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A new life for 29 rescued wolf dogs

Lori Lindner, co-founder and president of the Lockwood Valley Animal Rescue Center in the Los Padres National Forest, gets acquainted with one of the 29 wolf dogs she and her husband, Matthew Simmons, relocated to the sanctuary after they were seized from a roadside attraction near Anchorage. See full story

Lori Lindner, co-founder and president of the Lockwood Valley Animal Rescue Center in the Los Padres National Forest, gets acquainted with one of the 29 wolf dogs she and her husband, Matthew Simmons, relocated to the sanctuary after they were seized from a roadside attraction near Anchorage.
See full story  (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

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The animals were seized by authorities as evidence in an ongoing criminal investigation and scheduled for destruction before the Lockwood Valley Animal Rescue Center intervened.

Still a bit suspicious

Wolf dogs look warily toward their lunch at the sanctuary. “It was heartbreaking to see so many of these animals on chains,” said Lindner, 46. “Wolf dogs are products of human vanity and machismo.”
See full story  (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

Restless energy

A newly relocated wolf dog casts a shadow while pacing in its enclosure.The Humane Society of the United States has taken a hard stand against wolf dogs as unpredictable, destructive and rarely trainable. At least 16 states ban them, and California and 20 other states have restrictions on ownership.
See full story  (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

Acclimation process

Lindner helps a wolf dog get acclimated to its new environment. Crossing wolves, which have been bred by nature for millions of years to be wild, with dogs, which have been genetically manipulated for thousands of years to serve humans, creates a conflict of innate behaviors.
See full story  (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

New living quarters

Veteran Stanley McDonald, left, and Chris Craft measure wood for a gate they are working on in newly constructed enclosures for the relocated hybrids. “I see a lot of myself in these animals,” said McDonald, who was diagnosed with severe post-traumatic stress disorder after he returned from the Gulf War and Operation Desert Storm. “Like them, I was lost and troubled until I came here. Now, there’s a lot of healing going on.”
See full story  (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

A close-up greeting

Matthew Simmons gets a nip on his goatee from one of the wolf dogs. “No more pain,” said Simmons, 38, of the hybrids. “They’re getting along amazingly well, although there have been a few tussles in which one girl pushed another girl around. But overall, they honestly seem to understand that this is a better environment than where they came from.”
See full story  (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

Feeding time

Coast Guard veteran Lillyin Love tries to coax newly relocated wolf dogs to eat poultry from her hand. Because of their histories, size, strength and often unstable temperaments, the animals need lots of care. The nonprofit International Fund for Animal Welfare donated $43,000 to construct nine new enclosures with 10-foot-high fencing.
See full story  (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

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