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Senior Lion Mothers Wolves
by Katie Bolton
Tanasi and Jaclyn.
Sweet little kiss by one of the pups.
Jaclyn got nipped while punishing another wolf.
It is hard to get the pups to sit still.
All grown up now.
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Mars Hill College Senior Jaclyn Bowen got the rare opportunity to work with four wolf puppies over the summer as a volunteer "Wolf Puppy Parent". Jaclyn worked at Bays Mountain Park, a nature center in Tennessee. She got to work with Timber Wolves, also known as Gray Wolves.
The pack that lives at Bays Mountain Park has six adults, five males and one female. The pack had two generations - two 12-year-olds and four four-year-olds.
One reason she was hired was to get the puppies more used to humans because they are going to be living in a nature center for the rest of their lives. Jaclyn was not the only volunteer. "It "takes a village" of reliable individuals," she said. "Getting the puppies used to humans is called socialization. Another part [of socialization] was getting the pups and the adults to accept each other so that the adults wouldn't kill the pups, nor would the pups be overly stressed out in the pen with the larger adults."
Jaclyn told about her experience during a SLAM presentation on April 9.
The lifespan of a wild wolf is around six to seven years, but the lifespan of a wolf kept in captivity is ten to twelve years. The males were given vasectomies to prevent inbreeding and over population in the two-acre pen.
The puppies she got to work with came from a different facility, Bear Country U.S.A. in South Dakota. The average litter size is five to seven puppies. This litter had five, but Bays Mountain Park could only take four -- two males, and two females. The puppies were born April 28, 2007.
The mother did not come with the puppies. The pups were pulled from the den at seven days old, before the eyes and ears opened, so the first beings they saw and heard were humans, not wolves. Bays Mountain Park got the puppies at four weeks old. They were bottled trained and the largest one was 5.5 pounds, while the smallest was just 3.5 pounds.
How they could tell the all black puppies apart was by putting different colored yarn on them. All of the names are Cherokee names. The girls are Aiyana and Netar. Aiyana, which means Eternal Blossom, wore the blue yarn, and Netar, which means New Beginnings, wore the yellow yarn. The boys are Adahy and Tanasi. Adahy, which means Lives in the Woods, wore red yarn, and Tanasi, which means Tennessee, wore the orange yarn.
The job lasted 24 hours a day. Rain or shine, Jaclyn had to be working with the pups. Luckily there were other volunteers to help out. Wolves are mostly active at dawn and dusk. This meant early mornings and late nights. All the volunteers together calculated 5,200 hours of volunteer work.
What the job required was a lot of dedication. She could not have anything with pockets -- no jewelry, nothing with holes/tears, no strings or laces, or braids. She would have to tuck her shoelaces into her shoes, and wear her hair back in a ponytail. She was not allowed to wash her clothes because wolves base how they know each other off scent. Once they knew her scent, she could not change it. This means that even if a puppy threw up on her shirt, she was not allowed to wash her shirt.
Her job also required her to watch the puppies and document everything they did, so if one chewed on a stick she would have to write down which puppy, what time he started chewing, how long he chewed on it, and what time he stopped. She would also have to even write down when a puppy pooped, what time he did it, and analyze what was in it. At the end of the summer, she ended up with 700 pages of notes.
Wolves have very sharp teeth -- even the puppies -- so if one misbehaved, she would have to punish it. Now what that means is if a puppy bit her she would have to flip it over on its back and hold its neck till it stopped fighting. This would show that she was in control.
Jaclyn said that she had to remember to let them be wolves. The volunteers could not reach out and pick them up unless the wolves wanted them to. They also could not show favorites in any way or they would get jealous of each other. In fact Jaclyn said she was punishing one wolf puppy and anther got jealous, walked up, and nipped her elbow. As soon as the puppy she was punishing subsided, she had to flip the one that nipped her to punish it.
Before they introduced the pack of adults to the puppies, the volunteers had them howl so they heard each other, and they threw sticks and poop into both sets of living areas. That way, the adults got the scent of the puppies, and the puppies got the scent of the adults. Then they moved them to cages facing diagonally. That way the wolves would not get too stressed.
The pups and adults did not have any contact till August 18, 2007, over three months after Bays Mountain got the pups. They put the adults in with the pups one or two at a time. After that there could be no more human contact. Nature had to take its course. They looked for signs of submission/acceptance like ear and tail position, regurgitation, and rolling over.
The pups were small enough to still be viewed as pups but big enough to fight for themselves. They weighed 38-45 pounds. Full grown males can weigh up to 157 pounds, and full grown females can weigh up to 120 pounds.
Jaclyn said the introduction of the wolves went very well, and they are now one big happy pack. Sadly, the two 12-year-olds -- the alpha and omega males-- passed away. The mating season just ended and those two spots are up for any male wolf to take.
Jaclyn is very happy with the work she got to do and believes that the wolves will remember her forever, as part of the pack.
http://www.baysmountain.com/mainpages/wolfcam.html
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