Herp Habitat Rescue & Sanctuary

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Milwaukee, WI
Herp Habitat Rescue & Sanctuary

Milwaukee’s one and only 501(c)(3) reptile rescue! We provide compassionate care, rehabilitation, and new beginnings for reptiles in need.

Committed to education, adoption, and ensuring every scaly friend finds the perfect home. 🐍🐢🦎

07/28/2026

Slate health update! After ejecting part of his p***s at the vet, we have now completed our antibiotics and pain meds. Good news: Slate is eating, he is active, and he’s doing well! Bad news: he still has some swelling and darkness down there that we’re a bit worried about. Just to be safe, we’re thinking another vet visit may be in order.

Slate has already been through so much, from his UVB burns, to being found abandoned on the side of the road, to him amputating his own necrotic p***s… we don’t want to see him go through anything else. 😓

If you’d like to contribute to his next vet visit, consider a donation! Every donation helps, no matter how large or small! 💚💚💚

07/25/2026

Is anyone else seeing more and more AI reptiles on their social media?

The increase of AI reptile posts, infographics, care guides, company logos, profile pictures, and AI wildlife videos is concerning due to how much it is diluting the internet with SO MUCH misinformation. Not to mention the negative effects that AI has on our ecosystem which directly harms vulnerable reptiles and amphibians.

Just know, that if your logo is AI, I’m not shopping at your business. If you share AI posts, I’m going to be unfollowing you. If your merch is AI, I’m taking my business elsewhere. We understand that businesses are low on time and money… so are we… but honestly we’d rather see your worst phone pictures or an ad drawn with sharpies on lined paper.

Stop AI use in the reptile community to increase the spread of real, constructive information, and to lessen the negative effects that data AI centers are having on our ecosystem. Conservation and education IS political, and we hope the reptile community starts taking accountability and ends up on the right side of history, for the sake of the animals.

07/20/2026

Hello from the H**p Habitat team, and apologies for the low number of posts and updates lately! We have some updates for you all:

First off, we are pausing the intake of new lizards, tortoises, and amphibians for the foreseeable future and only accepting SNAKES.

Second, change is coming to H**p Habitat. We have ideas in the works, but we need to time to work things out and solidify them. In a nutshell, we are looking at focusing on species we feel especially passionate about, and leaning more into the sanctuary part of “rescue & sanctuary”.

Rescue work is overwhelming for several reasons, and one thing that has been effecting us the most lately is that you never know when a new surrender is going to completely upheave your life and drain the rescue’s resources and bank account. Of course this is unavoidable as we don’t pick and choose who we accept, but at the same time we find that it brings our operation to a standstill time and time again. It also feels unfair to the other 90% of animals who we should be able to help, but lack the resources to help due to the 10% that demand so much time and money. Not to mention how devastating it has been for us to spend thousands of dollars and months on end caring for sick animals, only for them to not make it in the end. To date we have only had a few animals who saw the vet with us ever actually get adopted. Most of them are either still unadopted, or their health problems were too advanced and they didn’t make it. And again, we do love these animals and desperately want to help them all, it is just devastating to stop our whole operation, deny healthy animals that we could help, go into debt to afford these vet bills, and then still not be able to save these sick cases.

All of this being said, we’re slowing down for now! We’re focusing on the animals in our care, and we’re focusing on what we’re passionate about. We do feel there is an epidemic of unwanted and improperly cared for reptiles in our community, but we will no longer be a shelter that takes in every species no questions asked. We’ll instead be focusing on doing the most we can with the resources we have available.

Much love and more updates to come 💚

07/04/2026

Sometimes adoptions take a few days from application to adoption, some take several months! Honey here has been waiting patiently for a bit now, but her adoption is right around the corner! 🍯

We like to spend a little extra time with these soon-to-be-adopted little guys to make sure they’re ready for the next chapter of their lives. We’re so excited for you Honey!! 💛

07/02/2026

Slate went to the vet.. 🚑 The other day he didn’t come out to eat, which is VERY unlike him. So we checked on him and sure enough, there was a problem. He had a hemipenal plug that had gotten swollen and was BLEEDING! 😭 We rushed him to the vet ASAP, and while they were removing it he decided to launch the plug out with part of his p***s attached. So he is now spayed on one side 🤦‍♂️ He’s on antibiotics and pain meds now and seems to be recovering well.

This brings us to today’s public service announcement: keep an eye on your male geckos’ hemipenes!

When males don’t mate they can develop plugs down there that are made up of dead skin, debris, and dried fluid. Normally a healthy gecko’s body should be able to regulate these, but a vitamin deficiency or improper sheds can cause these to built up past anything they can manage on their own. And eventually these will get enflamed and infected, causing big issues for these little guys!

How to help with these? Keep up with your multivitamins and ensure they have correct humidity for good sheds! A humidity hide mixed with some misting around shed time can go a long way. And if you notice swelling down there, TAKE THEM TO THE VET! It’s a sensitive area down there and it’s best they’re removed by a professional! 🦎

And as you can imagine, the vet visit and meds aren’t free 🙂‍↔️ If you want to support Slate, $5 would mean the world to him! 💚

06/26/2026

Meet Oregano! 🌿 This little brooks kingsnake weighed in at just 40g at a year old! This is way behind where he should be for his age. The owners said they got him from Petco after noticing how small he was and hearing that the employees fed him one pinky per month 😓

He will not hesitate to musk on you, and he is VERY stinky when he does, but that’s to be expected from a little guy this size! Help us in welcoming Oregano, and wish him lots of luck on his bulking journey! 💪

06/18/2026

Meet STINKY! This little MBD gecko has a personality 10x his size. His MBD isn’t too noticeable at first until you look closely and realize his forearms and lower legs are all pretty significantly bowed. This comes from a lack of calcium and D3 in his diet that leads to soft bones that become malformed over time. Stinky is a 6 year old gecko who came from a home who corrected their care mistakes overtime, but unfortunately MBD is not reversible. Luckily though, Stinky has no plans of slowing down! This little guy is active and wiggly as could be. Join us in welcoming Stinky to the family!

Consider donating $5 to help Stinky buy a brand new shade dweller UVB bulb!! 💡🦎

06/12/2026

We’re so happy to share that Shovel was adopted!! From coming to us sad, underweight, covered in stuck shed, and living in a basement abandoned by his owner, to now being the friendliest, most loved little guy in the world means EVERYTHING to us and we couldn’t be happier.

Enjoy you’re new life Shovel!!! 💚🐍💚

Address

Milwaukee, WI

Website

https://linktr.ee/herphabitat

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