Archives

Winter is right around the corner and that means that there are some more intense testing of boundaries, posturing, but also some heightened social bonding interactions. We have noticed a change in Grayson the past few weeks; he appears to be initiating more social interaction with Rieka, who is receptive to these social advances more often than not. In this week’s Pack Update on YouTube, a video is included that exemplifies this: “[Grayson] has a T2 tail posture while Rieka is doing some soft muzzle bites and to that Caz also responds with some muzzle licks to Grayson in a submissive manner. Rieka continues seeking Grayson, doing soft muzzle bites and we see them briefly parallel gaiting.”During another instance of Rieka and Grayson social greeting that was captured on video also acts as a reminder of the opportunistic nature of pack rank order: “… we see Grayson seeking some of that social bonding behavior with Rieka, holding a T2 tail while she does a series of soft muzzle bites. And we can’t ignore what the other wolves are doing too. Caz is also trying to participate in this interaction between Rieka and Grayson, but he also is taking advantage of the opportunity to stand over Blackstone who is laying down at the pumphouse. So we know wolves can be very opportunistic to vulnerabilities and take advantage of that moment to test boundaries and assert dominance over some of their packmates.”

While we have witnessed Grayson and Rieka engaging in some social behaviors, we also still see Rieka circling and targeting Grayson’s rear as she did last winter. At this time, we are certainly seeing less frequency and intensity of this type of focus. However, we still have much of the winter season left to go. Caz and Rieka still have a strong relationship; she oftentimes aligns with Caz in times of yearling dominance or when Axel or Grayson display corrective behaviors to him. The wolf care team continues to monitor these social relationships, which provides insight into overall pack dynamics. Proximity while resting, for example, is a good indicator of stronger relationships and alliances. We see a lot of that with Blackstone and Grayson, but the whole pack is pretty cohesive and calm so we do see a lot of resting together between all wolves at some point. One of the main questions we get is if Rieka has pair bonded with one of the males yet. We are seeing some behaviors that relate to pair bonding but we do not see anything definitive yet. What we can say is that we are watching very closely because whatever she decides will have implications for the dynamics of the pack.

Earlier this week, on Saturday September 16th, we captured some footage that was particularly interesting, and we wanted to offer some interpretations. Rieka was standing over Blackstone and doing little bit of social greetings and kind of presenting herself to Blackstone. She attempts to do a stand over, but she is a little too short. You see her tail rising as she moves closer to him and that’s a little bit more assertive and a little bit less social. Grayson comes around and he seems to be always keeping an eye on what the yearlings are up to.  

We had someone ask us recently, “is Rieka mature yet?” After some of us chuckled and said, “it depends upon the day,” she really is showing much more assertiveness, much more direct eye contact, facing issues more directly, and showing strong body postures. For example, even though Blackstone seemed to resist her dominance displays in the footage, she didn’t back off. She’s had a history of being a little bit intimidated and approaching from behind by tail grabbing because she wasn’t very confident. We are now seeing her directly facing the males and dealing with her place as the dominant female.  

On that same footage, we saw Caz taking an opportunity while Rieka was focused on Blackstone to do a chin rest and that is a dominant posture. Then he goes into a ride up. His tail indicated that he was not very comfortable, and it doesn’t seem like he’s very confident about that move. Blackstone was also facing him so that certainly could have been the issue.  

One of the highlights of this particular video is that we observed Caz and Rieka do a very short parallel gait after all this posturing and chin resting. Rieka kind of walked into that because she protected Caz from a lot of dominance interactions. Pictured above you can see their feet parallel to each other and walking shoulder to shoulder. Parallel walking is a social bonding behavior so we can confirm that fall is in the air.  

It is autumnal equinox today, equal length of daylight and darkness, the first official day of fall. We’re starting to see some beautiful fall colors and feeling the temperature changes. With having a dry summer we’re likely to see some more intense colors than we might see during a wet year. With fall officially arriving, we know that wolf activity will increase so we’ll be watching that as the sun sets earlier every day, we certainly will keep an eye on what the pack is up to. 

You may watch the footage here.  

We are doing pack updates a bit differently in the logs.  This text is the narrative from the Youtube channel which is done weekly. This allows details to be searched a bit more efficiently and logs to be posted more frequently. 

Every morning we bring the pack into what’s called the pack holding area (PHA) which is adjacent to our Wolf Care Center (WCC) building and the Wolf Lab. The younger animals walk into the WCC and get weighed but often they’re distracted by things like chipmunks. Caz jumping to catch the chipmunk is a good demonstration of why wolf fences should be 10-feet high with an overhang. They can also get distracted by vegetation or in some cases berries. We are almost done with the berry season, but there’s still a few low hanging Mt. Ash berries on the trees. They also get distracted by things in the trees, like birds that have been starting the fall migration might land or hit the exhibit windows or it might land and eat some seeds. We also have wasps that have been around as the drought increases. The yellow jackets and bald-faced hornets seem to take advantage of that drier condition and that means we have to apply a little bit more fly ointment. We often will have the wolves help the process; we spray the fly ointment on the rocks and let them scent roll. Because they go into the pond, we’re very cautious about what we use. We do use a lot of cedar oil, lemongrass, and peppermint. There are some other chemicals that work much more effectively but because they go in the water, and they eventually drink that water we want to be kind of mindful of what we put on the wolves. We already observed and recorded Caz dunking his head underwater for approximately 16 seconds. He has no problem sticking his face all the way down in to identify some things and so does Blackstone. The wolves can see the bottom of the pond and they try to figure out how to strategize to get their feet in and bring something to a shallow area so they can reap the benefits. Blackstone often gets ice chunks with a little bit of meat inside as enrichment since it has been so hot, as it has in most of the country. Today, temperatures dropped, and we had 39 degrees this morning. We certainly can appreciate Canada and Northwest winds as this cold front moved in and made it a little bit more manageable for the wolves. When it’s hot we like to get them in the shade, keep them on cool rocks and we like to make sure that everybody’s comfortable. Then there’s the pack social dynamics that come with cooler weather, so we’re starting to see activity and dominance ramp up a little bit here in the next few weeks, we also know it’s not out of the realm of possibility to get snow in September. Once we get snow the wolves get very active. 

Check out these links from the Timberwolf Alliance for wolves that are jumping for berries and from Voyageurs Wolf project for wolves dunking their heads for fish –