Every day, more and more wildlife habitat is lost to the spread of development. Give a little back by building your own humane backyard! It doesn't matter whether you have a small apartment balcony, a townhouse with a sliver of ground, a suburban yard, a sprawling corporate property or a community...

As my beloved seedlings languished untouched on the display table, I improved my sales pitch: “Would you like a late-flowering thoroughwort to help migrating butterflies refuel? What about an aster that’s the only pollen source for some bee species?” But unlike the animals who would devour these...

It’s a peculiar rite of modern homeownership: Plant a tulip bulb in autumn, cage or spray it to deter nibblers, admire its fleeting blooms a few months later, let it rot in soil ill-suited to its needs and repeat the whole cycle again the following year.

Black Beauty Ranch—which is the world-renowned sanctuary for rescued animals operated by the Humane Society of the United States—becomes another beacon of light for humane treatment of animals in the growing network of the Trust’s Humane Stewardship Alliance lands. With over 1,400 acres in Murchison...

With the right information and supplies, you may be able to solve some conflicts with wildlife by yourself. But when it’s time to call in a professional, here's how to find a humane, effective and ethical company. Ask for an inspection and written estimate It will be difficult for any company to...

A humane backyard is a safe haven for wildlife—a space where animals can thrive free from pesticides, trapping and other threats.

As my neighbors and I stood 10 feet apart and swapped tips for scavenging kitchen staples this spring, the wilder residents of our community shared no such concerns. Squirrels twirled maple seed clusters like bouquets to reach every tidbit. Bumblebees made a mockery of social distancing in their...

It seemed like a good idea at the time: Buy a house with a two-acre property, let our energetic herding dog have the run of the place and spend blissful summer days digging side by side in the dirt with her. And it was blissful, watching Mattie carve out her napping spots behind the ferns and tall...

WARNING: This page contains graphic content. What are wildlife killing contests? While contests like dogfighting and cockfighting have been condemned in the U.S. as barbaric and cruel, wildlife killing contests still happen regularly in almost all of the 42 U.S. states they are legal in. Killing...

The Humane Society of the United States works with community leaders and animal care and control agencies to create Wild Neighbors communities, where humane and non-lethal solutions are given priority.

How to spur wildlife-friendly projects in your community.

On summer evenings, my husband and I head to the darkest spot of our property to look for the light—in the form of fireflies rising from meadow grasses and twinkling their way into the trees. As the tulip poplars behind this spectacular display settle in for slumber, white yucca flowers open their...

The woodland phloxes bring the heavenly scents of spring, and the fireflies bring the sparkling lights of summer. Even in the depths of winter, cardinals, white-throated sparrows, northern flickers, mourning doves and squirrels bring all the music and entertainment we could ever need—right in front...

If you find a wild animal in distress while you're out for a hike, traveling or even in your own backyard, get them the help they need. Find a wildlife rehabilitator in the alphabetical list below. IMPORTANT! Before you " rescue " any wild animal, make sure the animal really needs your help...

Somewhere toward the end of the last ice age, we formed an alliance with wolves: Maybe the ancestors of dogs got food scraps while our own ancestors gained protection from predators and other humans. These social species eventually collaborated on a vast scale, possibly even hunting woolly mammoths...

Sitting on her porch in the desert one afternoon while recovering from surgery, Christine Hass closed her eyes. The operation to fix her detached retina had been difficult, and she sought respite from the lingering pain. “Suddenly I could hear all the birds singing. It was March—the migrants were...

Black Beauty Ranch’s most famous unofficial resident lurks out of sight in the mud at the bottom of a horse pasture pond. He weighs perhaps 150 pounds, with a spiked shell like a plated dinosaur’s and a massive jaw. To catch food, he lies in wait, opening his mouth wide to reveal a worm-like...