Canid conversations: Wild Spirit Wolf Sanctuary offers a variety of tours to help visitors learn about its residents

During a visit to the Wild Spirit Wolf Sanctuary, one might run across any number of members of the canid family.

The Ramah-based sanctuary is currently home to 78 animals, which includes wolves, wolfdogs, New Guinea singing dogs, coyotes and red foxes. While that is essentially maximum capacity, it’s also par for the course.

“We are actually the largest canid-specific sanctuary in all of North America,” said Katie Forbis, Wild Spirit social media and marketing coordinator. “Between the animals that we take in and the rescues that we help facilitate and network, we are one of, if not the top rescuing organization for canids in the entire country.”

Wild Spirit receives anywhere between 300 and 400 intake requests from people seeking placement for their animals on an annual basis. Whether these requests are accepted depends on a number of factors, including genetics, urgency of the situation and personality.

“From there, if it is more of a domestic dog or something that would not be a good fit for this type of sanctuary, we will provide as many resources as we can to aid in helping that animal,” Forbis said. “Even if they’re not a good fit for our organization, obviously they are still in a moment of crisis.”

Once a canid is accepted into Wild Spirit, it will live out the rest of its life at the sanctuary.

“We’re a permanent placement facility. None of our animals are eligible to be released to the wild because they’re all born and raised in captivity,” Forbis said. “They don’t have any skills to survive out in the wild.”

Visitors to the sanctuary have the opportunity to see some of these animals up close and personal through a variety of on-site tours, which help fund the mission of Wild Spirit, a non-profit organization. Part of that mission is to educate the public.

“We want people to be informed about these animals,” Forbis said. “My personal favorite is when we get kids that come in, and I get to share my love and passion with them. And help foster a life-long respect and understanding of these (animals).”

While there are twice-daily guided tours that occur during the Wild Spirit’s operating hours that don’t require reservations, some of the specialty options may provide better opportunities for interaction. All the specialty tours require registration at least 48 hours in advance. One popular option is the Twilight Tours.

“Since wolves are a crepuscular species, they’re most active during the early morning and then the evening time,” Forbis said. “People get to come in and see them when they’re most active, most playful, most energetic.

“As far as how close they can get, we do have barrier fences since we are a USDA-compliant facility … It’s like maybe four or five feet from the fence. People get to see them up close.”

Meanwhile, Camping with the Wolves serves as an extension of the Twilight Tours, as visitors can stay at Wild Spirit’s campground and be serenaded by the rescues overnight. Another add-on is the Feeding Tour, which allows guests to learn how to feed the animals the following morning.

Only about one-third of the sanctuary’s population can be found on the tour path because not all the rescues are fit for human interaction.

Canid conversations: Wild Wolf Spirit Sanctuary offers a variety of tours to help visitors learn about its residents

“As we rescue, a lot of these (canids) are very fearful,” Forbis said. “They don’t like people because they haven’t come from good situations. Seeing a bunch of strangers will stress them out. We strive to put the animals that won’t be stressed out about that.”

There are other intriguing specialty tours, as well. In the works is a photography tour that will allow visitors the chance to learn how to take pictures of wildlife from a professional photographer. There’s also a VIP tour with the Wild Spirit executive director, where attendees get to ask the sanctuary head questions.

Finally, the Keeper for a Day option gives those who think they might want to work with animals as a career the chance to see what the job might really be like.

“This is a really hard field to get into, and it usually doesn’t pay a lot,” Forbis said. “It’s a good experience for people to get that without having to commit their full lives to it.”