Aidan has been very social with Denali, letting Denali show some active dominance without much response except submitting, pawing and grooming. Aidan's need for attention has diminished, although, he will likely be the one with wolf care staff at the greeting rock. We started the brushing process with Aidan and Denali, trying to stimulate some of the under coat to shed. Wolves typically shed once a year during late May and June. Aidan has a significant amount of burrs in his coat and fortunately is very tolerant of grooming. These two young adults are very tolerant of hands on management and make the job of wolf care staff a bit easier.
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.
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.
Sorry for the delay in logs, we are working on Grizzer's new habitat and that takes precedence over all other duties. Aidan has had more trouble with the construction than Denali. His personality is a bit more sensitive to noise and strangers, which requires us to be a bit more cautious in activities. Because the fence work requires people on ladders, there is more anxiety about things over his head. To complicate things, the tree that came down last week may have caused some additional anxiety. The fence contractors should be done by tomorrow, and the rest of the work will be completed with wolf care staff, reducing anxiety for all.
Attila is 24 days old today. Attila is back on the path of weight gain. His growth rate slowed after a bout of teething and some preference issues with the bottle and bottle feeders. At this point, only wolf care staff are feeding Attila until we see a significant change in his attitude toward the bottle. Another notable behavior is the pups are showing some very strong associative bonds with the human handlers. In the first week of their care, they were inclined to retreat to the corners of the enclosure or burrow deep in one of the many comfortable sleeping pads in the enclosure. On the night shift last night, it was the first night that both pups stayed with the handlers the whole night. The socialization process is critical for wolf care staff to handle adult wolves, while we still have fear avoidance issues with strangers, crowds and loud noises; the bond is being established with those people who will care for the wolves the rest of their lives. Attila is very exploratory in personality, investigating the enclosure and jaw sparring with Red Paw when the opportunity arises. The pup’s premolars are irrupting and causing some teething pain. Both upper and lower canines have erupted, but are still too small for the calipers to measure. For the first time, staff have recorded grooming behavior. The audio clip represents more sounds of pups dreaming.
Attila is 25 days old today. The pups had a busy today with a media event at 4 pm and an open house for Ely residents at 5 pm. Attila was a camera ham… he was running square into the camera lenses with no fear at all. There will be many photos of this wolf in the future. Earlier in the day, after Attila did a head-butt at the gate, the staff let the pups out to explore the lab. Red Paw was very calm and explored every corner of the lab, as it’s a familiar place. In contrast, Attila, who deals with unfamiliar things well, became very nervous and whined. But, when the pups were outside in the grassy area for the media session, Attila had no fear of anything new. It’s interesting to see how the pups process situations differently. During the public program, Grizzer came to the window to watch the pups, and Attila was right there staring back at him, he even put a paw up on the window towards Grizzer. This can be perceived as a dominant paw, toward Grizzer, certainly these males will have some rank order sorting to do, but not until the pups are near 2 years of age. Attila also howls to the Exhibit Pack, and has been pawing at the gate and howling loudly facing the pack. Their ears are still not erect, so directional hearing is questionable.
Attila is 29 days old today. While Red Paw’s ears are starting to be more erect, Attila seems a bit behind in the physical development. Attila continues to be the most aggressive pup, growling during wrestling bouts. Attila seems to prefer the bowl feeding and lapping versus bottle. The video footage for today shows Attila’s first food begging behavior, which transgressed into grooming behavior. The audio clip is the sound pups make when lapping from a bowl. Attila is doing very well eating from the bowl, both lapping formula and gruel. The programs are a bit of a struggle for Attila, he gets anxious and whines until the wolf care staff or nannies can find the right combination to make him relax. Sometimes it’s a pillow, wolf hair, stuffed toy or even the staff’s hair as occurred this morning. Overall, the socialization is going well, but with wolf pups, we must always be diligent to avoid negative conditioning.
Behavioral notes over the weekend: <br> Attila continues to show some fear avoidance behavior towards quick movements and loud noises. The new stimulus brought into the enclosure has been good for their coordination. Attila was the first to climb on the stump.
The socialization process seems to be working well, although Attila is a bit shy about noises. When the voice mail was checked today, and there was a strange voice on the machine, Attila became very anxious, until, Curator Lori Schmidt began speaking. Attila does some serious headshakes of the toy football and is very predatory with the stuffed pheasant toy. He tried to pluck the fur, and drag the pheasant to the corner. We believe this is the first observed plucking behavior demonstrated, another predatory instinct that relates to carcass feeding. Attila was food begging from Assistant Curator, Donna Prichard, and has taken to the gruel formula and bowl lapping much better than Red Paw. The public programs in the auditorium are going well, the pups slept during all of the programs today with very little whining, compared to just a few days ago. Red Paw has his right ear nearly fully erect, and Attila has his left ear nearly fully erect. In the next few days, they should be both fully erect. Pup prints were taken today, and in comparison to the pup prints taken at 22 days old, they are clearly double the size. There appears to be a problem with the new video software compression format, we have ordered another software package and hope to resume video postings soon.
The International Wolf Center advances the survival of wolf populations by teaching about wolves, their relationship to wildlands and the human role in their future.