Wildlife Rehabilitation Internships

2025 Program Schedule:

Sunday May 25 - Saturday August 16, 2025

Application Deadline: April 1, 2025

Intern Program Information Documents

Printable documents with complete description of the current program, including duties, requirements, and application instructions, are available through this link:

• Wildlife Rehabilitation Internship Program (2025) (v03/01/25)

About Lindsay Wildlife Experience and the Hospital

Lindsay Wildlife Experience, a natural history, environmental education, and wildlife rehabilitation center located in Walnut Creek, California, connects people with wildlife to inspire responsibility and respect for the world we share. Founded in 1955, Lindsay houses a collection of live native California animals, an Exhibit Hall with hands-on discovery activities for children and changing natural history exhibits, and a wildlife rehabilitation hospital. We are licensed by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and the US Fish and Wildlife Service. With a caseload of approximately 4,000 native wild animals each year, we are one of the oldest and largest rehabilitation centers in the nation.

The goal of Lindsay’s wildlife hospital, started in 1970, is to rehabilitate and return injured and orphaned native wild animals back to their natural habitats. To give them a chance for survival after release, our patients are kept as wild as possible. Animals are handled only when necessary for feeding, cleaning, and medical care; infant animals are raised with their own species and are not socialized by humans.

Wildlife Rehabilitation Internship Program Description

This unpaid educational position requires a self-motivated, flexible, and responsible individual with good problem-solving skills for a job that can be intense, fast-paced, and often repetitive. The intern helps with care and treatment of injured or orphaned native California birds, mammals, reptiles, and amphibians.

Working in conjunction with Lindsay staff and approximately 200 volunteers, interns are given the opportunity to learn about all aspects of wildlife rehabilitation with hands-on experiences. Wildlife rehabilitation combines aspects of veterinary medicine, animal husbandry, and biology/natural history to provide rehabilitation care specific to each native species. (Lindsay annually sees about 100 species commonly or semi-commonly, with about 100 additional species seen infrequently.)

The Wildlife Rehabilitation Internship includes both husbandry and medical training and experience. Skills you can learn include: identification of the most common species in the region, basic care and husbandry needs of native wildlife, proper handling and restraint procedures for a variety of species, wildlife nutrition, basic bird and mammal anatomy, medication preparation and administration, fluid therapy, basic initial exam procedures, parasitology, microscope skills, basic raptor care, and time management skills. Interns work closely with Wildlife Rehabilitation Technicians, RVTs, volunteers, and veterinarians.

We also offer Research Internships for students working on degree programs, and veterinary/technician externships. Please inquire for more information.

Internship Primary Duties

• General husbandry of all patients in the hospital at any given time, including neonatal birds

• Caring for neonatal birds and mammals, which includes hand feeding, weighing, and cage cleaning

• Prepare species-specific enclosures and diets for incoming and existing patients

• Maintaining a clean working environment in the hospital, which includes sweeping, laundry, dishes, wiping down counters, cleaning syringes, restocking linens, putting away clean supplies or enclosures

• Documenting daily care and special notes for the patients online as well as on paper charts

• Administering oral fluids and medications

• Assisting with exams and medical procedures

• Basic diagnostic lab work

Program Completion Requirements

The program requires completion of:

• A minimum of 200 Intern Program hours during the 12-week session.

  • Minimum of three 5-hour shifts per week for the 12 weeks, usually 2 weekday shifts and one weekend day shift per week. Additional shifts may be added by prior arrangement.

    • • Two of the weekly shifts are patient care/husbandry shifts, one shift is a medical shift under the direction of wildlife rehabilitation technicians and veterinarians.

  • Shifts are usually 8:30 am - 1:30 pm (AM shift) or 1:30 pm - 6:30 pm (PM shift)

    • During “baby bird season” (May – August) there is opportunity for additional shift coverage from 8:00 - 8:30 am and 6:30 - 8:00 pm. During the extended shift hours there is more opportunity to work closely with the technicians.

  • Includes weekend and holiday shifts 

  • Alternate scheduling, including an extended timeframe into the next session, may be available by prior arrangement. Interns can choose to continue on after their session ends to receive more advanced hands-on instruction and accumulate additional hours

• All required training, including orientation and weekly class sessions that may require attendance on a non-shift day.

Program Session

This year's 12-week Intern Program session is scheduled to align primarily with college/university semester system calendars. The program session has a first day orientation/training, and will have pre-scheduled "hands on" classes and associated reading requirements. Interns are expected to be on-site with a regular work schedule.

• Session : May 25 - August 16: Timed to correspond with common college/university semester system summer breaks. 

There is the opportunity, by previous arrangement, to start early husbandry shifts, gaining additional credit for intern program hours. An early start requires acceptance into the hospital shift volunteer program and completion of initial training.

Application Process

How to Apply

To apply, submit a cover letter, resume, and fill out the Intern Availability Form, by April 1, 2025. References or letters of recommendation that would assist in our evaluation may be included.

• Indicate which internship program is of interest in your cover letter.

• Email submission to: hospitalrecruiting@lindsaywildlife.org

• Please include “Intern Application” as part of the email subject line.

Note: If your work experience and references are not directly related to the field, then the cover letter becomes very important, relating your past experience and career goals to the wildlife hospital intern position.

Important Dates

Application deadline: 11:59 PM (PDT)  April 1, 2025

Lindsay reviews applications: April 2 – 5, 2025

Lindsay schedules interview: April 6 – April 12, 2025

Lindsay notifies applicants of decision: By April 19, 2025

• If accepted, please let us know within 7 days whether or not you will accept the internship position.

Deadline to accept internship and submit required paperwork: 11:59 PM April 30, 2025

Shift schedules are posted: May 15, 2025

Orientation: Sunday, May 25, 2025