Keeping Warm

This entry was written by visiting Wolf Care Staff Volunteer, Cameron Feaster. Luna’s proximity to Aidan has been of key interest this winter. As past experience has shown us, pairbonding between the dominant male and female will increase as we get closer to the breeding season, even though the wolves are spayed and neutered. These days Luna spends a lot of her time interacting with, and resting near Aidan. In this week’s youtube video, you can see Luna rest in the straw beside Aidan while he feeds on a beaver carcass. This behavior could be due to her seeking warmth, but it may also be a part of the pairbonding ritual.

Giving Thanks

I would like to thank all of the members and donors who support our educational mission at the International Wolf Center. I wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving and would like to report that all of the wolves are doing well. We have some great pack interactions as the winter begins and our wolf care staff are so honored to work with these incredible ambassador wolves.

Dominance

Luna has been a bit more dominant than usual and continues to run after Boltz and Denali. We continually watch for irritation or pain response from her joint/leg issues, but she shows no sign of pain or slowing down. We’ve started placing straw in the enclosure and that seems to be a favorite spot for her to defend.

Activity

Luna’s been very active lately, doing more stalking than any other pack member. She seems to be handling the wet snow conditions, but temperatures are right around freezing. Things may change when we get temperatures below zero. We have straw in both dens and all the wolves have warm dry beds of their choosing. We will be purchasing some new IT Balance food for Luna that is similar to the components of her nutritional supplement that she received as a pup. This new food is expensive, but if it will help her maintain her vitamin D levels, it will be worth it. She looks great, her winter coat is thick and does a great job of holding snow in what appears to be the start of winter.

Sleeping Close

We have started placing straw in all densites and in the front of the Exhibit for Luna to have a comfortable spot to rest. Aidan also seems to appreciate the straw and this week’s Youtube shows them both resting together (that is, after Luna stopped biting Aidan in the neck). Sleeping distance is one of those behaviors that we monitor that may indicate pair bonding between individuals. Luna still wrestles and jaw spars with Boltz as a pup mate, but she is often sitting or resting near Aidan. Literature from wild wolves indicates this sleeping distance continues to get closer as the natural breeding season occurs. All wolves are spayed and neutered here to reduce reproduction, but they still pair bond.

The Star

Luna is the dominant player in this week’s Youtube video. It’s not that I wanted to do a feature film on Luna, it’s just that she is the most active when I film. Her level of awareness on activities surrounding the enclosure seems to be much greater than the other wolves. Her predatory drive is strong and there are several clips of her dominating two deer legs. She seems to have adapted the role of being a dominant female.

Size Doesn’t Matter

Since Luna’s August medical exam, we’ve increased some supplements in her diet and have noticed a significant gloss feel and look to her winter coat. She’s always had a striking appearance, but her continued consumption of twice a day vitamin d supplements and the addition of the Science Diet JD food seems to really agree with her. She continues to have some moments when the ability to be higher ranking seems to be her entire focus. She does have a way to make Denali whine, which only stimulates her more. For Denali’s sake, we know how to distract Luna. Luna likes to guard and posses food, and even if it’s a small piece of chicken, her ability to stand tall and defend, seems to keep her from proving that size doesn’t matter in the world of captive wolf rank hierarchy.

Pair Bonding?

We saw some slight indication of pair bonding with Aidan, but it was on Luna’s terms. In this week’s Youtube, Luna approaches Aidan while Aidan is submitting to staff. She does a modified play bow and some social grooming around his neck. Usually Aidan gets up when Luna approaches, but he must have noticed the subtle change in her behavior and he stayed in a subordinate posture while she interacted. Luna’s also been using a rock pile to give herself some height.

Healthy Coat

You may notice Luna’s putting on a bit of weight in the last few weeks. We want to keep her trim for her joint issues, but we would like a bit more muscle and body fat before winter. She was enjoying the addition of the joint health dog food, but she has become disinterested in the food. We continue to try a variety of items to stimulate her to have a good diet, and based on the feel of her winter coat, something must be working. She has a very smooth, soft coat. In this week’s video, we also demonstrate her ability to camouflage with the rocks in the enclosure. Her limp seems to be improving, although I believe we will see some return to soreness when the colder weather returns. She is so active in this exhibit between dominating Denali to chasing migratory birds, she is constantly moving. We are meeting with contractors to develop a heated slab which can be thermostatically controlled, the problem is, how will Aidan deal with more work in the enclosure. I may have to pack a bag and stay for a few days to get through this project, but anything we can do to help Luna is worth the effort.

Visitor

The logs this week are all the same. It’s been a busy week. We started with the discovery of some damage to an outside security fence behind the Retired Enclosure. It appears a wild wolf attempted to get into the secondary security fence behind the retired enclosure. There were a significant number of boards torn from the fencing with a lot of teeth marks. Surveillance video shows that it likely occurred on Sunday morning, although we don’t have a camera pointing directly at this fence, Shadow showed some tension and agitation. We had a group of students from Vermilion Community College volunteer with some invasive species removal. This is critical as the plants that they were pulling harden off with hundreds of burrs that get stuck in the wolves coats. Unfortunately, Aidan seemed to have the most stress about the work project. He was agitated while he was in holding, then after the students left and Aidan was released, he proceeded to have some fear avoidance behavior throughout the weekend. This created some interest from the other wolves that saw the dominant pack leader showing some weakness. We impose a lot of limits on activity in the wolf yard as winter approaches, but the removal of the invasive species is critical work that saves a lot of wolf frustration as staff try to pull burrs from their coat.