Fwd: W.O.L.F. Sanctuary - E-News Update - Emergency At WideAwake

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Wolf

Sanctuary — WideAwake Emergency

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

WideAwake Facility

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Situation

 

Towards the end

of September our paid staff member for the WideAwake Facility* (Karen) showed

up to do daily chores and found that the owner of the property where the

WideAwake Facility is located (Charlie) had brought in animals from a

horrible breeder in a neighboring county.

It turns out that we had been made aware the day before that the State

of Colorado had inspected the breeder’s facility and she again was in

violation of court orders limiting her to no more than four animals. And all of the animals had to be sterilized

and not puppies. She had 14 at the

time of the inspection. After Karen

explained how dangerous this was to the six remaining WOLF animals at

WideAwake, Frank (Cofounder of WOLF) was called by Charlie and he demanded

that Karen and the rest of the WOLF volunteers not return to the WideAwake

Facility until further notice. Charlie’s

acceptance of these animals to hide them out for the breeder, broke a number

of state and county laws, not to mention presented a serious health risk to

the WOLF animals at WideAwake.

 

*To read about the

WideAwake Facility and why it existed you can go to our web site. (click for link – WideAwake 1,

WideAwake 2,

WideAwake 3)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Bad

Breeder’s Facility

 

 

 

 

The Horrible Breeder

 

WOLF Founders (Frank & Pat) had been involved with

this breeder from the time they started WOLF.

She was one of the individuals they visited when seeking information

about wolf-dogs, before they even started WOLF. What they learned from her was what they

needed to fight against. In 1998 Frank

and Pat organized a ‘mash’ (mobile animal surgical hospital) unit

to do neuters at this breeder’s facility. Her breeding facility was out of

control. She had over 80 animals

breeding indiscriminately and in too small of a space. Animals were stressed and on edge and

switching enclosures at will and attacking other animals because of the

over-population. Puppies were being

ripped apart by other dominant females and vet care was non-existent. She had finally agreed to stop breeding and

signed a contract with WOLF to that effect.

 

When the six vets, twelve vet techs and twenty

volunteers showed up for the ‘mash’ operation, there were two

puppies in the bathroom of her house dying from Parvo, there was feces over a

foot deep in some areas, there was urine over ¼” deep in her sun room

and an old male named George dying a slow and horrible death in one of the

enclosures. He was nothing but skin

and bones and bleeding from his nose and could not move – the breeder

would not let us euthanize him. Our

vets were horrified, our volunteers were horrified, we were all horrified,

but we spent the day neutering over 24 males, examining and vaccinating every

animal we could capture. We had also

arranged with a vet hospital in Denver to do spays on all of the females for

free. All the breeder had to do was

take them in.

 

In the weeks that followed the ‘mash’

event, it became very clear that this breeder had no intention of stopping

her breeding. The state vet came in

and did an inspection, took her to court and won a court order requiring her

to stay under 24 animals. WOLF again

assisted to help her get animals placed.

Within a year she was again way above her limits and the state vet

came in and confiscated and killed over 40 animals.

 

Over the next eight

years this pattern repeated a number of times. Certainly this woman was certifiably

insane. She said she loved the

animals, but everything she did was counter to their well-being.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Challenge

 

We obviously could not leave our animals (at WideAwake)

in this type of situation. We had new

half-acre enclosures at the Sanctuary ready for them, but were still trying

to get our County Commissioners to approve our request to add additional

animals. We filed an emergency request

to bring these six remaining animals to the Sanctuary. Being in the middle of the stock market

crash and concerned about more ‘important’ issues to the county,

it was not happening very fast.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Hero

 

Commissioner Randy Eubanks (the commissioner who voted

in favor of our expansion request) understood the “value” these

animals represented to WOLF. He took

the time to understand the nature of the emergency and pushed to get the

other Commissioners to consider and approve an emergency dispensation of the

current limitations WOLF was under.

WOLF is very thankful for his support and that of the other

Commissioners.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Emergency Evacuation

 

WOLF arrived early in the morning at WideAwake. Representatives of the Gilpin County Sheriff’s

Department and the local Animal Control Department were arranged for an in

attendance. Teams of volunteers had

been organized and were ready to catch-up the six remaining WOLF animals from

WideAwake and get them moved to the Sanctuary. The goal was to get the animals moved as

quickly as possible and then to remove WOLF property from the site. Charlie (the property owner) was not very

receptive to our goals. Indeed the

Sheriff’s Deputy was instrumental in allowing us to accomplish most of

our goals. Everything except disabling

the enclosures was accomplished and the six animals were moved, examined and

released into their new habitats at the Sanctuary. They are doing great and we are extremely

grateful to everyone involved in the exercise. They include; Randy Eubanks, The Other

Larimer County Commissioners, The Gilpin County Sheriff’s Department,

The Clear Creek/Gilpin Counties Animal Control and the OUTSTANDING Volunteers

of WOLF.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Please Thank These Individuals

 

RANDY EUBANKS Larimer County Commissioner REubanks

 

Kathay

Rennels Larimer County

Commissioner krennels

Glenn

Gibson Larimer County

Commissioner ggibson

 

Brian

Florez Gilpin

County, Sheriff’s Deputy bflorez

Jon

Bayne Gilpin

County, Undersheriff jbayne

 

Martin

Gitlin Clear

Creek/Gilpin Animal Control mgitlin

 

Patricia

Mount Clear

Creek/Gilpin Animal Control pmount

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Next Challenge

 

Although we are very grateful to all of our County

Commissioners, they have only given us a temporary exemption until the end of

January. We must now figure out how to

deal with this.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We truly appreciate your concern and support

for the wolves.

If you would like more information about WOLF

(click to

request info) (click to visit website)