I have a lot of catching up to do on my personal blog, as well as with GeekMom, as well as a guest post for my friend The Country Cook’s blog later this week. We’ve been quite busy with wrapping up our basement finish project, and the typical kids’ activities are cruising along nicely too.

Later this morning I have my annual Air Force fitness test. This year I’m taking it at the AF Academy, which should be interesting: the fitness center is at 7000′ elevation. I know I will pass, at least.

In the meantime, let’s get going on our latest Colorado Discovery trip to the Colorado Wolf and Wildlife Center.

Jacob’s BFF-in-Colorado had a birthday trip to the center, which is located in Divide, Colorado. Divide is about 40 miles west of Colorado Springs. It took us about an hour to get there on U.S. 24 west of the Rampart Range.

The Colorado Wolf and Wildlife Center trip was very similar to our October 2012 trip to the Seacrest Wolf Preserve in Chipley, Florida…except for the much colder weather in Colorado.

The center offers daily tours, with prices ranging from $10 adult/ $7 children to much higher for photography and VIP tour experiences. They also have a full moon feeding tour in the evening that includes a fun-sounding bonfire. Kids need to be 8 years old to participate in the full moon experience, so we look forward to doing that with our sons soon. Check the link for their current calendar of tours.

We took the standard daytime tour at noon on a Friday. The kids had no school that day, so it was nice to go when it was less-crowded. The tour lasted about an hour.

It starts with a discussion of the ground rules. If you see my tips from our Seacrest trip last year, the rules were similar. No loose objects, comfortable walking shoes, etc. However, the CWWC has strict rules about photography: no tripods and no lenses that zoom in greater than 70mm. I had my 55-200mm telephoto lens in my camera case, but I assured the tour guide that I wouldn’t use it and she was happy enough with that.

The first site we visited were the two fox pens. There were two species of fox living at the CWWC: swift foxes and red foxes. The two groups don’t get along, so while the two pens were once joined by a bridge, the bridge had to be blocked off to keep them from fighting.

After a few minutes observing the foxes (they’re quite cute!) we walked to the wolf enclosures. The wolves live in approximately 1 acre enclosures and are in small groups. Their groupings are completely dependent on how well they get along with each other. I was surprised to learn that not all of the groupings are monogamous couples. Many are older males with younger females (in a father/daughter type of relationship) as well as a couple of older females with younger males. In a couple of the pens there were three wolves living together.

The wolves get to use the space however they feel fit, so there are many underground dens.

In Florida, all of the wolves lived together in one pack and we visitors walked among them…side by side. In Colorado we were always separated from the wolves with a fence. Also, while the Seacrest Preserve invests time in reproducing (which is why we were able to visit with the babies last year), the CWWC tries not to let their wolves mate. Because of the CWWC’s ability to easily isolate wolves if they’re infirm or have attitude problems, it turns out that the CWWC has taken in several of Seacrest’s wolves…because they otherwise might have be injured by the Seacrest pack.

The kids really enjoyed walking among the wolves, even if fences separated them. We also had a bunch of magpies following us…because our tour guide had a baggie filled with raw meat for the animals. Several times I saw the magpies swoop down and grab the morsels of meat before the wolves could get to them. I got a kick out of that.

Enjoy some more pictures from our tour. And be sure to scroll down for the You Tube video of the wolves howling!

 

 

Enjoy!