Blending Human Healing and Animal Rescue at Endless Mountains Vineyards

We built Endless Mountains Vineyards as a place where wine, nature, and rescue dogs help people slow down and reconnect. We share how reading body language, changing the words we use about behavior, and designing calmer experiences can support both human wellness and animal welfare.

• buying a vineyard to support dog rescue and a future holistic wellness center
• using wine and farming to bring people together with purpose
• noticing guest body language shifts as dogs build trust, especially with pit bull misconceptions
• creating events like a dog mom retreat, service dog partnerships, and paint-your-pet healing gatherings
• setting boundaries for dogs through thresholds, consent, and safe introductions
• reframing “aggressive” into clearer terms like dog reactive and dog selective
• learning from an on-site dog scuffle and debunking the lock jaw myth
• connecting behavior to cortisol, fight-or-flight, and the parasympathetic nervous system

You can call or text 267-785-3814 or visit EndlessMountainsVineyards.com to learn more about upcoming events and vineyard experiences.

To learn more about Endless Mountains Vineyards visit:
https://www.EndlessMountainsVineyards.com/
Endless Mountains Vineyards 
296 Vineyard Lane  
Falls, PA 18615
267-785-3814  

Transcript

Welcome To Endless Mountains Vineyards<br>

0:00

Welcome to the Endless Mountains Vineyards Podcast, where the landscape slows you down, the wine invites conversation, and every visit tells a story. Join your host, Jennifer Estelle, owner and operator of Endless Mountains Vineyards. Nestled in the rolling hills of Pennsylvania's Endless Mountains, this podcast is an invitation into intimate vineyard experiences, small gatherings, meaningful events, and stories that live where people, purpose, and the land meet. Endless Mountains Vineyards, where life is grape and connection is intentional. There's something special that happens when people slow down, breathe deeply, and share space with animals who are learning to trust again. At the vineyard, those moments aren't accidental. They're part of the design. Welcome. I'm Julie Schwenzer, co-host and producer with Jennifer Estelle, the possum owner and operator of Endless Mountains Vineyards. Jennifer, thank you so much for what you're doing. We're just gonna like dive in and explore one of these very meaningful parts of

Why A Vineyard To Save Dogs<br>

1:09

your mission. How does a vineyard blend human wellness with animal wellness? Great question, Julie. And I got emotional watching the intro. So um thank you for reminding me to take the pause, take the breaths, be intentional. So I think we touched on it last time. I purchased a vineyard because I wanted to help save dogs. And the ultimate goal for me was to have a holistic health and wellness center. And when I was looking for land, I stumbled upon the vineyard that was for sale. And I thought this would be a really great place to have an event space, you know. And in the process, I've been learning how to be a farmer and what agriculture is and how important it is. And in the process, I'm also learning to be a winemaker. So wine really does bring people together. We get to talk about the earth, the soil, like why the vineyard started here. And like I was saying, the ultimate goal was to have this holistic health and wellness center that brought people and animal together because through my rescue work and my advocacy work, I was seeing that big gap of there was not a real connection between human and animal welfare and how important that bond is to us humans. And when it's ignored, there's a lot of red flags that um appear. So yeah, we have events up here. We um, you know, I tell people we are dog friendly. I ask people not to bring their dogs unless we're doing a specific meet and greet with one of our fosters because we have enough dogs on the property. People usually come up here and they're dog friendly. If they're not dog friendly, they learn about our nonprofit, how we got started, and why it's important to bring that aspect together. And yeah, thank you for sharing that, like walking us through the process in your background.

Watching Guests Soften With Olivia<br>

3:08

When guests first arrive, the people, what signs do you notice uh show the animals are influencing their mood or their energy? Well, I'm a pit bull advocate. So right there, people, you know, there's a big misconception with the breed. And there's a lot of educ lack of education when it when it is towards that breed as well. So when people come, you could tell right away if they're either familiar with the breed, if they're dog friendly at all, or if they're not dog friendly. So I will usually always start with my oldest dog, Olivia. I'll bring her out. She's super friendly, she's very well trained, she loves all people. But she has personality traits just like we all do. She has likes and dislikes. Um, so it's fun for me to start with Olivia and then see people soften. And you can tell, you can tell like their shoulders relax, they become a little bit, you know, more approachable. Livvy's more approachable. She starts relaxing when they start relaxing, and then there's this trust and this bond. You know, it's very intentional. And then, you know, it starts slow. And you can tell by the time that they leave, maybe they're not gonna run to the rescue and adopt a dog, but maybe they'll be able to have a more educated conversation about the breed and say, I met this dog and I met this woman that kind of advocates for the breed and tells a different side of the story. And that's really what brought me here. So um watching people's body language, and again, that's how you communicate with animals, they don't have a voice, but they have they communicate through body language or growls or showing their teeth, and they're not all bad things, it's how they communicate. And do you see guests start to open up emotionally, like with their words, and and like you were mentioning, they their demeanor could change as they get more comfortable with the dog, and the dog also gets more comfortable. And I hope we get to see Olivia. Is she in the uh is she in the preview or um no, she didn't make the preview, but uh she's definitely on the website all over my social media. She taught me so much about the breed on respecting boundaries and fear-based aggression. She's the reason I went into therapy. I'm like, wait a minute. Wow, it's fear-based aggression because I think I have that. Um, yeah, no, she's special. She's one of the OGs, she's the Live in the Be and Let Live project, so she's special. And yeah, and then people do they talk to you pretty freely about their feelings as they get more comfortable? Yeah, that was the question.

Events That Blend Nature And Healing<br>

5:46

We actually had a dog mom retreat here back in October. We're gonna have another one, the dog mom retreat too. And we did a workshop specifically about tying in the connection with your bond, the bond with animals. So it was great to watch people um share their stories, and then obviously there's always emotion behind it. And then what are some examples of other activities where you combine this wellness and and nature and the animals, like another one that happened recently? Yeah, we well, we had two, I think two, three events so far, but we uh partnered with the University of Scranton um for service dogs. So that was a great event too, where people came up. Most of them were already dog friendly, but uh it's the school for the deaf, and it could completely tied into how you don't need a voice. You can really speak through body language and actions. So that was fun. Last weekend we had a paint my pet portrait. So there were some people that came up here, their pets were still with us, and then there were some people that their pets passed. So then we got to talk about Rainbow Bridge and the healing that nature can bring us, the healing that animals can bring us. So uh yeah, we do a lot of uh events like that. And then, of course, we always walk the property. We like to forage, we like to mushroom hunt, and it depends on you know who the crowd is, if they're dog friendly, but we always incorporate the dogs on our walks as well. So that's always a lot of fun. I think it it also helps with accountability because now you're walking, you know, you gotta really fulfill the walk goals, and you know, that's really sweet.

Keeping Dogs Safe With Body Language<br>

7:26

And how do the animals like because you're so wonderful with animals, how do you ensure that they feel safe and supported and they they don't get overwhelmed by the guests? Yeah, so again, it all comes back to body language. I have a dog north who gets overstimulated, and then when he gets overstimulated, you know, people think some of his signs are like pet my belly. I'm like, actually, he's uncomfortable, so I'll remove him. Like he's very comfortable with going out meeting people, but when he's over his threshold, it's time for him to come in the house and chill. He doesn't need to be around people 24-7. It always comes back to body language. Kenny, you can't approach Kenny. First time meeting him, he's got to sniff you. He's a nipper, and I'm okay. It doesn't mean that he's a bad dog, it's just that's what he does. He's part German Shepherd, so there's herding dog in there. So there's a lot of education that goes behind the dog's personality and the behavior traits. Yeah, he nips, and if you run, he's gonna chase you and nip because he's a herding dog. Yes, he's not aggressive. We always get and vocabulary and language. You know, when I first brought Buddy home, I was told that he was not dog friendly. And somebody asked me, they were like, Well, how are you gonna adopt out an aggressive dog? I'm like, he's not aggressive. I'm like, he just needs to learn boundaries. I've already introduced him to my dog slowly, you know, not in a shelter environment. And he has triggers and he has, you know, certain things that work for him and other dogs, but he's not aggressive, he's dog reactive. So that vocabulary, just changing the word around it, he's not an aggressive dog, he's just dog reactive, he's dog selective. I'm people selective. That doesn't put me on a euthanasia list. Absolutely, absolutely. And you know, is there an example too you can share with us of a guest experience breakthrough or like an unexpected moment of calm for that guest with the animals being present around them?

A Scuffle Turns Into Education<br>

9:28

Yeah, so we did have an incident, you know, with a learning curve or like one dog at a time. I brought Buddy out and I brought Olivia out, and Buddy jumped on Olivia and she like turned around and nipped at him, and he like latched onto her cheek. And it was during an event. Um, and you know, we had to, you know, kind of not pull them apart, but I had to splash water on Buddy to kind of let him to let go. And then that opened the conversation of the lock jaw. I'm like, they don't have lock jaw, they have very strong jaws, and that was completely my fault because Livy's older, he jumped up on her, he startled her. Now I know he doesn't take correction very well, but again, he was under-socialized, he doesn't know commands, you know. So he does need a lot of work and he needs a specific person that's gonna help train him to better understand and to also know when it's time to, you know, let go or move away. Um, he's very smart for training with a trainer. Um, so that was a big lesson for us and for the group as well, you know, just to see that and know that, like, okay, things got escalated, things got heated. But again, he's not a bad dog. That doesn't warrant certain actions. It just was too much all at once. And that was our fault. But we also got to, like I said, it got elevated. We got to bring the uh crowd down, like, you know, she's okay, he's okay, we removed him, we'll bring him back out when she comes in. Um that was a learning lesson for us all. But you know, we all left with, I think, a little bit more knowledge. And I it's definitely safe to say that people have, like you mentioned, the same issues as animals. And I like how what you're doing brings awareness to us all because I think we can all probably see some, you know, traits that we have or characteristics that you know it's not just animals, it's us too. We all can work on something. Absolutely.

Stress Science And Decompression<br>

11:30

And there's a lot of science behind it too. When I got Northy, I learned a lot about cortisol levels and fight or flight and your parasympathetic nervous system. You can't respond when your central nervous system is out of whack. So that's why it's so important to bring dogs into a place like this, let them decompress. Because not only are they decompressant on a personal level, but scientifically, you're bringing those levels down so that they can learn how to respond. Because when we're in fight or flight, we don't respond very well, and neither do dogs. You can't train them, they can't comprehend. It's the same thing, and it's all going back to communicating through the body language. You know, we how many times did people say read the room? Absolutely. These are you know great tips, and thank you for sharing the experiences you have at the vineyard. It just sounds

Wine That Gives Back Closing

12:25

wonderful to me. I mean, animals, nature, wine. I think that's why you drink wine and help. You don't even have to be a dog lover, you can be a wine enthusiast and help us save more dogs. It's a win. That's amazing. That's amazing. Well, thank you so much for what you're doing, and I'm looking forward to our next discussion. Thank you. Thank you, Julie. Thank you for spending time with us on the Endless Mountains Vineyards podcast. Whether you're discovering Pennsylvania wines, exploring the beauty of the Endless Mountains region, or simply looking for experiences that feel personal and grounded. Endless Mountains Vineyards offers something a little different. This is a place where wine brings people together with purpose. We'd love to welcome you to the vineyard, share a glass, and invite you into the experience. You can call or text 267-785-3814 or visit Endless Mountains Vineyards.com to learn more about upcoming events and vineyard experiences. Endless Mountains Vineyards, where life is great and every visit gives back.