Days 2 and 3- Weeding

     Day 2  

 Day 2 was rather dreary. It was cold, and raining. And I'm not one for playing in the mud or the rain. But Brigid and I drove to Wolf Run with the intention of making what we expected was going to be a bad experience, into one in which we made a positive impact. When we got there, Savannah assigned us to our first official project: cleaning up the enclosures. In other words, weed and pick up bones left over from breakfast. I hadn't expected this, but I was relieved to hear that we would be working in one of the hybrid enclosures and therefore would be able to interact with and observe more wolf dogs.

    When I first entered the enclosure, I had to leap over a puddle of mud. Upon reaching the other side, I was immediately greeted by a rather large wolf dog, nudging at my hand. I was thrilled to have received this kind of warm and affectionate greeting, but was only that lucky until Kalysi--the hybrid that had greeted me--realized  her mistake. She had mistaken me for one of the senior volunteers and was extremely taken aback when she did not recognize the face which she was peering into. She comically, and in a very spastic manner ran away into her hutch in the center of her enclosure. It took her a while to summon the courage to come back out, but the longer that we worked in her area the more confident she became. Though she was never up close and personal with us--aside from my initial interaction with her--she was exceptionally curious and would often hover over us as we worked beside her enclosure.

Kalysi-watching us work. Day 2

      The job took about an hour and a half. We did the best that we could, but with no tools and only our hands to pull up weeds, sticker bushes and trees, our ability was limited. I feel that this lack of resources is extremely indicative of the lack of funding that Wolf Run has. Without funding, they cannot provide the proper tools for volunteers to adequately care for the animals or maintain their enclosures. It's sad to think about, especially because the animals are ultimately the ones who suffer, and they have no control over their situation.


  Day 3
        Day 3 was significantly better than Day 2. There were four of us volunteers going to work together on a beautiful day. Savannah again had us weeding, but this time we were not assigned an are in the enclosures. However, one of the areas that Savannah had asked us to work on was an area very near an enclosure, different from the one I had been in previously.  The hybrid in that enclosure did not like the work that Paige and I were doing. She would be startled by the sudden movements or loud noises that we made and would being howling and barking at us, almost as if she was asking us to stop and get out. But when I finally stopped, and I took a moment to try to interact with her, the howling stopped. She approached the fence that I was resting my hand on allowed me to pet her nose and face. It was a very intimate moment that showed the vulnerability that these animals face. She was torn between her wolf instinct, telling her not to trust me, and her dog instinct, telling her to love me. It was a good experience and the work that we accomplished that day was great, however, to repeat this point, it would have been much better if we were able to utilize proper tools. But maybe that will have to be a project for the future.

The piles of work that we accomplished: Day 3