shadow – May 18, 2009 12:00 AM

During the recent incident between Grizzer and Malik, Shadow was not extremely agitated or defensive in any way. He remained calm during the separation, vet inspection and reintroduction period. This helped us gauge the issues related to keeping Malik in the pack. As humans, we tend to let emotions cloud our judgment, and it was critical that we had a good assessment of the situation, as to what was best for Malik. Staying in the pack and maintaining social relationships is best for any wolf, isolation in retirement is not the best case scenario, nor was it appropriate to change the entire dynamics of the social group by retiring Shadow, just so Malik wouldn't be alone. We took Shadow's lead, and kept the pack together, and observed Shadow taking the lead in controlling the yearlings and Grizzer when the pack was back together. We are more alert to the subtle interactions between the pack, but we take the lead from Shadow, the pack leader.