While I stayed in West Yellowstone this week, I took an afternoon and explored the Grizzly & Wolf Discovery Center, a non-profit wildlife park dedicated to educating the public about the grizzly bear and the grey wolf.
The non-profit GWDC was formed in 1999 in order to purchase the center from a private company and to focus the center on education rather than entertainment; the site is now an Association of Zoos and Aquariums certified facility.
The bears and wolves at the center have been relocated from a variety of areas, most having been labeled "problems" and would probably have been killed otherwise. The exhibits tell each animals' story, and also provide a wealth of information about wild bears and wolves.
GWDC offers wonderful viewing opportunities of these magnificent animals, along with a number of excellent educational activities. I spent hours just watching the animals-- the wolves trotting friskily around the park, the grizzlies playfully wrestling. Sam and Illie are the bears pictured; the wolves are the Gallatin Pack. Sam and Illie wandered into an Alaskan fishing village in 1996 after their mother disappeared and were soon relocated to GWDC.
