ANIMAL CARE INTERNSHIPS

Applications are now open for spring/summer 2026 internships. We will continue accepting and processing applications throughout the spring as openings allow and remove positions as they fill.

Basic Information and Requirements

A successful wildlife internship can open many doors for you. Whether you want to do field work as a biologist or work with exotics as a veterinarian, hands-on experience with wildlife is a powerful statement on your resume.

Not in college? That's okay! We welcome interns who are interested in learning more about different species and levels of care.

Our requirements for internships are fairly simple. You must, however, be very willing to do a lot of manual labor. Working with wildlife means a lot of cleaning and lifting. It means being on the ground while cleaning out cages and feeding animals. You'll be moving cages and large boxes/bags of food and you'll be working outside on and off throughout the day. This is a very labor-intensive, hands-on experience.

• available days, nights, weekends, holidays
• able to follow specific instructions
• minimum age of 18 years
• prior hands-on animal experience is desirable but not necessary

Our internships are unpaid and you must have transportation to get to the center. Please read each description carefully. If you have questions, please email us [intern@wrcmn.org].

Avian Nursery Internship

THE FULL AVIAN NURSERY INTERNSHIP DESCRIPTION IS AVAILABLE HERE. [https://wrcmn.org/content/763/e1edafca/WRCNurseriesInternships2026.pdf]

Avian Nurseries interns start in late April and continue through the end of September. Working 20 to 30 hours/week, interns complete at least 300 hours throughout the season. This internship is an unparalleled opportunity to participate in the rehabilitation process, from providing proper husbandry for birds throughout their stay, all the way through release!

With guidance from the Songbird Nursery Director and Songbird Managers, you’ll get to know the species-specific care requirements for around 50 distinct species. In addition to caring for common backyard favorites like American Robins and Northern Cardinals, you’ll have experiences like teaching Barn Swallows to swoop down and catch insects mid-flight, keeping clever American Crows occupied with enrichment, settling day-old ducklings into new enclosures, and ensuring fish-eating Green Herons have the proper vitamins for their diet.

As an Avian Nurseries Intern, you will guide and support the Songbird and Waterfowl volunteers on your team. Volunteers help us stay on top of feeding and cleaning, but only interns are responsible for some of our more fragile species. Interns also learn advanced skills like administering many types of medications, and potentially performing subcutaneous injections.

The privilege of working with these incredible birds comes with a lot of cleaning and maintenance—biosecurity, washing cages/dishes, doing laundry, and other cleaning tasks are mandatory.

To highlight your hard work, you can participate in patient releases! Our whole team works together to keep our patients wild so that they will fly out of their kennel prepared to find food, find a mate, and evade predators.

APPLY [https://www.volgistics.com/appform/1824234672]

Mammal Nursery Internship

Update on available spots:

• mid-June through late-October: Still available if you are able to start in June and stay until at least Oct 9th
• midseason (May - August): FULL

THE FULL MAMMAL NURSERY INTERNSHIP DESCRIPTION IS AVAILABLE HERE. [https://wrcmn.org/content/763/e1edafca/WRCNurseriesInternships2026.pdf]

Our Mammal Nursery is by far our busiest nursery, admitting approximately 9,000 infant mammals. The most numerous patients in the nursery are squirrels, rabbits, raccoons, opossums and other rodents. Less common species, that we cannot guarantee will be admitted, are foxes, muskrats, woodchucks and other native mammals.

As a Mammal Nursery Intern you'll be working alongside volunteers and answering questions as able. You'll be responsible for direct care of our higher stress and rabies vector patients. You'll learn husbandry for these species and how to ascertain their qualifications for release. Proper animal handling, caging and feeding will also be covered in the internship.

All volunteers are 18 years or older and come from a variety of backgrounds. You'll be working with people of all genders, races, religions, etc. Acceptance and kindness are core beliefs at WRC. We expect everyone to always put their best foot forward.

You'll be working in a hospital setting so cleanliness is critical to our patients' well-being. Cleaning is a large part of the internship. You'll be doing laundry, dishes and cleaning cages daily. On the bright side, the reward for successful treatment is the opportunity to release animals that have been in your care.

Because you will be working with rabies vector species the pre-exposure rabies series/vaccine is required. From the initial shot to the titer report, which is what we require, takes nearly two months. You should start this process immediately if you're interested in a Mammal Nursery Internship. Luckily the series is fairly easy to get. You can order it through your physician, school health services or even your local Walgreen's.

You have a choice of two sessions:

• late-March through mid-July
• mid-June through late-October

Reduced hours at the beginning or end of the internship session can be arranged to work around school dates, but you must work a minimum of 10 hours per week during those reduced hours periods. Overall you'll work a mix of weekdays, weeknights and weekends for a total of 300 hours.

QUESTIONS ABOUT THE RABIES PRE-EXPOSURE VACCINE? HERE'S EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW. [https://wrcmn.org/content/767/75863498/FAQRabiesVaccines2026.pdf]

APPLY [https://www.volgistics.com/appform/1824234672]