Shy Wolf Sanctuary - Naples, Florida

Shy Wolf Sanctuary is a rescue shelter for exotic animals who have been bred in captivity and whose owners have either given them up or abandoned them. The sanctuary did not start out as an animal shelter. It was, and still is, the home of Nancy and Kent Smith. It all began in 1993 with providing a home for one exotic animal, Moondance, a Black Asian Leopard.

 Black Asian Leopard

As the need to care for displaced exotic animals grew over the years, the facility also grew. Enclosures for the animals had to be added and volunteers recruited to help clean and maintain the facility as well as to help feed the animals. Today the sanctuary houses such animals as prairie dogs, wolves and wolf dogs, Fennec foxes, sugar gliders and gopher tortoises. It is still run exclusively by volunteers, and from what I saw, you may never find another group of volunteers as dedicated as these are. We were there on a Saturday, and while we were on the tour of the facility, the busywork never stopped. Volunteers were cleaning enclosures, Boy Scouts were hauling in plants for a garden, and other volunteers were leading tours.

The grounds have maze-like connections between the enclosures, maybe because, like Topsy, the shelter just grew. You can see that there has been an attempt to keep the grounds as natural as possible, and grape vines overhead on all the passages provide shade from the Florida sun.

In addition to caring for these exotic animals, the mission of the sanctuary is to educate the community about these animals and the need to protect and preserve them in the wild. To this end, the sanctuary works with local and state animal control officials, schools, and visitors to Shy Wolf Sanctuary. Sanctuary volunteers take animals to “Meet and Greet” sessions at local public events, such as ice cream socials, flea markets, grand openings, and shopping center promotions. I first encountered a “shy wolf” from the sanctuary at the official grand opening of Bay Oaks Recreation Center on Fort Myers Beach. Until that time, I never knew there WAS such an organization. I was incredulous that a wolf could be calmly lying there, seem as tame as the family pet, and even let me take his picture. From that time on, I wanted to visit the sanctuary.

The year 2001 saw the formation of Shy Wolf Sanctuary, Education and Experience Center, Inc. a Florida Nonprofit Incorporation. Shy Wolf is also recognized as a 501(c)(3) tax exempt corporation by the Internal Revenue Service. The sanctuary is maintained entirely through volunteer efforts and donor support. If you would like more information about the sanctuary, go to their web site: www.shywolfsanctuary.com

Carl is a volunteer who does outreach programs for the sanctuary. This photo was taken on the official grand opening day of the local recreation center in October, 2009. I'll give you one guess as to who our tour guide was when we visited the sanctuary.nearly two years later. You guessed it--it was Carl.

Carl and Promise, wolfdog from the sanctuary.

Promise couldn't have been calmer when I took her picture. I was fascinated that a typically wild and fierce animal could be lying there like a puppy dog. Promise had been a stray with severe skin problems when she came to the sanctuary. After her hair grew back, she became an excellent ambassador to go on  outreach programs. Nothing seems to rattle her.

Entrance to the Shy Wolf Sanctuary

This handsome wood carving stands in front of the fence that leads to the grounds. Go through that gate, and you are in the sanctuary.

Peggy and Cora are waiting to hear the introductory information about the sanctuary.

Judy and Ray are also part of the audience.

Nancy Smith, owner of the property where the sanctuary is located, gives a Saturday tour group information about the animals and their enclosures. Nancy is the driving force behind the sanctuary and a vigorous advocate for the care and protection of the animals.

Carl, our guide, is holding Peanuts, the prairie dog. Prairie dogs are small, burrowing rodents that live in the prairies and mountain plains of the western USA and Mexico

Visitors to the sanctuary are welcome to pet any animals that like to be petted.

 

Inoli is a Crab-eating Fox from Brazil. The Crab-eating Fox lives in the central part of South America. It searches for crabs on muddy floodplains during the wet season, giving this animal its common name.

 Dickens is an Arctic Fox that ended up in Florida because unscrupulous breeders will sell animals to anyone that has the cash, and that includes selling arctic foxes to people who live in Florida, an environment that couldn’t be further from the animal’s natural habitat. The buyer kept the fox on his lanai until he got bored with the animal, who could not be litter box-trained, and decided to “donate” him to Shy Wolf Sanctuary. He is the only animal at the sanctuary with his own air conditioning unit, and engineering students from Florida Gulf Coast University are working hard to plan an even better habitat that will provide him a cooler option at our new facility.

What big ears you have, Joey! Joey is a Fennec Fox, a small nocturnal fox  found in the Sahara Desert of North Africa. Its most distinctive feature is unusually large ears. The Fennec’s coat, ears and kidney functions have adapted to a high-temperature, low-water, desert environment. In addition, its hearing is sensitive enough to hear prey moving underground, the better to catch his prey with.

Next we visit the wolf and wofdogs' enclosures.

Carl and visitors are inside the wolf's enclosure.

This guy loves the attention he's getting.

Julie reaches down to pet her new best friend.

This guy is shy.

The names of the four wolves in this enclosure.

The enclosures for the animals have been built in and around trees, offering natural shade. Chocawa is on the right. He came to the shelter as a three-week-old pup with serious health issues. He is as white as chalk (hence his name), but he has the nickname “Pigpen” because he likes to roll in the mud.

As a pup, Julie, in the middle of the photo, appeared in an episode of “King of the Jungle” on Animal Planet. Subsequently, her owner wanted to get rid of her. Somewhere along the line, she must have been badly mistreated by a man because she was so terrified of men that when a male volunteer at the sanctuary entered her enclosure, she jumped to the top of a ten- foot fence.

Chatima came to the shelter as a three-week-old pup. She is cooling off in the water tub at the left. After treatment for serious health problems, Chatima is cautious, which is a typical wolf trait, but also friendly even with strangers, so she is a good ambassador at events.

Maraya is the fourth member of this group, and she was one of three pups left at the shelter. She is curious, friendly, and loves posing for pictures.

The names of the four wolves in this enclosure

Viggo was a stray befriended by a vet. He is the “alpha” male in this pack of four. He is adoptable, but the pack of three other wolf dogs benefit from his presence, so he won't be adopted out.

Elan had health problems so serious that when volunteers from the sanctuary took him to the vet, he was given only a 50-50 chance of survival. Once Elan got to the shelter, he wouldn’t eat until he was served a cheeseburger on a china plate. This wolf has good taste, doesn’t he? He is still wary of people but trusts and even loves some of the volunteers.

After Bella and her brother had been purchased from a breeder, both animals were shy and terrified and escaped the owner’s house several times. They were surrendered to a shelter, adopted out, and again managed to escape. The sanctuary took Bella in and paired her up with Yuki. The match went well, and little Bella rules the roost. The whereabouts of her brother are unknown.

Yuki loves to be the center of attention, as you can see him interacting with Carl. He can be a bit temperamental, so he is a Level 4 animal, requiring more experience from volunteers. They need to be able to read his body language and react quickly because he may become aggressive without warning. He has, however, met his match in little Bella, as she can and does take food right out of his mouth, something our volunteers would never get away with trying!

Pawnee and Chief live here.

Pawnee lived in a county in North Carolina which decided to ban wolf dogs, so his owner had to give him up. His next owner believed him to be “an aggressive and dangerous animal,” but Peggy and Cora would probably disagree with that estimation. He’s shown no aggression towards other animals and is currently residing with Promise and Chief.

 Chief is a beautiful wolfdog that originally came from a high-kill shelter in Alabama. He had been escaping and picked up several times by shelter staff. The previous owner finally got tired of bailing him out and signed Chief over to the shelter. The staff at the shelter saw this diamond in the “ruff” and kept him alive much longer than they normally would have, given he had the label "wolf" in a state that has banned wolves and wolfdogs.

Though shy at first, Chief eventually warms up to people. I liked Chief right away, even though he was not attention-seeking. There must be something special about this bad boy because his appeal kept him alive through a very dangerous time in his life.

The sanctuary keeps memorial plaques for those animals who have crossed “over the Rainbow Bridge” to live a pleasant life until some time in the future when they will be reunited with their owners.

Memorial plaques for departed animals

On this Saturday morning, Boy Scouts from Troop 2000 in North Naples were busy carrying in and planting plants in the garden that they designed.

The garden

They watered the garden, too.

After visiting the Shy Wolf Sanctuary, our group, Irma, Cora, Peggy, Julie, Ray and Judy had lunch at Zorba's Greek Restaurant. 

All in all, it was a very nice and informative day, and I left with an admiration for Nancy, Carl and the other dedicated people who carry on, day in and day out, with the care for these beautiful animals.  I think that for all of the volunteers, it is a labor of love, and seeing healthy, happy animals is their greatest reward. 

Salvador Dali Museum - St. Petersburg, Florida

Salvador Dali was born in May, 1904, in Figueras, Spain, in the foothills of the Pyrenees Mountains. His artistic talent showed at a young age, and he started his first drawing lessons when he was ten years old. He began to study art at the Royal Academy of Art in 1923, but he was expelled twice and never took the final examination because he believed that he was more qualified than those who would have examined him. A humble person, Dali was not.

In 1928, Dali went to Paris, where he became a leader of the Surrealist Movement. With the Cubism and Surrealism art movements among the most progressive of the day, Dali created some of his most famous works, including “The Persistence of Memory,” an icon of the Surrealist movement. During this time, he met his future spouse, Helena Diakanoff Devulina, better known as Gala. Gala was a Russian immigrant who was married to poet Paul Eluard when Dali met her. She became his companion, his muse, his model, and his business manager. Throughout his life, Dali was a master of self-promotion and a genius at parlaying his artistry into financial success.

To evade War II, Dali chose the US as his permanent residence in 1940. Dali was moving into a new type of painting with a preoccupation with science and religion. As he moved away from Surrealism, and into his classical period, he began his series of 19 large canvases, many concerning scientific, historical, or religious themes. Among the best known of these works are The Hallucinogenic Toreador and The Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus. He was also inspired by the great classical masters like Raphael, Velasquez, and Ingres.

In 1948, Dali and Gala returned to Europe and spent their time in Spain, Paris, or New York. Dali painted one monumental history painting every year during the summer months in Lligat, Spain. In 1974, Dali opened the Dali Museum-Theater in Figueras, Spain. After Gala’s death in 1982, Dali’s health began to fail, and he had to retire due to palsy, a motor disorder. His hands trembled and were weak, and he could no longer hold a brush. Towards the end of his life, Dali lived in the tower of his own museum, where he died in 1989 from heart failure. Outside of the Dali Theater-Museum created by Dalí himself in his home town of Figueras, Catalonia, Spain, St. Petersburg's Dalí museum has the world's largest collection of Dalí's works.

From his early impressionist paintings through his transitional surrealist works and into his classical period, Dali was a constantly growing and evolving artist. He worked in all media, including oils, watercolors, drawing, graphics, sculptures, films, photographs, performance pieces, and jewels. He was known for his cutting-edge artwork and his flamboyant personality. Dali’s art may not be your cup of tea. It isn’t mine, but I nevertheless marvel at his creativity and the breadth of his achievements. His work is on display in many museums and remains eminently collectible.

Albert Whitted Airport

The Albert Whitted Airport is owned and operated by the City of St. Petersburg. It provides convenient access by air to the city's downtown waterfront, business district and urban communities

Galbraith Terminal, named in honor of local philanthropists, John and Rosemary Galbraith, who have supported both the community and the airport.

The Hangar Restaurant

In the words of a local food critic, “Good food makes for a smooth landing at the Hangar Restaurant at Albert Whitted Airport in St. Petersburg.”

The airfield occupies 110 acres and handles around 80,000 general aviation aircraft operations annually.

A view of 3 planes from the restaurant

 

Bay Oaks Social Seniors Marchyne, Jean, Margie, Cora, Emma, Joanne, Sara and Justin (youngsters who lead the group), Robert, Barbara, Mary, Shirley, and John



Marchyne, Jean, Margie, Cora, Emma, Joanne, Sara, and Justin


 Robert, Barbara, Mary, Shirley, and John

Justin, Becky, Robert & Barbara

Museum Entrance and Salvador Dali's signature as seen on the outside of the museum

The thirty-five million dollar Dali Museum was built on the downtown waterfront next to the Mahaffey Theater, featuring a large glass entryway and skylight. The new museum opened on 1-11- 11 at 11:11 am. (I couldn’t find any significance in Dali’s life to explain the date and time. I think it was done that way just because they could.)

Mary & Barbara at the entrance to the Dali Museum

Emma, Jean, Joanne & Margie about to enter the museum

A living wall of plants at the entrance to the museum

Becky in front of the wall of plants and beside the “fountain of youth.”

A grotto-like massive stone with a vertical garden seems to hold up a corner of the building.

The Mahaffey Theater is a 2000-seat performing arts venue adjacent to the waterfront of Tampa Bay and across the plaza from the Salvador Dali Museum.

A Dali-inspired bench behind the museum

The glass dome rises 75 feet from the plaza.

The window wall undulates around the building.

The window wall as seen from the inside on the ground floor

This is how the window wall looks from the inside on the 2^nd Floor. The second floor houses administrative offices and a research library.

This is the view of the window wall/atrium on the top floor.

The main galleries are on the third floor atop a spiral staircase which some say resembles a strand of DNA. The artwork on the third floor is located above the flood plain and will be protected through a Category 5 hurricane storm surge. Its 18- inch-thick concrete walls can withstand 165 mph winds. The danger of a hurricane is a very real threat in this area of the country.

A view of Tampa Bay from inside the museum

Sliding Doors Entrance
The doors open like an elevator and lead to the sizable gift shop.

 

Poster of Museum Opening
The museum's collection includes 96 oil paintings, over 100 watercolors and drawings, 1,300 graphics, photographs, sculptures and objets d'art, and an extensive archival library, and displays are periodically rotated.

The BOSS group is waiting for the tour to begin.

Gift Shop Wall of Posters
This gift shop is not your typical museum gift shop. It is very large and jam-packed with all things Dali. You have to enter the museum through the gift shop and wend your way through the aisles and aisles of items to get to the ticket sales booth. Also located on the ground floor is a snack bar, theater, and community room.

A glitzy, giant-sized praying mantis is suspended from the ceiling of the gift shop. This innocent- looking praying mantis had a sinister symbolism to surrealists because the female praying mantis devours the male after mating with him.

The Disintegration of Persistent Memory.

This work was done from 1952 to 1954. Dalí employed extensive symbolism in his work. The hallmark "soft watches" that first appear in The Persistence of Memory suggest Einstein's  theory that time is relative and not fixed. The idea for clocks functioning symbolically in this way came to Dalí when he was staring at a runny piece of Camembert cheese on a hot day in August. Dali created this painting to explore the effects of nuclear weaponry, asserting that the invention of such weaponry had a profound effect upon everyone on the planet, even those in the small fishing villages along the coastline of Spain. (This is a photo of the Dali poster and does not do the artwork justice, but I hope it gives you the idea.)

The Ship & The Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus

The Discovery of America was painted in 1958 and 1959. It is a Masterwork, which is more than 14 feet tall. The center of the painting is dominated by a young Columbus who is leading one of his ships onto the shoreline of the New World. He holds in his right hand a standard on which the face of Gala is depicted in the pose of St. Helena, the mother of Constantine. To the right of Columbus is a kneeling figure of a monk, who is actually Dali.

The Hallucinogenic Toreador

This large vertical composition was begun in Port Lligat in 1968 and finished in 1970. This is a double image painting that repeats the image of Venus de Milo in such a way that the shadows form the features of the toreador. The Dali museum is home to 7 of the 18 masterwork paintings by Dalí (including The Hallucinogenic Toreador and the Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus), the most of any museum in the world. To be considered a masterwork, these paintings must be at least 5 feet in any direction and have been worked on for over a year.

Gala Contemplating the Mediterranean Sea Which at 20 Meters Becomes the Portrait of Abraham Lincoln.

Completed in 1976, this painting is approximately 6 ¼ feet x 8 ¼ feet. Unlike most artists, Dali liked naming his works using very long names rather than just brief descriptions. As the painting’s title suggests, when you look at this painting from a distance, it becomes a portrait of Abraham Lincoln.

This is Gala again. The painting plays tricks on my camera, but maybe if you move back from the computer screen and squint a bit, you can see Lincoln’s face quite clearly.

Rolls Royce Sign.

The wonderful Rainy Day Rolls Royce, a reinterpretation of a Dali surrealist artwork, is on display on the ground floor of the museum.. It is just right there, as if you were walking by it on a street. In one way, it’s good because you can examine it close-range, but in another way, everyone is milling around it, so you can’t get an uninterrupted view of the art.

Side view of the Rolls

Notice the details, including the snails and seaweed all over the car. I love the whimsicality of this piece, and the longer you look, the more you discover the unexpected, like the deep-sea diver-chauffeur and his passenger, the mermaid.

Rolls Diver/chauffeur in diving gear

Mermaid Passenger

Sorry I couldn’t get a better pic of the mermaid inside because of all the reflections. But, again,  I hope you get the idea.

Rear view of the Rolls, complete with manta ray on the roof

It's time to leave the museum and be on our way back home. Emma is ready.

The final view of the Dali Museum as we head for home. Farewell to the museum honoring the most famous surrealist artist/showman of the 20th century.