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Enter Wisconsin's Eagle License Plate Giveaway now through September 2nd for your chance to be one of 10 Wisconsinites receiving this Endangered Resources specialty license plate free for the first year.

Enter online at the Department of Natural Resources website, http://www.dnr.wi.gov, and search keywords "eagle plate" or enter in person at the at the Natural Resources Park at Wisconsin State Fair August 4-14 at the Natural Heritage Conservation Program display in the south building.

The eagle license plate features the latest design of the Endangered Resources license plate, that since 1995 has raised money to help care for Wisconsin's native wildlife, plants and state natural areas. Revenues from the $25 annual donation motorists pay for the plate have played an important role in helping restore bald eagles, trumpeter swans and other once endangered species to Wisconsin.

"The eagle plate celebrates a great comeback in Wisconsin," says Drew Feldkirchner, Director of DNR's Natural Heritage Conservation Program. "We're excited to be able to give away 10 of these eagle license plates to raise awareness of this new plate and the great cause it supports."

Normally getting an Endangered Resources license plate costs $40.00 initially and thereafter requires a $25.00 annual donation to the Endangered Resources Fund. A private gift to the Natural Heritage Conservation Program is allowing the giveaway of 10 license plates free for the first year.

Enter the giveaway by providing your name and contact information. Entries are limited to owners of a registered Wisconsin vehicle that qualifies for a special plate: an automobile, light truck, farm truck or motor home.

Winners will be randomly selected September 5, 2016. Winners who want to keep their eagle plate in subsequent years will be responsible for the $25.00 annual donation required to own the plate.

Through direct donations and purchase of these Endangered Resources license plates, Wisconsin citizens played an important role in bald eagles' comeback by funding aerial surveys to find eagle nests and work with landowners to protect them and to monitor the population. Other key factors included banning the pesticide DDT nationally in 1972 (and in Wisconsin in 1969), prohibition of killing of eagles, improved water quality in lakes and rivers, and reintroduction of eagles in some areas. As a result of these efforts, bald eagles were removed from Wisconsin's endangered species list in 1997, and the number of eagle pairs in Wisconsin has grown from 100 pairs in the 1970s to a record 1,465 in 2015.