Check Up

On Tuesday morning, we took Luna (under chemical immobilization) to the Vet clinic for a set of x rays and blood work. This was a follow up to her medical issues with the femur fracture, bone density and nutritional deficiencies she faced as a pup. The good news is, the plate is solid and is still in alignment as it was installed in May of 2012. The issue we have is that the head of the femur looks like it did not form correctly and is not aligning well with the hip socket. This is probably causing the limp and discomfort that she feels. We are looking at management options on days when she seems to have a comfort issue, but as this week’s Youtube video shows, she is extremely active and shows very little limitations.

luna – Jul 12, 2013 12:00 AM

We hope everyone has had a Happy 4th of July and continues to enjoy the days of summer. All wolves are doing well here, we are monitoring a growth that opened on Shadow’s cheek and are doing some repairs to the pond. Grizzer had a new concrete floor installed in his den because he was continually digging under the foundation. Luna’s growing back a winter coat, so we must be on the downhill side of summer. The Ethology Course begins on July 20th, we are sure to have some good behavioral observations to report next week.

luna – Jul 19, 2013 12:00 AM

Luna is starting to grow her winter undercoat. That's a bit early considering it was a 90 degree week, but she spends most of her time in the cool den, so she's comfortable. We are observing her interactions with the male to see if there's any particular social trends. It's far to early in the season for pair bonding, we usually don't see this until December or January, but Luna does treat Denali more as a pup mate (a big pup mate) and Aidan more as a pack mate.

luna – Jul 25, 2013 12:00 AM

Written by Ethology Participant: Dolf Hergert<br> As a participant in the recent Wolf Ethology Course at the Int. Wolf Center, I took an active role in behavioral observations of Luna. Initially concerned about her prior injury to her leg, my observations of Luna lent me to believe that she has little difficulty in maintaining her rank in the pack. Although a limp is often evident, she often instigated chases with the other wolves that covered large areas of the enclosure. Other data collected through observations indicated that she spends a large of time eating.One particularly amusing bit of observation was on the evening of July 22, 2013. Luna and Boltz were snapping at dragonflies for about five minutes.Luna caught one and promptly walked away and ate it. Another memorable incident was when Boltz was feeding on a deer carcass and Denali began walking towards him with his teeth bared. Luna's response was to quickly walk over to Boltz and sit down which barred Denalis approach to Boltz. Denali ended up turning and walking away and Boltz resumed feeding.

luna – Aug 2, 2013 12:00 AM

Luna was extremely active proceeding the cool weekend and evening temperatures in the upper 30's. She may have over did herself. On Tuesday morning, she seemed a bit sore, so we scheduled a vet check and will be following up with some x-rays early next week. This is just a follow up now that her bone growth is near completion as she matures to a two year old. It will also be a good time to get a complete blood panel and make sure she is still on a good nutritional track. She's not acting like there are any issues, but we are in a calm time of the year to remove her for a few hours of medical care. It's a bit risky to take a wolf out of the pack, especially a dominant wolf like Luna. But, she is the only female, so she should have no problem transitioning back in after the clinic visit.

luna – Apr 26, 2013 12:00 AM

Luna has started to shed some of her undercoat, but most of that shedding is a result of Boltz (or Denali) jaw sparring with her and getting their teeth caught in her hair. We have noticed that her coat is really getting lighter, this could be the effect of sun fading or the undercoat becoming more prominent. We do notice her frequently lying in the sun, even on the warmest days. This may feel relief on a winter's worth of sore joints.

luna – Jun 7, 2013 12:00 AM

The last time we weighed Luna was in October of 2012 when she weighed 67 pounds. We were hoping for 70 lbs as her yearling weight, and we were quite surprised when she weighed in at 79.5 pounds, which was the same weight as Maya when she was a yearling. Luna has nearly completed the shedding of her undercoat and it appears she will maintain a whitish tinge to her dark guard hairs. She continues to assert a significant amount of dominance over all the other wolves in the pack, including Aidan.

luna – May 4, 2013 12:00 AM

The logs will all be the same this week. The weather creates added challenges to the daily job of caring for wolves and we've had a variety of weather. The warm spell that melted a significant amount of snow led to standing water which later froze when colder temperatures returned. This week's Youtube video features some great demonstration of Aidan doing a stiff leg jump to crack the ice. Boltz is a bit hesitant on the ice since he fell through the ice into about 2 feet of water (thanks to Denali's hefty body size on the ice). Luna's displaying less stiffness as the temperatures warm and she's been spending a lot of time digging. This week is another special week as Grizzer turns 9 years old on May 5th and Shadow and Malik are 13 years old on May 8th.

luna – Jun 14, 2013 12:00 AM

Luna's had a complete shed and her summer coat does nothing to protect her from bugs. She's very restless and irritated in the early morning when the bugs are the worst, but she finds relief in the den and in the woods. She continues to be very dominant with all of her pack mates, and has some intense face-off's with Aidan. She seems stiff when she's been resting for an extended period of time, but once she's mobile, she has few limitations.

luna – Jun 1, 2013 12:00 AM

Luna continues to demonstrate some active dominance and most of the time, Denali is getting the focus of her attention. Other than that, Luna is busy stalking birds, caching food, possessing everything that is brought into the enclosure and getting some of her undercoat removed not only through staff brushing, but also through her own self grooming. She is stiff when she's lying down for extended times, but she has no problems keeping up with the pack and on most days, setting the pace of pack activities.