What started as a pet grooming and boarding salon run by Jessika Bailey has turned into a rescue haven, home to eight dogs, three cats, a rabbit, a chicken and a few cockatiels. Fittingly, it’s named Bailey’s Funny Farm.
Upon entry, one is greeted with an explosion of colorful animal paraphernalia — sculptures of balloon animals, dog beds, posters, paintings, stickers — and a variety of barks, chirps and meows. Next to the chairs and large potted plants in the waiting area, a stunningly fluffy rabbit named Yankee curls up in its enclosure.
Bailey started her business on West Street six years ago. Being raised on a farm in Grinnell, she grew up surrounded by animals.
“We were always called Funny Farm,” Bailey said. “I was raised on a farm and we always had crazy stuff going on, and the name just stuck.”
A large room in the back of the store is dedicated to the rescue dogs — to walk through the door is to be faced with a cacophony of barks. The dogs are taken, two at a time, to the backyard, equipped with a sandbox, a dog pool and a hammock, for playtime throughout the day.
“I’ve done rescue work since I was a little girl. I would find dogs and cats and then I’d go door and door and I’d make flyers,” Bailey said.
Bailey began grooming in 2004 at a pet store in Marion, Iowa, while studying at Kirkland College. Eventually, she moved back to Grinnell and began grooming professionally, operating from other people’s homes and her own. As the business continued to grow, she acquired her own establishment.
Bailey operated multiple grooming establishments in Grinnell since 2008 and owned an establishment in Montezuma, Iowa, for nearly eight years.
Bailey’s team features another groomer, a receptionist and high school girls who come in to open and close the shop.
Bailey’s provides grooming services in the form of baths, haircuts, hair-coloring, deshedding and toenail work.
Her clients include a diverse range of animals, including dogs, cats, birds, rabbits, guinea pigs and horses.
“You can do a lot of fun stuff with pets. We shaved a cat to look like a dinosaur once and we gave a dog a mullet. I paint dogs’ toenails all the time. I have a lot of long-time clients that love it, so I get permission, so when they’ll come and pick up their dog, it’ll be like surprise, its tail is purple today,” Bailey said.
Today, Bailey lives on a farm in Searsboro, Iowa, from where she commutes to her establishment in Grinnell. Her farm is home to several horses, goats, dogs, pigs, turkeys, chickens, a turtle, a goldfish and a salamander.
“The turtle was supposed to eat [the] goldfish, but he didn’t, so now they’re friends,” Bailey said, laughing.
Bailey acknowledged that working with animals comes with its own challenges.
She said these challenges are mainly through the risk of physical injury, from getting tennis elbow through blow-drying to groomer’s lung, caused by the inhalation of animal hair and dander, which can be fatal.
Bailey listed some of the injuries she had faced in her work: a staph infection from a cut from one of the dogs; a scratch by a cat which led to blood infection that required emergency surgery to get the infection out of her spinal cord; getting bitten on her hand so hard, while doing a toenail trim, that she had to go to the hospital immediately, since the bite went into the nerves in her fingers.
“It’s challenging, but I’d still rather fill my day with dogs. It’s therapeutic,” she said.
