Mikayla Raines with Dixie the fox.
(Facebook photo)
Global YouTube star built rescue from zero to revenue of $1.3 million in just eight years, but hit burnout
Mikayla Raines, 30, founder of SaveAFox Rescue Corporation, near Faribault in Rice County, Minnesota, and an international YouTube star with videos of her rescued foxes and other wildlife, on June 21, 2025 committed suicide.
Ethan Frankamp, 35, Mikayla Raines’ husband since December 2020, and father of their daughter Freya, disclosed Raines’ death in a tearful video on June 23, 2025.
Within hours the news––and Frankamp’s statement––made headlines in media as big and distant as the New York Daily News, MSN, the Daily Mail of London, England, the Times of India, and the Hindustan Times, which assigned two correspondents to the story.
Finnegan Fox
Founded in 2017, the nonprofit SaveAFox Rescue Corporation climbed from zero to total revenue of $1.3 million in 2023, according to IRS Form 990, experiencing rapid growth and global recognition through the success of Raines’s videos of charismatic rescued residents including Finnegan Fox.
Finnegan Fox, also star of three books for children, had become a particular favorite of Showing Animals Respect & Kindness founder Steve Hindi, who was first to call ANIMALS 24-7 after learning of Raines’ suicide.
“My name is Mikayla Raines and I am the founder of SaveAFox Rescue,” she introduced herself online years earlier.
“I have always loved all animal species, but I found my love for foxes at the age of 15,” Raines explained, “when I met my very first fox while volunteering” for her mother, also a wildlife rehabilitator.
Finn & Dixie XL Plushie that Laughs.
(Saveafox.org photo)
“I knew I wanted a fox in my life”
“At that time, I knew I wanted a fox in my life, but I had never planned on starting a rescue or even having multiple foxes!
“My love for these animals was recognized in 2015 when I was offered a captive-born red fox to bottle-raise and keep, as captive-born foxes could never legally be wild.
“Although not a true rescue,” Raines said, “she was my very first red fox. I named her Farrah Foxett.
Finnegan. (Facebook photo)
Fur farms
“Owning a fox opened a whole new world for me.
“I was then put in touch with fur farmers,” Raines continued. “Fur farms are something I never even knew was an active business in the U.S.
“After rescuing my first three fox pups from a fur farm, rejected by the mother fox, I began my rescue. This required no college, although I had already been going to college to become a vet tech. I didn’t complete the course, as I left to save foxes instead!”
But leaving college did not end Mikayla Raines’ education.
“Much of my animal care knowledge was learned from taking those college courses and additionally taking years of wildlife rehabilitation classes through the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources,” to qualify for the multiple state and federal licenses that operating SaveAFox Rescue Corporation required her to have.
Mikayla Raines & Nirvana fox.
(Instagram photo)
“Many of the foxes here are surrenders.”
“I keep a good rapport with fur farmers,” Raines said, “as they are kind enough to give injured, ill, adult, and rejected fox pups to the rescue. But that is only where half of our foxes come from. Many of the foxes here are surrenders.
“Surrendered foxes are also captive-born foxes,” Raines pointed out. “They were once sold from breeders to someone for a pet. Most people don’t understand what it is like to have a fox until they have one. They are destructive, and not fully potty trainable, which leads many owners to give them up. Even some good fox parents have had to give their foxes up due to life’s unexpected circumstances.
Reanna Cole Morgan, Mikayla’s assistant and roommate at SaveAFox from August 2017 to April 2018. (Saveafox photo)
From Lakeville to Faribault
“I originally started up this rescue on my own,” Raines said, though she was assisted from August 2017 to April 2018 by her friend Reanna Cole Morgan, who came from Oklahoma to live at the sanctuary temporarily while helping out.
Recounted CBS Minnesota, “Mikayla Raines founded Save A Fox in Lakeville in 2017, initially finding herself at odds with the city council for violating her permit by taking in more than twice the number of foxes allowed, and by expanding the fencing on her property, according to city officials.
“Although she lost her Lakeville permit,” CBS Minnesota said, “she received $60,000 in donations in just a three-month span, leading her to open a bigger operation near Faribault in Rice County.”
Finnegan. (Facebook photo)
“A mystical experience”
“When photographer Robin Schwartz visited Mikayla Raines in Minnesota last July,” profiled Kristin Hugo for National Geographic in February 2019, “it was a mystical experience. Raines’ property was surrounded by towering oak trees and waist-high yellow-tipped grass. The photographer and her human subjects were covered in DEET and polka-dot bites from the swarms of mosquitoes. The heat was so intense that the two people who lived and worked there walked around in their bras, and the bright sun painted them with harsh lighting.”
Said Schwartz, “It was like a fantasy world.”
“Then there were the foxes,” continued Hugo.
“There are two species of foxes who live at SaveAFox—red fox and arctic fox. They have names like Banjo, Todd, and Dixie. Some are affectionate toward humans; others will ignore their caretakers. Some are red, some are black and silver, and some are splotched like dogs.
“The foxes love toys, and they grin and wag their tails like dogs,” Hugo wrote.
Mikayla & Anubis, a black backed African jackal. (TicToc photo)
“I bottle-raise all fox pups”
“Now we have many great volunteers,” Raines acknowledged in a recent video. “But there are still a few things that only I do,” including, with Frankamp’s help, the social media work that brought in the SaveAFoxRescue Corporation funding.
“I keep up with our licenses, I bottle-raise all fox pups who come to us un-weaned, I take foxes to their vet appointments, and I manage to fundraise,” Raines said.
Raines in her final video, posted 24 hours before Frankamp explained that she had committed suicide, described how the SaveAFox Rescue Corporation had outgrown her ability to cope.
Raines lamented that her only time with the foxes had become her video-making time, mentioning that she was always tired, declaring “I don’t want to do this anymore!”
Juniper Russo, president For Fox Sake Wildlife Rescue. (Facebook photo)
“From people who knew Mikayla well, I heard only positive things”
Among the people who seemed most to understand, in posthumous tributes, was Juniper Russo, executive director of For Fox Sake Wildlife Rescue in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
“I did not know Mikayla well enough to call her a friend,” Russo began, “but we were in touch with some regularity, our work often overlapped, and we shared many close mutual friends.
“From people who knew her well, I heard only positive things,” Russo testified.
“The public often got me and Mikayla mixed up, because we are both fox rescuers who have been open with the public about our struggles with autism and depression,” Russo said. “I would always laugh and say, ‘No, Mikayla is the pretty one.’
Mikayla Raines & fox kits. (Facebook photo)
Closing a fur farm
“About a year ago,” Russo narrated, “Mikayla was given an opportunity to permanently close a fur farm and save 500 foxes. For someone who dedicated her life to ending the fur trade, this seemed like a dream come true, the pinnacle of her entire career.
“The fur farm agreed to sell her the cages at a low cost so they wouldn’t lose their investment, and she could have all the foxes for free.”
Detailed Adams Publishing Group reporter Colton Kemp in December 2023, “The owner of one fur farm in Iowa, which often gave its sick or injured foxes to the rescue, recently decided his fur-farming days are over.
Said Frankamp, “He made clear that he was planning on quitting, which just means pelting and killing all the foxes. We talked it over and said ‘You know, maybe we can come to an agreement.’”
They did, with a nondisclosure agreement included that prevents SaveAFox Rescue from identifying either the farmer or his farm.
Mikayla Raines with Dixie the fox.
(Facebook photo)
“Moved heaven & earth trying to find homes”
“We purchased all of the cages and had all the foxes surrendered to us,” Frankamp told Kemp. “We also made him sign a contract that he’ll never farm for fur again. We got lawyers on it and got a contact figured out that was good for both sides. All of the cages and all of the foxes are ours now, and we just need to find good homes for them,” while spending $7,000 a month to keep the newly acquired foxes fed.
Resumed Russo, “Mikayla moved heaven and earth trying to get veterinary care and find homes for all of them. A lot of people love the idea of a pet fox,” Russo explained, “but few want an unsocialized fur farm fox who wants nothing to do with them. Zoos and sanctuaries took many of them.
“We were asked,” Russo acknowledged, “but ultimately said no because of a lack of space. In the end, Mikayla still had dozens of foxes left and not enough space and resources to adequately house and care for all of them.
Mikayla Raines. (Facebook photo)
“Her heart was in the right place”
“I heard the rumors and the gossip: critics saying that it’s wrong to take that many foxes— much less ‘buy’ them— without a full plan for them. That may be true,” Russo admitted, “but there isn’t a rescuer on this planet who has never made an impulsive decision in a desperate attempt to save lives. I never doubted that she was doing her best and that her heart was in the right place. I felt for her because I understood how the situation happened.
“But I failed Mikayla in my own way,” Russo confessed. “When I saw the public and other rescues criticizing her, I didn’t come to her defense. I thought she was fine— she always looked so happy and put-together— and I thought that the criticism and harassment she faced were rolling off her back.
Mikayla, Ethan and Freya. (Facebook photo)
“Doing things right”
“Mikayla’s husband Ethan is too polite,” Russo said, “to say the names of the people who harassed Mikayla to death, but I know them and have had my own dealings with them.
“One of the people primarily responsible for Mikayla’s death,” Russo alleged, “is a convicted animal abuser who was shut down after she hoarded, starved, and tortured wild animals. This person tried to distract from this by pointing fingers at rescues like Save A Fox and For Fox Sake Wildlife Rescue that maintain ethical and financial transparency and have licenses in good standing.
“I have often told other wildlife rescuers,” Russo finished, “that when documented animal abusers become your enemy, it’s a sign you’re doing things right.”
Ethan Frankamp announces his wife’s death. (Facebook photo)
“She felt as if the entire world had turned against her”
“A couple days ago, Mikayla Raines passed away,” Ethan Frankamp began in announcing her death.
“She felt as if the entire world had turned against her. She had always battled with borderline personality disorder, causing emotional instability as well as impulsive behaviors. But this time it went too far. She couldn’t bear what she was feeling any longer. And she ended her life.”
Raines, testified Frankamp, had “endless empathy for those in her care,” but her empathic nature also meant, Frankamp said, “that she took everything negative to heart.
Mikayla Raines & her husband Ethan Frankamp with Finnegan fox. (Facebook photo)
“For years, she pushed through the pain”
“For a few years,” Frankamp explained, “a group of people had been throwing dirt on Mikayla’s name and the rescue. Most of these are people she knew and some of them have other animal sanctuaries. They constantly spread ridiculous claims and rumors and being the sensitive human that she was, Mikayla took it all to heart. And it hurt her. It hurt her a lot.
“For years, she pushed through the pain of people trying to bring her down.”
To “Every one of you who was responsible for making her feel this way,” Frankamp said, “I wish you had to see me find her. I wish you had to hear the screams and the cries of her family. I wish you understood what you were doing before you did it. Before it had to go this far.”
Mikayla Raines. (Facebook photo)
“Nothing really seemed to help”
“Ethan describes himself as a ‘Father, husband, animal rescuer, car-builder, handyman, video editor, and toilet unclogger’ in his Instagram bio,” wrote Hindustan Times correspondent Sumanti Sen.
“In a September 2021 Instagram post,” Sen recalled, “Mikayla appreciated her husband for the effort he ‘puts into this rescue with me. He is just as much running this rescue as I am, if not more, because he has taken a lot of responsibilities off my plate.’
“Ethan revealed that his wife struggled with her daily life and emotional regulation despite several years of therapy and several medications,” Sen summarized.
“Nothing really seemed to help,” Frankamp said. “Simple tasks were hard for her. Looking at her from the outside, you could never tell what was going on in her head, but even just socializing could send her over the edge.”
Bobcat “T’challa” rescued by SaveAFox.
(Facebook photo)
“Every waking hour”
“As many of you know, she was on the autism spectrum, and while that made her life very difficult, it allowed her to hyperfocus on one thing, and that one thing was obviously animals.
“From a young age she dedicated every waking hour of her life to helping them, whether it was helping a snapping turtle cross the road or saving 500 foxes from a terrible fur farm. She was never in it for fame, money, or personal gain. She was truly one of the most selfless people I have ever known.
“Not having her here makes everything feel empty. I feel broken. But I will continue her dream,” Frankamp finished.
Theo (left) and Sien (right). (Facebook photo)
“We lost a mother to the foxes”
Offered Vegan Green Planet blogger Karenna Love, “We lost a mother to the foxes abused on fur farms, the animals—and most of all her child and husband. Online bullying is real and can have devastating impacts, as with Miyakla.”
SaveAFox Rescue Corporation still needs homes for foxes, but not just any homes.
“All the foxes here are, I guess, domesticated, but I mean, some of them are pretty wild,” Frankamp told WCCO television in Minneapolis in December 2021.
“It takes a pretty special person in the right circumstance and location to actually be able to adopt a fox from us.
“If you have carpet, that’s going to be a bad time. If there is any soft furniture or blankets, they will get destroyed. Stuff is going to get wrecked, most likely.
Beth & Merritt Clifton.
(Gene Chontos photo)
“You have to be willing to adapt to the fox,” Frankamp emphasized. “There are a lot of changes you will have to make in order to provide a fox a good life.
“We don’t want people to get a misconception that foxes are just laughing, funny dogs,” Frankamp said, “because that’s not the case at all. We try to make sure we are honest with people and not trying to glorify them as adorable pets who are perfect, because they definitely are not.”
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