After the wolves were moved into the enclosure, we made it a practice to stay away from them while they were eating their main meal of the day or when they were chewing on a bone, but when they were six months old, one or the other of them would elect to carry food over to us and to eat it at our feet, showing that they knew we would not try to take it from them. We appreciated the trust.
Occasionally, when not particularly hungry, Tundra or Taiga will come out of the barn ostentatiously dangling a piece of meat while looking at us with a grin and a twinkle in the eyes. This is an invitation to play. If we don’t immediately respond, they will bounce in front of us, toss the food in the air, and deliberately allow it to fall onto the ground a yard or two from where we are standing; then they will bow over it, stretching their front legs forward and lowering their heads, then lifting them to look us in the eyes. If we make a move toward the offering, whichever one is soliciting our attention will grab the meat, usually a chicken wing, and dash away in high glee, chased by us and by its sibling. The object of this is the game, not the prize, for if the one being chased drops the food, or even a stick, the other does not try to pick it up. If one of us reaches for it, however, we are allowed to take it, but we are then expected to dangle it above the heads of both wolves, who leap repeatedly for it. After some moments, we allow one to snatch it from us (they are always careful to avoid closing their jaws on our hands now), and the chase resumes anew. The wolves will keep up the play so long as we are willing to chase them, but inasmuch as they can attain a rate of about twenty-five miles an hour when going at full speed, we clumsy humans can never catch up. Indeed, when we are too greatly outdistanced, the one carrying the prize will stop and wait for us, sometimes even running up to us, dropping the prize, and quickly snatching it up again before we can take it.
During our first summer together, the four of us gradually became a close-knit family, our relationship based on love, trust, understanding, and respect, each giving wholeheartedly and taking as amply from the others. During our walks through the forests that surround our home, the zest for life that Tundra and Taiga always demonstrate, the curiosity they display, and the intelligence they apply to their explorations of the wilderness never fail to elicit similar feelings from us. No matter how trying a day either one of us may have had, or how depressing has been news of the outside world, our boisterous, often fatiguing walk (which Sharon calls “our daily drag!”) invariably renews us. And afterwards, back in the enclosure, during the quiet times of loving and communion in which our civilized barriers are swept aside by the primordial essence of the wolves, our physical contact with them puts us back in touch with the wildness that is latent in all humans. Each evening, Sharon and I leave the enclosure renewed and tranquil.
In early September our local veterinarian, Dr. Laurie Brown, came to give the pups a vaccination against rabies, parvovirus, and distemper, a precaution taken because we did not want to run the risk of disease, which had killed Toivo, Siskiwit, and the various pups in Ishpeming. Of the three diseases, parvo and distemper were of the most concern, and I only consented to the rabies vaccine when Laurie assured us that it was made from a killed virus, which ensures that an animal will not become a carrier of the disease, as has occasionally occurred when some dogs and wolves have been injected with a live-virus vaccine.
Laurie Brown is a slight young woman who more than makes up for her lack of size by dexterity, excellent qualifications, and a thing that I prize above all in a veterinarian-a deep concern for all animals. She had not previously had anything to do with wolves, but when I telephoned her a few days after we returned home with the pups, she unhesitatingly came to examine them. (Not all veterinarians will treat wild animals.) The way in which she handled the wolflings, and the immediate, positive response that she elicited from them, told me that I had chosen our veterinarian wisely. She immediately discovered that Tundra had a small umbilical hernia and that Taiga had a vaginal infection. Both are common in very young canids, and she felt that Taiga’s problem would clear up on its own accord – which it did – and that in all likelihood Tundra’s hernia would also correct itself as he grew older. Otherwise, she found them in excellent health. Later, when I realized that they had roundworms, Laurie supplied medication for them.
When it came time to vaccinate them, since she had by then visited them a number of times, she had no scruples about entering the enclosure. Wisely, she immediately leaned against the barn wall so as to stay on her feet while being effusively greeted by her patients, who could both now put their paws on her shoulders. When the joyous lupine hellos had been delivered, she injected each one while I held the patient as a precaution. We need not have worried. Tundra, the biggest, who then weighed forty-nine pounds, whined a little, but this was because I held his scruff too tightly, as though I were reprimanding him. He took no notice of the needle prick. Taiga, who is always eager to be fussed over and lies down at any excuse, was too busy licking and mouthing my hand to notice that she had been given an injection. Indeed, even though I have the experience gained with Matta and Wa, I am still astonished at the toughness of our two wolves. They bite each other quite hard during play, they smack heads together with loud thunks, and they bang into things, but no matter how hard they strike an object, which at times is the leg or knee of one of us, they don’t even pause in their stride. We do, however! The head of a wolf, I am sure, is made of cannonball iron.
A few days after the vaccination, my daughter Alison arrived from England to spend two weeks with us. Alison, a policewoman with the Surrey Constabulary, had never seen a wolf, but having read my books and talked with me by telephone about Tundra and Taiga, she had no hesitation about entering the enclosure the morning after her arrival. Beforehand, however, I explained that the pups would mob her, as they had mobbed every one of the eighty-seven visitors they had received since their arrival at our property.
They would stand upright so as to give her face a few licks, I predicted, so she should use her arms to ward off their large and heavy paws, which are capable of scratching if they come into contact with bare skin. I also told my daughter that I would intervene once the two had been allowed to welcome her in proper wolf fashion, after which they would certainly want to get to know her personal odour.
Usually, whenever we take a visitor down to the enclosure, the pups gather at the fence and wait, exhibiting excitement by dancing and climbing over one another. As we get close to them, they stand upright and stick their heads through the large mesh wire that is joined to the small aperture fencing four feet above the ground. At this point, I will allow a visitor to pat them and to accept a lick or two if I am sure that the newcomer is not nervous.
I was somewhat surprised, therefore, when Tundra and Taiga exhibited calm behaviour as Alison and I approached them. Indeed, they were acting as though I were coming on my own, treating our joint arrival as a routine visit from their Alpha human male. When we got to the wire they stood up and licked me as they usually do, but without the exuberance they reserve for Sharon, and certainly without the super-exuberance with which they greet strangers. Alison patted the two heads; the wolves responded by licking her hand and wagging their tails, then they dropped back to all fours. Alison asked to be let inside.
When I take a visitor into the enclosure, I usually let him or her go first if the wolves show that they have accepted the newcomer. My reason for this is that they are so anxious to get to a visitor that if I enter first, they are liable to slip past me and get out so as to greet the stranger in proper style. Thus I bring up the rear and close the gate while Tundra and Taiga are mobbing their guest. By the time I have done this, the visitor has been well and truly licked and I bring the mobbing to an end, whereupon the wolves start to sniff their new friend, eager to become more intimate with the person’s scent, in the process causing some individuals considerable embarrassment when they stick their noses in very private places. But when Alison preceded me into the enc
losure, neither wolf leaped up to lick her. Instead, they behaved exactly as they behave toward me. I was astonished, especially when each of them flopped down at my daughter’s feet and assumed the submissive pose, ears back, tail between the legs, one rear leg lifted and urine dribbling freely. These are signs of respect, recognition that they are in the presence of an Alpha and are happy to offer homage. Seeing their behaviour, I told my daughter to squat down and stroke them. What followed left no doubt in my mind that Tundra and Taiga looked upon Alison as an Alpha female. They treated her in exactly the same way that they treat me.
Until that moment, I had not devoted much thought to my relationship with Tundra and Taiga. I realized, of course, that they looked upon me as the Alpha male of our human-wolf pack, but my automatic appointment to this “office” had developed so naturally that I had simply accepted the role and its attendant responsibilities in much the same way that, many years earlier, I had accepted fatherhood. Indeed, if I thought about the matter at all, I suppose that I considered myself the surrogate male parent of the wolves, who, just as they looked upon Sharon as they would have viewed their natural mother, showed by their behaviour that they considered me to be their lupine progenitor. Because of these things, they came to me for protection when startled, they solicited my affection when they felt in need of it, they accepted me as a referee when one was necessary to settle those disputes that arose between them, and they showed that they were aware of my pack standing by according me the same level of respect that they would have given an Alpha of their own species. As a human child looks to its father in these matters, so Tundra and Taiga looked to me, and for my part, I behaved toward them as though they were, indeed, my own issue. I still do. So does Sharon. The fact that between ourselves we refer to them matter-of-factly as “our kids” is, I believe, sufficient indication of our feelings toward them.
Just as human children need the point and counterpoint of a mother-father relationship, so it is with wolf children. Similarly, when the young of either species begin to mature, the bonds that have been formed by family ties strengthen if they have been tempered by mutual respect, fairness, and understanding. From the start, Sharon and I loved our adopted wolf children, and they returned our love. We played with them, laughed with them, worried about them, made sure they were properly cared for, and, when necessary, disciplined them, a role that fell mostly to me, but one that Sharon also accepted when necessary, although as a human female of a most gentle disposition, my wife was never quite able to bring to her reprimands the level of sternness exhibited by a mother wolf. Nevertheless, Sharon’s gentle ways have always had great influence with Tundra and Taiga; they may at times take liberties with her that they would not take with me, but they surely love her deeply, a fact they demonstrate without fail every time Sharon enters the enclosure. Taiga, the high-strung, mischievous extrovert, always leaps up to lick Sharon’s face and will not be satisfied until my wife crouches and presents her face so that it can be properly tongued, an action that Sharon recently described this way: “When Taiga licks you, it’s like you’re a car going through a car wash? Her tongue feels like it’s two feet long. Tundra is the dainty one!”
My wife has an inherent wit that invariably demonstrates deep insight. When I am bright enough to see beyond the comic aspects of her impromptu quips, I invariably discover that Sharon has managed to sum up in a single joking sentence a series of truths that I have been searching for in vain, her comment here being a case in point. Sharon made the remark after I had typed a rather disjointed account of the ways in which our wolves lick us. I rejected what I had written and went to discuss my problem with Sharon. Her reply put matters into perspective, because the way in which each wolf licks also demonstrates the differences in their personalities.
Of the two, Taiga is the one that must be disciplined on a regular basis, while Tundra rarely needs to be reprimanded. Taiga continues to be exuberant and mischievous, whereas Tundra is deeply thoughtful, controlled, and exceptionally calm. He, too, has a sense of humour and enjoys a prank, but he never allows himself to be carried away by excitement and he is almost always self-controlled. Taiga is always ready to play, a trait reflected in her twinkling gaze, but all too frequently she does not know when to stop. Similarly, when she licks, she does indeed give one a “car wash.” When she howls, she gapes wide and her voice is shrill, unmodulated, and downright discordant; she is guileful, eager, loving, and very beautiful.
Tundra, although he plays readily enough, seems to spend a lot of time in thought. Unlike his sister’s definitely slanting eyes, his are round and capable of directing extremely penetrating stares at whatever individual or object attracts his attention. They are remarkable eyes, serene yet quizzical, direct but not threatening, and when they change and show the latent humour that is never too far below the wolf’s consciousness, they sparkle to such an extent that I must always chuckle. When Tundra licks, he does so with the very tip of his tongue-little, moist dabs that are repeated three or four times in quick succession and are then abruptly stopped, after which he sniffs at us, his nose often resting on chin or cheek, while he gazes into our eyes. Unlike his sister’s voice, Tundra’s is deep, well modulated, long drawn, and emerges from a mouth that is tunnelled, his lips forming an almost perfect circle that has a diameter of probably two inches.
Taiga is easily excited, but she is also quite sensitive; she demonstrates this whenever I must discipline her and she tells me most clearly that she is sorry. Her entire demeanour suggests that she will never trespass again, but minutes later she will probably do just that. So I must discipline her, my tone of voice being generally sufficient to control her behaviour, but at times I must scruff-shake her, or even bite her muzzle. Then she is most contrite and wants to be loved; so I love her, stroking her body, scratching her neck and ears, and, cupping her face in both hands, kissing her gently on the lips. After that, up she bounces, joyful and probably triumphant! And the chances are that the whole scene will have to be replayed again. . . and again. In fact, I am beginning to suspect that she transgresses in order to get the extra loving that always follows the reprimand.
Tundra is, I believe, even more sensitive than his sister. On one occasion, when I had to slap his nose and speak sternly to him, he refused to approach me for two whole days! Indeed, I had to go out of my way to get him to forgive me, but when he did, his behaviour told me that he was very glad to be friends again. He pressed himself against me, took my hand gently in his mouth, wetted himself a few times, then lay down so I could rub his body, his eyes half-closed in ecstasy. Some days later, after Taiga had been trying to steal a bone that he was chewing and he had finally warned her off by emitting one of his deep growls, I went to walk past him and he growled at me and actually made a threatening motion with his mouth, aiming at my leg, though he “pulled his punch.” My reaction was quick and positive, if exceptionally mild. I took off my old, well-travelled, and much-prized bush hat and hit him with it, thereby ending the headgear’s long life, for the brim and the crown parted company. Tundra had clearly realized his trespass, for he abandoned his bone and beat a very hasty retreat, his tail tucked between his legs, his ears pasted to his head. Aware that his threat reaction had been prompted by Taiga’s pestering rather than by my accidental approach, I squatted and called him to me. On this occasion he responded immediately, running up, giving me several dab-licks, and then lying down so I could fuss over him. Since then, I have not had to discipline him again, and nowadays, whenever I have occasion to scold Taiga, Tundra dashes up and joins me, roughing up his sister until she whines in submission.
These things characterized Tundra and Taiga and our relationship with them even at the time that Alison came to visit and was greeted by the wolves in the manner I have described, a pattern of behaviour so different from that which they had always exhibited to all other visitors that I at first believed it was coincidental, that for some reason they had not been in their usual boisterous
mood when confronted by yet another stranger. But after somewhat more than an hour, during which I removed myself from the immediate vicinity of my daughter and the two wolves, their behaviour remained constant – there was no doubt that they were treating her as an Alpha. Was it possible, I wondered, that the wolves were actually able to detect, the bloodline that Alison and I shared? I rejected this at first; it just seemed too incredible. Then I reconstructed my behaviour as I had walked alongside my daughter toward the enclosure. Had I, in some way, signalled our special status to the wolves? I pondered this all morning and through lunch, and decided in the end that I had treated Alison exactly as I treated other visitors prior to introducing them to the wolves: I had talked about their differences, explained their behaviour, and told her how she should react to them, which was precisely what I had done on eighty-seven previous occasions.
When it was time to walk the wolves, I suggested that Alison might like to lead one of them, replacing Sharon for the first time. But I did not discuss with either my wife or my daughter the unusual way in which Tundra and Taiga had reacted to Alison, feeling that to do so would prejudice Alison’s future behaviour and, frankly, not really accepting the possibility that the wolves could indeed sense the genetic lineage that my daughter and I shared. Pretending that I had something to do in my office before we went for the walk with the wolves, I asked Sharon to instruct Alison in the proper way to handle Taiga, who was usually led by my wife; my reason for making the request was that I did not want to risk influencing Alison in any way. The leads that we use are spring-loaded, extending to a maximum of sixteen feet, but retracting automatically when they go slack. Each is also fitted with a brake so a dog or wolf, in our case-can be held at any distance from two feet up to maximum extension. They are easy to use, but given the nature and exuberance of the wolves, there are some tricks that a beginner should know.
In Praise of Wolves Page 20