Lakota is doing extremely well, she has had no complications from the surgery, and she has not shown any interest in scratching at the stitches as they dissolve and the wound heals. Her coat is glossy and she has been developing a good layer of undercoat. Her behavior is as active as ever and she is coming in to the winter in good condition. I’m not sure if I wrote this before, but Lakota’s body weight at the time of her surgery was 92 lbs, this is the same weight as a 2001 immobilization.
I received an email of concern about Malik, so I thought I would share my response with everyone who might be concerned with the wolf dominance behavior that we are experiencing. We always have concerns for the omega wolves as caretakers for the wolves, we're human and we think emotionally. Wolves are wolves, they don't think like humans do on an emotional level, but think as a wolf, a socially dynamic animal that lives in a rank order based on abilities and strengths. Calm, assertive behavior keeps the pack calm. Anxious, nervous energy is viewed as a weakness. A classic wolf behavior it to express anxiety over strangers, changes to routines and anything different. Such is the problem, when work needs to be done in an exhibit. We had a great wolf check this morning, Malik, Shadow and Grizzer all got a venison roast, while Maya made off with the deer head. Whatever anxiety they had last week seems to be over. Thanks for checking the logs, we appreciate the fact that people see how incredible these individuals are and that they respect them as wolves. Unfortunately, because they are wolves, there will be behaviors that effect the human emotion. Our job is to understand them, care for them and be calm and stable when interacting in the wolf yard.
Shadow seems to be taking Grizzer in stride, with watchful behavior, alert ear posture and high tail when Grizzer approaches. Staff can tell the mood of the exhibit based on Shadow’s interactions. When Grizzer is pushing his status, Shadow will stay more aloof with staff. The more staff can keep Grizzer occupied with enclosure enrichments, the less problems Shadow will face as the dominant male.
Malik continues to be the low ranking wolf with the high ranking tail. Whenever possible, Malik approaches the other wolves with a high tail showing his willingness for a higher ranking status. Most of the time, Shadow shows no concern over this posture and ignores him, whereas Grizzer sees this as something to address. Fortunately for Malik, Grizzer’s follow through is lacking. Generally, Grizzer chases Malik a few times around the pond and over the logs, and then stops to interact with Maya or rest on the greeting rock. Malik stays on the other end of the enclosure for a while, and then repeats his higher ranking tail. This arrangement seems to work for this group of males. In this week’s image, Malik displays a sign of status by scraping the ground after doing defecation.
MacKenzie’s photo may look a bit under the weather this week. Wolf care staff noticed her holding her left ear at an odd position and rubbing against the fence. When wolf care staff attempted to check the internal ear canal, she became very agitated. MacKenzie is a very dominant wolf and is very reluctant for any handling when she’s not feeling well. Upon the Veterinarian’s recommendation, wolf care staff started MacKenzie on otibiotic ear ointment twice a day. Getting the ointment in her ears is a bit of a challenge, but she allows wolf care staff to come behind her while another staff person offers frozen bonedust through the fence. She only has one week of this treatment.
Grizzer’s agitation level seems to be correlated with extended periods of holding. While holding the wolves off is a necessary part of working on the facility, we attempt to reduce the large periods of time that the wolves need to be held off. Another key ingredient to keeping the peace, is to have some type of treats scattered around the enclosure when they come out of holding. This is easier said than done when Maya or Shadow don’t go into holding. Staff can’t hide treats with those two following them around and Grizzer gets that much more agitated watching them near the treats.
Lakota is doing great since the surgery. Her incision healed without any problems, and her attitude has been tremendous. She’s growing a full winter coat, and has been eating well to store some reserves for the winter. When we fed the venison roast on Thursday, she spent some time caching a few pieces in the straw denbox, but eventually consumed her fair share.
As Grizzer starts testing for status, it’s interesting to watch Maya’s response. Maya tends to still associate with Shadow, even though Grizzer is testing Shadow. She’s very watchful of activity and rarely gets involved unless Grizzer is the focus. She continues to be a bit timid around wolf care staff, but seems to be focused on the small birds in the enclosure.
In order to keep Shadow’s confidence level high, we have greatly reduced the Behind the Scenes presence of strangers. We only have one work crew scheduled in October, the Working for Wolves program, and we have many items of distraction to keep the wolves occupied during that weekend. One thing wolves love to do is shred birch bark logs, so the crew will be out scouting and hauling multiple truck loads of logs into the enclosure. One thing to keep in mind, Malik and Shadow were the aggressors that drove out our retired pack of wolves. It doesn't make them bad, it's just what wolves do. We anticipate as Shadow and Malik age, they will be moving into retirement as well. Although, with new pups coming in the spring, the focus for the next several years will be on the young members of the pack, not the old. We hope to keep this cohesive group together until Malik and Shadow are at least 10 years of age.
Written by Workin' For Wolves participants Pam Dolajeck and Lori Rhodes: The weather for the Workin' for Wolves weekend was perfect. All the wolves were very relaxed with the participants presence. Work in the retirement area consisted of removing dead trees and reinforcing the excavated area that Lakota had dug out with birch logs. The excavated area measured roughly 8' deep by 8' wide-all dug out by a 14 year old wolf! Lakota checked out the newly reinforced area and seemed quite satisfied with the work that had been done.
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