Porch Notes
The animals you meet: Michigan wildlife rules, explained
Rules and licenses
Most of the answers on this page fit on a porch sign: leave it alone, and here’s who to call if you can’t. See what changed this year.
The short version
Michigan law treats wild animals as belonging to everyone — which means, practically, that they belong to no one, and a few clear rules govern every encounter:
- You can’t keep wildlife. Possessing a live wild animal without a license is illegal — not the fawn, not the baby raccoon, not the injured goose. Licensed wildlife rehabilitators exist for exactly this; everyone else’s kindness is a misdemeanor that usually ends badly for the animal.
- You can protect your property — more than you think. Since a 2023 rule change, landowners may remove 13 common species doing damage — year-round, no permit.
- Feeding is a patchwork. Birds: legal, with fine print. Deer or elk in the Lower Peninsula: illegal. The full map is here.
- When in doubt: don’t touch, photograph from a distance, and call the right door — the directory at the bottom of this page.
”I found a baby animal”
It is almost certainly not abandoned — the most important paragraph on this page. Does deliberately park fawns alone, sometimes for up to eight hours, because a motionless, nearly scentless fawn is safer without mom drawing attention. The same logic covers bunnies (mom visits at dawn and dusk) and fledgling birds (ground-hopping with parents nearby is a life stage, not an emergency). Don’t touch, keep the dog in, and it’s gone by tomorrow. The genuine emergencies, and the contact-a-rehabilitator-first legal sequence, are on the found-a-baby-animal page — the one page on this site we most hope you read in May.
”There’s an animal in my house”
The landowner’s rules page carries the 13-species list and the playbooks (raccoon in the attic, bats with their June–July rule, skunk under the deck). The doctrine in one line: exclusion beats removal, always — every removal without fixing the entry point is a vacancy listing.
The big animals
Bears want your bird seed, not you; coyotes are in all 83 counties and respond to bold hazing; wolves are U.P.-only and federally protected; cougars are real, rare, verified, and protected. The encounter page exists to lower heart rates, not raise them.
Keeping, collecting, roadkill
Wild pets: no. Big cats, bears, and wolf-dogs: banned by statute. Turtles and frogs: a few common species, on a fishing license, within limits — with a strict protected no-list. Feathers: federally protected, even found ones. Shed antlers: legally yours. The keeping and collecting page maps the lanes — and if you hit a deer, the roadkill page covers the free salvage permit.
Who to call: the master directory
| Situation | The right door |
|---|---|
| Injured or truly orphaned animal | A licensed wildlife rehabilitator — searchable list at Michigan.gov/WildlifeRehab |
| Sick, dead, or unusual wildlife (incl. cougar or wolf sightings) | The DNR’s Eyes in the Field online report |
| Bat in a bedroom / possible rabies exposure | Your local health department |
| Wildlife conflict needing a permit (deer damage, geese, swans) | Your local DNR wildlife office |
| Animal in the attic you don’t want to handle | A licensed nuisance wildlife control professional |
| Poaching or wildlife crimes | The RAP line: 800-292-7800, call or text, 24/7 |
| Sick or dead domestic birds (backyard flocks) | MDARD: 800-292-3939 |
The signpost
The DNR’s nuisance-wildlife and Keep Wildlife Wild pages carry the official guidance; Eyes in the Field takes the reports. Hunting-side rules live in the hunting hub.
Sources
Last reviewed against the listed sources: June 11, 2026.