The McCleery Discovery Center will have a chance to share Kane’s rich history with a visitor this weekend.
That’s because Diane Gallegos, executive director of Tenino, Wash.-based wolf sanctuary, Wolf Haven International, will be in Kane Nov. 10-11. She wants to learn more about the history of the buffalo wolves — aka lobo wolves — that found protection in Kane nearly 100 years ago.
Decades ago, Dr. E. H. McCleery began gathering buffalo wolves to keep on his property in Kane to protect the species from extinction. The remaining wolves now live at a facility in Montana.
Earlier this year, Wolf Haven International acquired the McCleery Buffalo Wolf Foundation in Bridger, Mo., along with the 33 remaining captive buffalo wolves.
While the wolves no longer reside in Kane, visitors to the McCleery Discovery Center at the Kane Depot can see McCleery artifacts and even a taxidermy mount of a wolf.
“I’m excited to have Diane coming to Kane and learning more about the history of Dr. McCleery’s wolves, and reviewing the collection/artifacts at the Center,” said Richard Bly, executive director of the McCleery Discovery Center. “The significance of this colony of wolves is that they are the only buffalo wolves in the world.”
Visitors to the historic Kane Memorial Chapel on Saturday will be able to hear more about how the lobo wolves are doing.
Gallegos said she is “happy and excited to present a program at the Kane Memorial Chapel at 7 p.m. Saturday and update the community on the pack.”
“I am bringing along a video and photographs of the pack and their newborn pups,” she noted.
The pups were born in June in Bridger.
“The pups are very healthy,” Gallegos added.
Bly welcomes the public to the free presentation, but noted that seating is limited at the chapel.
He provided a little more background on the famous wolves.
“Canis Lupus Nubilus is their scientific subspecies and they have been extinct in the wild since the early 1930s,” said Bly. “Dr. McCleery had acquired wolf pups over a 10-year period starting in 1920, protected them in his backyard on Tionesta Avenue in Kane, and today, nearly 98 years later, there are still 33 wolves in the pack.”
Wolf Haven reported in June that while the captive buffalo wolves will no longer be allowed to breed, the non-profit organization will preserve the DNA of the buffalo wolf lineage through cryopreservation.
Wolf Haven International has a mission to conserve and protect wolves and their habitat. Over its 36-year existence, Wolf Haven has rescued and provided sanctuary for more than 250 animals. It currently houses 57 wolves and two coyotes at the Washington sanctuary.
Wolf Haven participates in Species Survival Plan programs — partnerships between captive facilities, the Association of Zoos and Aquariums and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service — for two endangered species: the Mexican gray wolf and the red wolf.
