BATON ROUGE — The Wildlife Hospital of Louisiana is treating a record number of animals this year, all out of a space roughly the size of two parking spots.

The hospital operates out of just 350 square feet inside the LSU School of Veterinary Medicine, split across three small rooms used for operating, holding and treatment.

"I always say that we need to stop apologizing when we bump into each other because there's constantly people bumping into each other. There's no sense of personal space," fourth-year vet student Gabrielle Acquaviva said.

By July 2025, the hospital had already surpassed its total case count for all of 2024.

"We're already approaching 1,700 cases, which is 15 percent higher than last year, which was a record year," Wildlife Hospital of Louisiana Director Mark Mitchell said.

With the Great Migration for birds expected over the next few months, the hospital anticipates that number climbing even higher.

"We expect to see a number of animals injured as a result, so we expect this to be probably 20 or 25 percent higher than last year with the way things are looking," Mitchell said.

Some of the bird species currently being treated, including the Mississippi Kite, are expected to join that migration soon.

"We're hoping we can get them healed in time and rehabilitated," Mitchell said. "If not, they'll actually have to stay over the winter and then they would get released next year."

Earlier this year, the hospital announced plans for a new stand-alone facility that Mitchell says would be about 12,000 square feet.

"We work out of a 350 square foot space as you can see here. We have between 30 and 50 hospitalized animals every day, 7 days a week," Mitchell said.

The hospital is working with various stakeholders to pursue a $5.5 million facility. Despite being located inside LSU's vet school, it does not receive state, federal or university financial assistance and relies entirely on donations.

Mitchell says a new facility would also benefit human health, not just wildlife.

"We need to protect our wildlife and not just through conservation, but also through assessing things like One Health for humans. We've identified a few diseases that increase the risk of disease for humans," Mitchell said. "We can share that information with public health and what that really does is show how the animals can be important sentinels for our own health as well."

The hospital is currently about a third of the way toward its funding goal. If fully funded, construction could begin in 2027 with completion expected by the end of 2027-28.