If you missed the first two installments of this report, please go to Texas Rescue, from our Winter Newsletter and Texas Rescue - Chapter 2 in our Spring Newsletter..

The Saga Continues. . .

Our last installment of this major undertaking ended with the relocation of all of the animals from the old NAWA site. Two animals had been relocated to Colorado, five animals were placed at permanent homes in Texas and eight were placed at a temporary location in Texas while their permanent homes were built in Colorado. This chapter concludes the rescue as the eight are moved to Colorado.

It was Sunday, August 10, 2003 and time to begin the third and final trip to Texas to bring the remaining eight NAWA animals to their permanent home in Colorado. The crew this time: Indigo Mountain Nature Center (IMNC) founders Sue Cranston and Carol Scarborough, Wolf volunteers Nickie Koeller and myself, Cheryl Budler. Nickie and I departed Fort Collins around 3PM and began the tenacious driving experience that was to dominate the next four days. We made it to IMNC in three and a half hours and bed down there for the night with intentions for an early start.

We were up by six the next morning, anxious to hit the road, but there were a few things that needed to be taken care of and we did not get started until after ten. Then we began the long trip to Orange, Texas, driving for eleven hours and stopping to spend the night at a friend's house. We took our time the next morning as we were not in such a hurry. We made the second part of the trip to Orange in eight hours, but by the time we made it to the wolves foster home, it was dark and pouring down rain so we could not get a good look at the animals. It would have to wait until morning.

With a few things to take care of, we got started by ten the next morning. We still needed to get the transport crates to the enclosures, pick up the tranquilizers from the local veterinarian, and wait for the transport driver and his driving partner to arrive with the hired truck and trailer. There was also the issue of the heat. As you may imagine, Texas in August is not pleasant fall weather. The previous week temperatures were in the 100 degree range with high humidity. That kind of heat combined with the stress of being darted, the health of the animals was potentially in jeopardy. Lucky for us, the spirits must have been watching over us because the temperature seemed to be hovering around ninety degrees that day, with some cloud cover. We felt we would have plenty of daylight, as long as it didn't rain, to get the eight animals safely darted, in their crates and in the truck if we got started by three. However, since we all know how things happen, we decided to get started around one o'clock.

We arrived at the foster home and saw that the animals looked great. They had all gained weight, built up their muscles, were bright, alert and enjoying the space they had in their enclosures. We decided to start with the four pack since they were the most difficult to get down the last time. They were considerably more difficult to dart this time around as they had more room to avoid me. Yana Usdi proved to be the most taxing of the four; the darts seemed to bounce off him and he also appeared to have a slight limp. Finally we got them all down and in their crates. Once Usdi was out and relaxed, Sue Cranston was able to determine he had a disk out in his spine. Fortunately, it slipped easily back into place. While all of this was going on, I was moving onto the next enclosure.

continue - - ->