The cool mornings have brought about a new burst of energy in the Retired Pack. Lakota has been up to her usual tricks of playbowing to the staff and the other wolves and then racing around the pen, looking to see if anyone is chasing her. So far, Lucas has been willing to do a few sprints after her, but MacKenzie just tends to wait until she comes near to take a grab at her.
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Started brush training the pups today. As temperatures top the mid-40's, the tendency is to start seeing shedding shortly after. Grizzer took to the brushing well. He actually kept coming back to handlers to get more grooming.
MacKenzie somewhat jumpy/snapping at Assistant Director, Gretchen Diessner (GD). MacKenzie's eye trouble sometimes affects her attitude. GD left the enclosure and Curator Lori Schmidt continued the scheduled wolf check without incident, continued eye drop treatments for MacKenzie.
Mackenzie and Lakota's first day in retirement went well. They were very eager to investigate their pen and settled into comfortable sleeping areas under the balsam trees.
Pack extremely calm today after feeding on Saturday night. A local trapper provided 5 beaver for the pack, a welcome break from the previous ground turkey meals they had earlier in the month." Pack dynamics is good in all enclosures, fundraising continues to build the retirement enclosure for MacKenzie and Lakota.
Lakota has always had the personality trait for being most likely to entice the other wolves into a game of chase. This trait hasn't faded with her advancing age. As the fall weather approaches, staff again see Lakota excitable and often begins wolf care with several laps around the den boxes, jumping at low level tree branches and both wolves and humans in her path. She continues to excavate two major tunnels in the enclosure, one nearing 15 feet in depth.
Maya is doing well, there was some concern that her submissive behavior would have been a focus of the pack, but she seems to be able to avoid situations that may result in a mobbing. She is quite content to go off by herself and chew on a bone (that she is very able to defend) and wait for the other wolves to greet before approaching staff. Her coat is very full and healthy. She appears to be gaining length more than the other wolves, but no noticeable height growth, she is still shorter than Grizzer.
Of all the wolf interactions, the dominance between Grizzer and Nyssa is most notable. Grizzer and Nyssa like to play rough and are ususally found biting each other with the full neck scruff in each others mouth. It's actually a technique wolf care staff have used when Grizzer is being mouthy; push Grizzer toward Nyssa and they go after each other. They both have the hide for it, and seem to seek each other out. Nyssa seems to be over her skittish behavior related to the wheeled carts, but this weekend is the Workin for Wolves weekend, where staff and program participants will be moving rock into the enclousure. Special attention will be paid to Nyssa to see how she deals with this.
Today's wolf log written by Kim Wheeler – Workin' for Wolves 2004 There was a lot of work done in the exhibit enclosure this weekend. The wolves were moved to the pup enclousure, Maya was a little stressed by some of the noises and new people, she was very inquisitive when she returned to the exhibit enclosure. I think she like the new rocks put around the pond. Not having seen Maya for 3 months, I was amazed at what a beautiful wolf she has become and she is the sweetest wolf (sorry Lori I had to break the rules)
The following was written by Michel Amacker, a Workin' for Wolves Participant – October 2004 Grizzer did very well in the holding pens on Saturday and Sundary during the various work projects. After their release, Grizzer and Maya investigated the pond with caution, but got braver as time went on and acted like the rocks were always there. On Sunday, some large rocks were moved to create cover spots for Maya. When Grizzer came back into the enclosure, he sniffed areas were rocks were placed and scent-rolled on some white pine branches. With very little effort, he jumped from one large rock to another. He has grown into a strong healthy wolf.
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