Wolves in Gardner, Colorado seem to be doing quite well amidst the winter weather. So well, in fact, that at least one of them was able to find the time to become a local celebrity thanks to a well-timed photobomb.
Wolves aren’t exactly plentiful in the “Centennial State.” The wild population is estimated to be around 45 total wolves, and that’s including 20 pups that were born just this year. Colorado has been making a real effort to reintroduce the wild canines into the state. Then there’s also the captive population, which is growing through wolf sanctuaries.
One in particular that’s important to this story is “Mission: Wolf,” which describes itself as a sanctuary for unwanted, captive-born wolves:
“Mission: Wolf is a solar-powered nature center that provides a sanctuary for unwanted captive-born wolves and horses. We offer experiential education to inspire the public to become stewards of the Earth. Since 1988, we have provided lifelong care for over 125 wolves and 25 horses, facilitated experiential wolf education with over 1 million people and preserved over 550 acres of pristine sub-alpine habitat.”
In other words, Mission: Wolf is doing a lot of great work.
They’ve even got a couple of live cams on their property, and one of them recently provided some footage that went viral. KWGN2 – a news station in Colorado – was going about their daily morning news broadcast when they threw it over to a live shot at the wolf sanctuary in Gardner, Colorado.
That ended up being a fruitful decision, because a wolf immediately ran into the shot, and caused one of the anchors to excitedly describe the moment as feeling starstruck:
“We have a wolf on our live cam out in Gardner, Colorado. I am starstruck… look at that. We’ve just got to sit on this.”
And that they did.
For a couple of uninterrupted moments, all of the news in the world was pushed to the wayside, and this beautiful wolf was the main story. It was in a very playful mood, bouncing around in the snow and in taking in the beautiful view of the Rocky Mountains off in the distance.
The wolf briefly dug in the snow before hopping down and rolling around in the snow. That led the other morning anchor to relate the wild animal’s behavior to that of our furry friends:
“He’s rolling around just like your dog at home.”
In other dog-like move, the wolf picked up an item that those on the broadcast referred to as “a toy” and “breakfast.” It proceeded to walk right by the camera once more, before exiting out of the shot to continue its daily wolf activities. The video itself was cool, but it’s the reactions from everyone at Channel 2 News that really make it a fun watch.
They were thrilled to have witnessed the wolf, and captioned the video on their official social media channels with this:
“We didn’t have ‘wolf walks into live shot’ on our bingo card this morning on CW2 Daybreak but WOW are we thankful! Turns out the camera lives at Mission: Wolf Sanctuary in Gardner, CO!”
