This weekend is the Working for Wolves weekend, and due to the significant amount of preparation work, we will be posting the same text for all the logs. The main priorities for this weekend include straw removal, cleaning and filling the ponds in the Exhibit and Retired Enclosure, putting a roof and protective walls on the medical enclosure and starting the fence layout for Grizzer’s new enclosure. It will be a busy weekend, and work will continue in the upcoming weeks on Grizzer’s habitat. The goal is to get him into the new area by June 15th. All the wolves are doing well. Aidan and Denali are having no problem eating their entire deer carcass on weekends, and Shadow and Malik are transitioning to more food carcass meals with chicken on Tuesday and Thursdays. Grizzer gets chicken on a daily basis as he has a small area left to heal from his head and we want to maximize his nutrition to keep is immune system strong. Someone emailed with concern about Malik in the den, because he sleeps so soundly, they were concerned that there was something wrong. Old wolves do like their sleep, but we keep the camera on the wolves and staff are aware of their condition.
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During the Working for Wolves weekend, we pressure washed the pond and have refilled with clean water. We still have a little frozen line and haven't been able to pump to the upper pond yet, but Denali enjoys the chance to get back to swimming. He's still wrestling with Aidan and is usually on top doing a squash while Aidan submits. The crew did a tremendous job hauling the old straw to the enclosure edge to serve as mulch for a future seeding project. This provides many opportunites for small rodents to burrow in the straw and gives Denali a lot of opportunity for hunting.
Of all the wolves that causes us concern during a work project, Shadow is the most likely to show anxiety and bark howl at the work crews. At least, that was his past behavior. But, not this year… Shadow was amazingly tolerant, even on Sunday morning when the crew split up with 1/2 half of the crew working on the medical pen and the other half clearing branches in Grizzer's new habitat. Shadow and Malik were perched on the den watching the crew come and go, even when the rains started. If you recall in a recent log, we were going to recommend a new behavior towards the wolves by work crews. This included no direct eye contact, no cameras, no focus on the wolves at all, just go about the task of working, and that approach, seemed to work.
The pack has had a quiet week, so there's not much news to report and all logs will be the same. The Center is moving forward on an additional habitat for Grizzer with a design that will allow continued access to the current pack holding area. He has become quite comfortable in this area and its' location is right in the Center of Wolf Lab activity which seems to be of interest to Grizzer. This is a bit reminiscent of Lakota.
The temperatures were a bit cool this past week, but we are making progress on melting any residual ice that may affect wolf mobility under immobilzation. We need to move some straw, as the insulating effect of the straw may influence ice melt. Once we have this enclosure clear of ice, and staffing can be arranged, we will conduct the retired wolves tri-annual immobization. This includes a complete blood panel and for Malik, a dental cleaning and inspection.
This weekend is the Working for Wolves weekend, and due to the significant amount of preparation work, we will be posting the same text for all the logs. The main priorities for this weekend include straw removal, cleaning and filling the ponds in the Exhibit and Retired Enclosure, putting a roof and protective walls on the medical enclosure and starting the fence layout for Grizzer’s new enclosure. It will be a busy weekend, and work will continue in the upcoming weeks on Grizzer’s habitat. The goal is to get him into the new area by June 15th. All the wolves are doing well. Aidan and Denali are having no problem eating their entire deer carcass on weekends, and Shadow and Malik are transitioning to more food carcass meals with chicken on Tuesday and Thursdays. Grizzer gets chicken on a daily basis as he has a small area left to heal from his head and we want to maximize his nutrition to keep is immune system strong. Someone emailed with concern about Malik in the den, because he sleeps so soundly, they were concerned that there was something wrong. Old wolves do like their sleep, but we keep the camera on the wolves and staff are aware of their condition.
Denali continues to wrestle with Aidan, but he doesn’t win many points when it comes to wolf care staff. Aidan still determines who gets to greet staff first by showing guarding behavior. At this point, Denali doesn’t question his authority, so it’s really hard to define who’s in charge. The addition of pups next summer will be the definitive test of leadership.
While Malik is getting some dental work, Shadow will have his own veterinarian to do some blood work. We intend to do a glucose test to see if there might be a diabetes issue. Shadow has a higher water consumption than Malik and if there is an issue, it may influence his feeding patterns. We plan to get weights on both wolves when they are immobilized. We really don't need an immobilization for Shadow to weigh him, he stands on the scale with no problems, but Malik hasn't had a sound weight recorded in nearly a year.
The staff was very focused on Shadow and Malik’s medical exam this week, but Aidan and Denali did get their regular checks. We also planted 60 small seedlings in their enclosure, 20 oak and 40 spruce trees. Aidan and Denali were very quick to find them and dig, but we were able to replant most of the seedlings and so far, they are still green. We will be beginning the Enclosure Enrichment program soon, which means, at 1 pm every day the wolves will be drawn off the Exhibit and have some type of stimulus placed in or around the enclosure. This could be food, scent, ice cubes, sounds etc. basically, anything that peaks their interest. Aidan is very good at locating scents.
This past weekend was the first in a series of three Planning for Pups programs. Denali and Aidan did an excellent job of demonstrating the value of socializing pups. Grizzer was tolerant, although we were very careful to give him his privacy. Shadow started a bark howl on Sunday morning, but that was probably more directed at the Curator for applying fly ointment to his ears. Due to the extra work load this weekend, all wolves will share one log posting.
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