How do I get started in animal rehabilitation???? Like where and who should I contact?

Answer 1

The rest of the answers won't help you much in the US for wildlife rehab. I was going to go into rehab (I am a captive wildlife major-senior year now) and found out more about it.
I don't want to discourage you, but my school (the best public natural resource/wildlife school in the nation) has a running joke. If you want to be a wildlife rehabber, you need to first marry a rich husband. I know personally 3 different facilties- run by the wife with love for animals, and financed by the neurosurgeon/lawyer/etc husband. I have one friend still going into rehabilitation- and that is because her fiance makes 6 figures.
Ok, if you decide you still want to:
You need to find a rehab center or a zoo close by that you can volunteer at- they need to be registered with the state or they don't count (and are illegal btw). Once you turn 18, you could take the federal rehabilitation test, which is not that hard if you know animals. The test is to discourage those people who just want to have a pet raccoon or something of the sort. Next, you need a 2 yr apprenticeship by a master rehaber (talk to the person whose place you volunteered at first). After that, you need to find a veterinarian willing to work on animals for you, and will sign that they trust and will help you. The master rehaber you apprenticed with needs to vouch for you and say you are a good candidate. Then you can start building a facility for a specific group of animals (you usually need to just say birds of prey, mammals, snakes, etc). Each state has different guidlines- some are just the federal and some states are stricter. Once you have it built, you will need to contact the Department of Nat. Resources to inspect it. Usually, they will find something wrong and you need to spend a lot more money fixing it. You will need to get inspected every year after that as well.
Once you have your own facility for 3(maybe 5) years, you can start having interns and volunteers to help you, but you would need to take another test to be a master rehabilator.
Any other questions, feel free to ask- a lot of the specific rules vary from state to state. One common misconception is that you need a college degree to be a rehaber- it might help your understanding of the animal, but you don't actually need one in most states.

Answer 2

What kind of animals? Wild animals? Birds and snakes? Dogs and cats? Zoo creatures?

For dogs and cats, start by volunteering at your local shelter. As you gain more experience helping animals with serious health problems, you'll start to gain a sense for what things you can do to be the most helpful.

That's actually still a good path if you want to do wild animal rehabilitation, because once you learn about the veterinary issues of cats and dogs, it's not much of a stretch to understanding the physiology of raccoons and rabbits and skunks too.

Many wild animal rehabilitators specialize. There is a woman I know of living locally who takes in baby birds and other injured birds in the area. She keeps them at her house and takes care of them. We were referred to her by our 24 hour emergency vet when we found an injured bird. You could try calling your local emergency vet or other vet clinics (emergency vet would probably know the most though) to see where they refer injured wild animals in your area. Then contact that person or organization to see how you might be able to help. You might also do web searches with your state and "rescue" or "wild animal rescue" or "turtle rehabilitation" or whatever specifics you're most interested in. People with those organizations should be able to tell you how you can get involved.

Answer 3

Try doing volunteer work in an animal hospital to get some experience. That will tell you if this is truly the what you want.

Answer 4

Maybe start at your local Humane Society or volunteer at the zoo.

Answer 5

it depends on where you live. in new zealand you do a course with the department of conservation, mabye try park ranger jobs or do vet related work, or zoology. is there a humane society near you ,they may be able to help.