’s Barons Ball (South Carolina), Fond du Lac Association of Commerce, Furbearers Unlimited, Fur Breeders Unlimited, Fur Institute of Canada, Hawgs for Dogs (Minnesota chapter of Guidedogs for America), International Mink Show, Kansas Fur Harvesters Association, Maine Agri-Women, Make-A-Wish Foundation, Mechutan Fur Corp., Museum of the Fur Trade, National Animal Interest Alliance, the National FFA Organization (formerly Future Farmers of America), National Trappers Association, National Wild Turkey Federation, Oregon Women for Agriculture, Paul Newman's Camps for Children with Cancer, Pennsylvania Trappers Association, Property Rights Foundation of America, Provider Pals, Shoreland Lutheran High School (Wisconsin), Vanguard Albany Symphony, Western Pennsylvania Fur Farm Cooperative, Wisconsin Agribusiness Council, Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation, Women in Timber.

Click here to download our Furry Friends promotional flyer (PDF format).

For further information contact: Teresa Platt, Executive Director, Fur Commission USA, PMB 506, 826 Orange Avenue, Coronado, CA 92118-2698 USA, (619) 575-0139, (619) 575-5578/fax, furfarmers@aol.com, www.furcommission.com.

To take a cyber-tour of a fur farm, visit Fur Commission USA's Fur on Film at http://www.furcommission.com/video/index.htm

© 1998-2008 Fur Commission USA

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