The afternoon went smoothly until we got to a 15-year-old animal (Timbre) with a history of kidney problems. Sue, Pat and Cheryl, now known as "The Team," discussed the situation and decided it was unsafe to tranquilize the animal. With guidance from the team, Tina leashed and muzzled this quiet wolf so blood could be drawn safely and vaccines and antibiotics given. Thanks to her gentle nature, treatment proceeded without any problems.

Then the next pair of animals allowed us to hand inject one (Spirit) while the more hesitant male (Yukon) had to be darted. The male was in very poor condition and was known to have severe hip dysplasia. He had a large lick sore on one of his back legs that we were told was a pain-displacement sore. We cleaned and treated his wound, inoculated him and drew blood. Sue and Tina then placed him sternally and adjusted his spine. The following day he showed remarkable improvement.

Darkness halted any further attempts that day, so we hauled all the drugs and much of the supplies back out of the swamp and to the truck. We headed back to the hotel for the night to update and complete the medical records, catch up on the never ending emails and make phone calls.

Day 6 (Sunday, February 2nd): We got off to a late start since we spent most of the morning trying to locate a veterinarian that could come out to the site. We were concerned about the high temperatures (ranging from 103 to 107.3, normal range is from 100 to 102.5) and the condition of the blood. Unfortunately, since it was Sunday, we were unable to find a vet that was willing to visit the site that day; however we were in contact with several vets via telephone.

We began darting animals around noon. The day began on a depressing note when the first animal we tranquilized, an alpha female (Anasazi) with personality plus that had already touched the hearts of the team members, tested positive for heartworms.

The next few pens proceeded without any problems. We then moved on to a high content female (Duchess) that had lost her entire pack to distemper, and were able to hand inject her with no difficulty. After performing the now routine exam, tests and medication administration we ran into some trouble. Her respiration and heart rate began to drop so we quickly administered the reversal drug and waited for her to respond. She was slow to respond so we administered intravenous atropine to help her heart rate and began CPR. Within less than a minute she leapt to her feet and began her usual pacing. The entire team and the volunteers were in tears and it took everyone a good thirty minutes to compose themselves enough to proceed to the next pen.

We moved onto the "four pack" (Aiyana, Nahima, Yana Usdi, & Welela) from there. These animals were highly unsocialized and stressed. They had previously shown clinical signs of distemper, but they failed to develop the full blown virus. Due to the high stress level of these animals we proceeded with extreme caution. All four animals were successfully darted; we backed off and waited for the drugs to take hold. After forty minutes, with the animals still running around and not down enough for us to work on, we attempted to dart with a second dose. These attempts proved futile as well, they looked and acted as if nothing had been administered. As darkness settled over the swamp we headed home once again leaving six animals remaining to be treated for the next day. The team was exhausted; mentally, physically, and emotionally but still had medical files to update, and dozens of emails to answer and phone calls to make.

Day 7 (Monday, February 3rd): We started out the day by once again darting the "four pack." And once again, all but one failed to go down with the drugs we were using. The smallest female did go down and we were able to perform the appropriate medical care. We contacted Dr. Heidi Zinser, DVM and explained what was going on. She was kind enough to rearrange her entire afternoon schedule to come out to the facility with her technician Debbie and assist with the remaining animals. While we waited for Dr. Heidi to arrive, we moved on to the final pair (Beowulf & Frackette) that had actually survived full-blown distemper. One was hand injected and the last darted. We found it ironic that the two animals that had been the most ill were some of the only animals that had normal temperatures.

Dr. Heidi arrived and with a class three drug, that had been unavailable to the team, the remaining three wolves were darted and successfully tranquilized under her supervision. The animals went down almost immediately and were inoculated and blood was drawn.

By this time results of the blood tests were beginning to come in. Unfortunately, the diagnostic lab was having trouble getting enough serum to run some of the tests. One possible cause for this was dehydration. Since we knew that the animals had water available, the team felt fecal samples needed to be taken to rule out giardia and other parasites that reduce the ability of the animals to absorb the nutrients they ingest. The volunteers began collecting fecal samples and Dr. Heidi took them, along with the remaining blood samples, back to her clinic for testing.

With all of the darting, testing and medical work completed on all twenty animals, the team breathed a huge sigh of relief. We headed out with a few of the volunteers to have dinner and a margarita (or 2!). When we returned to the hotel, we found out that we had received a request from The Association of Sanctuaries (TAOS) to cross the state to San Antonio to evaluate 15+ potential wolf-dogs that had been abandoned by their owner. We were beginning to wonder if we were ever going to make it home to Colorado!

Day 8 (Tuesday, February 4th): We returned to the compound to find the wolves responding to the antibiotics. With the exception of the terrified and stressed few that we are not sure will ever recover from the harsh lives they have lived and the horrible things they have seen, the animals greeted us with bright eyes and positive attitudes. Most wagged their tails and happily took treats from our hands. It is our sincerest hopes that these animals will be able to live out the remainder of their lives with all the love, dignity and respect they deserve.

Currently Wolf and IMNC have found a sanctuary outside of San Antonio that is willing to allow half-acre enclosures to be built for each group of animals where they may live out the rest of their lives.

Our sincere thanks goes out to Pam, Jerry, Lisa, Kathy, Doug & Kathy, Tina, Lori, Caroline, Tammy, Dan, Sam, Heidi, Debbie and all of the former volunteers and individuals who have helped to keep these beautiful animals alive.

During this ordeal "The Team" was giving the rundown of their day's events to Frank back at Wolf, every night. Frank was then writing and sending out news reports via the internet to the Wolf email list.

"The Team" finally made it home to Colorado on Thursday, February 6th at 10:30 pm. OK, you're saying hooray, job well-done.

Not quite, the next chapter begins. Placement for the animals and ongoing medical care still needed to occur. Although a number of very concerned individuals and groups were trying to get all of this taken care of, it just wasn't happening quickly and efficiently. With one thing and another, Wolf ended up with legal custody of 13 of the animals. We have been writing grant proposals and general emergency support requests. We have also been working to find a location where they can be moved to for permanent sanctuary. As most of you are probably already aware our county has limited the number of animals that we can have at the sanctuary, so moving them here is not an option. We do have some good offers at this point, however we are still searching and keeping our possibilities open.

The offer that we currently believe is the best situation for the animals is at an existing accredited sanctuary in the San Antonio area. We are moving forward with building plans that involve building 6 half-acre enclosures with a perimeter fence. We have established a 4-phase plan that will allow us to build these enclosures a section at a time. This will accommodate moving 8 animals after phase one into 4 -- 50' x 150' areas and then in phase 2 adding on the remaining section of those 4 enclosures to make the total size of each enclosure 150' x 150'. Phase 3 would build the front sections of two additional enclosures and then moving 4 more animals to those. Phase 4 would finish off the 2 final pieces of those enclosures.

The reason for this approach is to get all of the animals out of their current situation as soon as possible. We have temporary placement in the works to accommodate all but 8 of the animals. This will also allow us more time to generate the funds necessary to build all of the enclosures.

Great, you say. Sounds like everything is under control. Not! The way the situation unfolded involved the original custodian, who had been given authority for the well-being of the animals, after they were determined to be abandoned property by the local constable. This individual, in turn, signed over the custody of the animals to three different entities; five animals were signed over to a person named Jean, two other animals were signed over to another person named Lisa and the remaining 13 animals were signed over to Wolf. We were not totally sure why the choices were made the way they were, but we had no say in that process. We focused our efforts on the animals whose well-being was now our responsibility. We had received a signed and notarized document transferring that custodianship. We had our representative in Texas make arrangements with the land owner, where the animals were located, to use the property until we could get all of the animals moved. A document to that effect was in the possession of our representative. We also arranged to have liability insurance taken out on the property and required all volunteers working with the animals to sign a liability release. We then moved forward with working out arrangements to get the animals moved. This was all going pretty well, and allowed time for the general health of the animals to improve while arrangements were being made. On February 21st Jean showed up and took two of the animals in her custody, without any problems.

During these few weeks several individuals approached us wanting permanent custody of a number of the animals. One organization that had been formed by previous volunteers wanted to take four of the groups and put them into 25' x 25' enclosures. Jean, the individual who had custody of 5, wanted custody of one other animal (Duchess) and was going to put her into a 25' x 30' enclosure. The original custodian wanted custody of one animal, but never answered our questions about the size enclosure he was building. We looked for ways to accommodate their desires without compromising the long term well-being of the animals. We recommended to the group, of previous volunteers, that they take fewer animals and build fewer, larger, enclosures (minimum 100' x 100'). We recommended to Jean that, because of her current responsibility for 5 animals, she focus on those and we would find a good place for Duchess. We never heard back from the original custodian.

On Friday, February 28th Lisa showed up and removed the two animals in her custody without incident. That same day, a member of the volunteer group, the original custodian and a constable showed up at the facility and began to remove Duchess saying they were taking her to Jean's. Our representative informed them that this was not an acceptable option for Duchess and that Jean had already been informed of this. He also presented the supposed legal document that gave Wolf custody of Duchess and the document that gave him authority to act on behalf of Wolf. The constable would not recognize the validity of either document. Our representative put Frank on the cell phone with the constable and nothing Frank could say would change his mind either. In fact, at one point, the constable stated that Wolf did have legal custody of the other animals, just not Duchess. He would give no reason why Duchess was different or why Jean was not taking the other three she had a legal right to take. He went on to explain that we should be concerned about getting them moved because in two weeks they would all be killed. They removed Duchess forcibly, screaming, kicking and biting in a two and half hour ordeal.

We were all left wondering what the heck all of this was about. If the constable could overturn what we believed to be legal custody, why were we spending the time and money necessary to get these animals moved to quality homes? Also, where did the two-week deadline come from?

Due to the fact that it was a Friday afternoon, we were unable to get any answers from local authorities. We were now in a do or die situation and could not wait until Monday to get things going. Wolf filed a formal complaint with the Sheriff's department and proceeded to figure out how we would get the remaining animals, which were supposedly in our custody, moved within two weeks. We found a situation where we could build enough enclosures to accommodate the animals temporarily in 50' x 100' enclosures, which could be opened up to 100' x 100' and accommodate 3 of the groups permanently. The cost was going to be $5,000 which Wolf committed and construction began Saturday morning.

After waiting for a couple of days for a response from the Sheriff's department, Wolf finally called them to follow up on the complaint. We were informed that the county attorney had been given the information. A call was placed to the county attorney who was very rude and condescending. The attitude was very accusatory, indicating that all Wolf was concerned about was getting "free" animals so they could raise bunches of money. And, "if you're lookin' for me to say the constable did somethin' wrong, you're gonna be watin' a long time, the constable can do whatever he wants with those animals." Again, we were left wondering what was going on - Texas really is a different country. If it were not for the animals, Wolf would have pulled out of the whole situation.

Our last effort was to see if we could get the constable to give us some assurance and written ownership of the animals. We initiated a call to the constable. He immediately assured us that we did have legal custody of the remaining animals. We indicated that three of them were in the legal custody of Jean. He replied saying that he was told that she couldn't take three of them; all she could take was one, which is why he gave her Duchess. He figured he was at least getting one taken care of. We tried to let him know that we were not going to continue spending the exorbitant amount of time and money to move the animals without some legal document that would insure that there would still be animals to be moved. Finally, when he acknowledged that we had a formal lease on the land he agreed to write a transfer of ownership if we sent him a copy of the lease. He also indicated that there would be no two-week deadline. Although this same information had been verbally communicated to him when he was at the facility, somehow now it made a difference. We weren't going to question any of this - all we wanted was to get these animals safely into good situations. Within a day and a half we had the ownership document and were moving forward again. However, we now had spent $5,000 we hadn't intended to spend, we had ownership of 15 animals not 13 and were still wondering what to do about Duchess. We are communicating with an attorney in respect to the situation with Duchess.

As we move forward we are still considering many good options for the most effective and efficient means of accommodating the needs of all the animals. The 15 animals left are broken up into 7 groups of 2 each and 1 additional older animal. We have firm placement for 5 of those groups and are still discussing situations that would potentially accommodate 5 groups. All of these placements require some time to allow money to be raised and building to occur. We believe however, that this approach will be the most economical and still provide the animals with high-quality permanent homes.

We did postpone the building of the permanent enclosures at the sanctuary in Texas, due to the money that had been committed for the temporary facility. If the majority of our current discussions, for placement, pan out we will not have to build at that sanctuary at all.