Dane County Humane Society's Wildlife Center

09/14/2025

Are critters helping themselves to your garden this summer? Digging holes in your lawn? Sneaking into your shed?

Sometimes wildlife can make rowdy neighbors! When approaching a conflict at your home, focus on solutions that promote coexistence—not only is it harmful to people and animals to trap and relocate, it also may not be effective at keeping nuisance animals away long-term. See our news story linked in the comments of this post, which explains in detail why live trapping is harmful, and tells stories of patients at the Wildlife Center that were harmed by live traps.

Instead of live trapping, consider keeping critters out by putting up barriers like fencing around new plantings or garden beds, burying metal mesh around gardens, chicken coops, or other structures to deter digging, choosing plants that will help naturally deter grazing, or lining your compost bins with wire mesh.

And, if you are dealing with serious wildlife or pest problems, don’t try to handle it yourself! Contact a humane wildlife control professional who is licensed to legally handle wildlife exclusion or removal in your area. Wildlife control companies that use humane practices are the best ones to look for, otherwise the methods used may not be in the best interest of the animal.

09/12/2025

Migration is underway for birds in our area, and a local organization, Southern Wisconsin Bird Alliance, is looking for volunteers to join their Bird Collision Corps program. Window collisions pose a significant risk to migrating birds, and this program collects data for continued scientific research and mitigation efforts. Volunteer shifts run weekly from September 15th - November 1st this season. Check out the program website for more information and to sign up for a volunteer shift!

Bird Collision Corps Volunteers and scientists work to understand bird window strikes in Madison

09/02/2025

This past week the Wildlife Center released some of our largest birds and smallest birds, a Bald Eagle and two Ruby-throated Hummingbirds!

In addition to the eagle and hummers, we also released 9 American Robins, 4 Barn Swallows, 6 Blanding's Turtles, 4 Common Snapping Turtles, 4 Eastern Cottontails, 3 House Wrens, 1 Little Brown Bat, and 7 Western Painted Turtles.

This week’s Bald Eagle was a juvenile from East Madison who proves even the mightiest can have a rough start. This bird arrived with a broken pelvis, blood in its mouth, and a concerning honking sound with every breath. To complicate matters, our team also detected a heart arrhythmia, making its initial treatment a delicate balancing act. After two months of careful, complex care to heal its pelvic fracture and support its overall recovery, this resilient bird was ready to return to the wild. This week's eagle is all brown because it is a juvenile who has yet to develop the iconic "bald" head.

The dynamic hummingbird duo came to us as healthy hatchlings after their nest fell from a tree. Our first recommendation is always to try to reunite baby animals with their parents, but in this case, it just was not possible. These teeny-tiny (3.2 gram!) beasts were raised by Wildlife Center staff, interns, and volunteers and graduated from our care to buzz around in nature where they belong.

09/01/2025

Dane County Humane Society's Wildlife Center will be open for regular hours today (September 1st). If you find a wild animal in need of assistance, please contact the Wildlife Center at (608) 287-3235.

Dane County Humane Society's main shelter and both Dane County Humane Society Thrift Store locations are closed for Labor Day and will reopen tomorrow (Tuesday, September 2nd).

08/27/2025

This past week the Wildlife Center released 2 American Goldfinch, 6 American Robins, 1 Big Brown Bat, 1 Black-capped Chickadee, 1 Brown-headed Cowbird, 1 Cedar Waxwing, 1 Chipping Sparrow, 2 Chimney Swifts, 1 Common Garter Snake, 4 Common Snapping Turtles, 8 Eastern Cottontails, 3 Eastern Phoebes, 2 Great-horned Owls, 6 House Finches, 17 Mallards, 3 Mourning Doves, 1 Northern Flickr, 2 Ruby-throated Hummingbirds, 1 Virginia Opossum, and 17 Western Painted Turtles.

The two Great Horned Owls—one tough adult and one juvenile—each had their own second-chance story.

The adult was rescued in late June after an unfortunate meetup with a car grill in Dane County. The bird arrived with a left wing fractured in two places, along with significant bruising and abrasions (especially around one eye and the beak).

Long-term care for birds of prey is always a delicate dance—especially when it comes to keeping those precious feathers in perfect condition. Despite our best efforts (replacing a "tail guard" almost every day), this owl proved it was *very determined*, picking at the tail guard until important flight feathers were bent. Even patients have opinions about their recovery plans! This bird also received special foot care to prevent lesions—a common challenge for birds resting on limited surface textures instead of the huge variety they encounter in the wild.
With a watchful eye, this bird managed to recover and went back to the wild on 8/21 and they didn't fly solo...

Another Great Horned Owl was released with the adult, a juvenile who transferred to us from another facility. The bird needed a large flight enclosure - where it could prove its overall readiness for the wild.

Since the juvenile immediately moved outside when they arrived, we don't have any photos of that individual, but here are a couple photos of the adult while they were housed indoors and had some diagnostic tests done.

08/20/2025

It wouldn’t be summer in the Midwest without those pesky mosquitoes! Because we have all the right conditions – lakes and rivers, warm temps, humidity, rain, and green spaces – their peak activity is June through August, with July being the worst. Mosquitoes are a double edged sword for the Wildlife Center. They torture our caretakers as we try to care for our outdoor patients, but at the same time many of our patients benefit from mosquitoes as a food source either in care or after their release.

Mosquitoes are fascinating! Only females bite because they need the proteins from blood to mature their eggs. After being bitten, some mosquito saliva remains in the wound. Your body’s immune system reacts to the proteins in the saliva and the skin area swells. And you itch! (And itch…)

They have several sensors to detect who/what to bite:

Chemical: Carbon dioxide and lactic acid (given off when we breathe), as well as chemicals in sweat call attention to you
Visual: Moving around and wearing clothing that contrasts with the background is appealing to mosquitoes
Heat: If you’re warm, you’re a target

Insectivores—animals and plants that feed mainly on insects—rely on mosquitoes as an important food source. Insectivores include species of bats, birds, lizards, frogs, spiders, and even other insects. At Dane County Humane Society’s Wildlife Center, providing specialized care for our patients includes providing them with natural food sources, including mosquitos! At the Wildlife Center we capture live mosquitos and other insects using a trap. Then, at the end of the night, caretakers release the mosquitos into our flight pens that house aerial insectivores (birds like swallows, swifts, and flycatchers) for enrichment and food. Then we cross our fingers, hoping that the patients eat most or all of the mosquitoes before we come back in the morning!

To donate general funds to the Wildlife Center, which we can then use to buy mosquito traps and other care items, you can make a donation in-person, via mail, or online on the DCHS website. The link to our donation page is in the comments below!

08/14/2025

Earlier this month, we introduced you to a special milestone at the Wildlife Center — our 50,000th patient, a mallard duckling. We're happy to share that this mallard duckling, along with several others, was released on Tuesday, returning to the wild and diving right into its new home in Madison’s waters.

Reaching 50,000 patients is a remarkable milestone for our Wildlife Center, and it is only possible because of generous community support. In celebration, we are inviting you to help ensure the next thousands of animals get the care they need to thrive. Please consider donating at the link in the comments!

Want the chance to witness a future wildlife release like this one? When you give $1,000 or more a year (that's just $84 a month), you become a member of DCHS’s Directors' Council. This special group of supporters enjoys unique experiences throughout the year, from exclusive events and animal encounters to behind-the-scenes updates with our leadership team.

08/08/2025

We have reached a big milestone—DCHS’s Wildlife Center has surpassed 50,000 patients admitted since we began our program in 2002! Our 50,000th patient is one of our most common admissions (surprise surprise): an adorable Mallard Duckling! Here are photos of that duckling only a couple weeks apart.

We have a goal to raise $50,000 in general funds for our program. It seems like fate, because our biggest upcoming need is a set of new waterfowl (duckling!) enclosures. These enclosures have not been updated since they were built, well over 15 years ago, and in the last few years they have been falling apart. New enclosures would be larger, safer, and will allow us to better care for hundreds of ducklings (and other aquatic animals) each year. The donation link is posted in the comments.

We could not provide our professional care to these animals without you—our supporters—and we are hoping that our community can rally behind us. The community we serve is larger than Dane County. We receive wild animals from all over the southern half of the state, including 32 different Wisconsin counties. We are here as a resource for the long haul, the next 50,000 animals and beyond!

Any additional funds raised will be used to continue the work our Wildlife Center does every day to help injured, orphaned, and sick wildlife.

07/27/2025

It’s baby season and that means hatchling and fledging birds! It can be difficult to tell birds apart when they don’t have their adult plumage. Clockwise from top left, can you guess the species in each of the photos below? We’ll give you a hint: they are all different species commonly found in Wisconsin. Answers will be posted in the comments below soon!

07/16/2025

July 16 is World Snake Day, an important day to recognize and celebrate some of our most misunderstood wild creatures. 🐍

You can find 21 different kinds of snake species in Wisconsin, but 14 of them are listed as endangered, threatened, or of special conservation concern. Habitat loss is a problem for the conservation of all reptiles, but snakes also face the additional threat of being killed by humans, sometimes intentionally. We have admitted 13 snakes since last July, with most of their injuries caused by vehicle collisions, cat attacks, entanglement in landscape netting, and being trapped in homes or sheds while searching for a safe place to hibernate.

Snakes are critical to our local ecosystems, and even our economy! They eat many agricultural pests like rats and problem bugs. In nature, they help maintain some wildlife populations as predators and also serve as prey for larger birds and mammals. So if you see a snake in the wild, take a moment to appreciate how important they are to the environment that we all share!

Two venomous snake species can be found in Wisconsin, but both are rare in the state and are not often encountered by humans—but if you feel frightened and are not sure of a species, it’s best to give the creature space and move along—both of your days will be better for it!

Pictured📷: Common Garter Snake

07/13/2025

With the large number of patients admitted to the Wildlife Center every year (around 3,000!) there are bound to be a few interesting x-ray images along the way.
X-rays are one of the ways staff determine the condition of an animal admitted to the wildlife center, much like humans being x-rayed after an injury. They are especially helpful for turtles, since we can’t see or feel any injuries inside their shell without x-rays!

Aside from a broken tail, do you notice anything interesting inside this Common Snapping Turtle? Upon closer examination in photo #2, you can spot two snail shells in this turtle’s digestive system!
Common Snapping Turtles are omnivores- meaning they eat both plants and animals- so finding a snail shell inside isn’t surprising, but it is not something we catch on an x-ray image very often.

Snapping Turtle Fun Fact: Did you know Common Snapping Turtles can grow up to 22 lbs and live as long as 90 years in captivity?

07/07/2025

With the Fourth of July having just passed, and American Eagle Day at the end of June, we wanted to celebrate Wisconsin’s two native eagle species–the Bald Eagle and the Golden Eagle.

Our beloved national bird, the Bald Eagle, has made a remarkable comeback in Wisconsin in the last 50 years thanks to federal protections alongside the work of scientists and advocates. From only 108 nests in the state recorded by the Wisconsin DNR in 1973, the charismatic raptors had an incredible 1,684 observed nests in 2019. In 2022, the species was finally observed nesting in Milwaukee County—officially marking the re-population of Bald Eagles in every county in Wisconsin.

We recently released the first Bald Eagle to be rehabilitated in the new 100’ Solar Flight Pen. This flight pen allows large birds to spread their wings and gain strength after being unable to fly due to various injuries, in this case abrasions and bruising on the left and right carpus (the equivalent of wrists on humans) sustained during a car collision. Upon release, this bird immediately flew into a nearby tree, a rare move as Bald Eagles typically are not strong enough to quickly rise high, instead needing a longer “runway” to take off. The exercise in the new flight pen must have really paid off!

Did you know? Wisconsin also serves as a wintering home to another eagle species—the Golden Eagle. Although more rare in our state, they can winter in the Driftless region of Wisconsin. Often confused with immature bald eagles, due to similar coloring, you can spot them by their smaller head and beak and fully brown inner wings.