Protection or Play

This is the story of a young wolf pup and the very important lesson he learns about safety awareness and listening to his parents orders.

It is mid summer in the Yellowstone National Park and the land is teeming with life. New nests are being built by mother birds anticipating their upcoming broods. Young deer are gleefully following their mothers around in order to learn about the ways of the forest. Another playful bunch is just beginning to come out of their den for the very first time. A small pack of wolfs has been living in a den just over one of the mountain sides of the parks main roads. Within this small pack is a young pup named Flops.

Since they were born, it has been about six weeks and all the pups are starting to become more bold in their attempts to explore the new world in front of them. Their mother is very anxious about them wandering off, so she keeps them as close to their den as possible. Many predators live within the confines of the Yellowstone National Park, and the last thing the pack wants is for a young pup to wander off and get killed by a grizzly bear, bald eagle, or coyote. The ensure that their pups learn to follow their orders and not roam off to explore and play, the alpha pair takes great care in teaching them to stay put. Flops on the other hand is a little more hard to keep still as he's the eldest of the pups and feels like he can do anything at his age.

One day, Flops decided to leave the safety of the den to go out and explore his new mountain world. There are so many places he can go and there isn't enough time to see them all, so Flops just keeps roaming along and taking in all the sights he can. After a few hours of trekking through the mountains, Flops suddenly gets this eerie feeling that something is watching him. Not knowing what it is, he keeps going but has all of his senses on high alert. Out of nowhere something slams into his side and knocks him for a loop.

What had just hit him was a bald eagle scanning the ground for prey a few minutes prior. Upon seeing the young wolf pup, the eagle got into position and dived toward the unaware pup to try and grab him. Unfortunately for the eagle, Flops has heard something coming his way and ducked right when the eagle tried to grab him, but still ended up getting hit by the top of the eagles foot and was sent flying. After the initial hit, Flops regained his footing and started to run back the way he had come through the trees.

En route back to where his families den sight was, Flops came into an open field he had passed through earlier and a grizzly bear with a cub came into view. Seeing the bears, Flops immediately retreated back into the trees. Looking back at what his parents had been trying to teach him, he could have easily avoided something like this if he had just listened and stayed at the den until he was old enough to venture out. Considering that the bears in front of him were grazing in the tall grasses and hadn't noticed him, the young pup decided to try and go around them, following the treeline. Slowly while keeping trees in front of him, Flops started creeping ever so slowly around where the bears were.

A few times the bears stopped and sniffed the air, but they went back to grazing and didn't seem to mind the young pups scent on the wind. After getting to the other side of where the bears were, Flops made a dash back for home. Upon his arrival back to his families den, the young pup was met by an angry pack. They had been searching for him frantically since he wasn't in the den when they woke up. Once they saw him coming back, they were both relieved and furious. They had taught him better and he knew it, but after giving each of his parents an apologetic kiss they forgave him and brought him back into the den. From then on, Flops stayed within the den like his parents taught and since then has learned that staying safe is better than having fun with the risk of being someone else's dinner.