Vega was a beautiful black female born to Naima, alpha female of the main pack. Her sire was probably Faust. Even as a puppy Vega exhibited climbing skills that rivaled Faust's, though it seemed mostly limited to trying to meet approaching humans half way. Vega was rather shy despite her socialization. She did form strong attachments to a few humans once she matured. But people who had helped socialize her in her first year had a head start in maintaining a physically close relationship with her.

Vega was the original source of a new term for our ethogram, "ottering," a behavior in which a wolf assumes a bow and, legs remaining deeply flexed, play runs or invites chase or shows approach avoidance conflict with back humped, and ears back. She looked rather like a giant otter skittering around.

Though she was a large, almost burly female, Vega was never very high ranking. She certainly looked the part - a lovely black with slowly developing silver "trim" and burning yellow eyes. But she was dominated by a series of other wolves, both litter mates and younger additions to the pack. In spite of this she managed to mate and whelp.

Vega was an extremely good hunter. She was part of the Dream Team which also included Altair, Ursa, and Chinook. More than once they pulled down bison calves and it looked as if they had a good chance of eventually killing a one. Since we stack the odds in the bisons' favor we seldom let the Dream Team hunt together and only when the calves were older and had experience with other, less ept, wolves.

In April of 1992 Altair, the alpha female of the pack had whelped and was periodically coming out of her den and directing intense ritualized aggression at the pack. Vega was expecting a litter too, which might put her on a collision course with Altair. On the morning of April 21, 1993, after nearly half an hour of watching wolves mostly resting, I suddenly noticed something so strange I could scarcely credit my eyes. Vega was in the holding pen with Kaleah. Instead of aggression, all was sweetness and light. She had climbed into the holding pen and wormed her way into Kaleah's good graces by kissing up big time. Kaleah lapped up the homage. Against the odds, Vega had found a possibly safer place to bear her young!

Vega was always attracted to pups, even those not her own, and in 1994 she made us put Karin, Orca, and Alyeska in and leave them with the pack. They had been officially reintroduced over a weekend and then removed to continue an agility training project. The nursery was out of sight and several pack members acted agitated when we took Alyeska, Karin, and Orca away. Altair and Kiri tried to manipulate the gate latches, but Vega took more direct action later - she climbed out. We had to use the alpha male Chinook, and the puppy Karin, as lures to get Vega back within the perimeter fence. We wound up putting all three pups back in the pack permanently even though we also beefed up the overhang with a hot wire.

Vega's climbing skills did not decrease with age. Once she was removed from the pack, after a stressful period of being a harassed and bitten omega, she continued to display climbing skills. About three summers ago she climbed out of her enclosure at East Lake apparently because she wanted to get into the pups' nursery. Member Ken McCort, who is a Paul Bunyan of fence, improved the overhang, extending and reinforcing it until even Vega, with her ability to hang onto chain link with her toes almost as well as a racoon, could not get out.

This past fall, Practicum students Ken Knijff and Ramira ter Mors found her curled up in the corridor between the East Lake pens and the bison pasture. They called Monty who came and put her back in a pen with Socrates and Kiri, her sometimes roommates, until the weak spot in her erstwhile pen could be found and strengthened. John Davis located and fixed the weak point in the fence. That was Vega's last time out though Monty did find a place where she had started to tear a hole in the overhang in early February. We put her in again with Socrates and Kiri.

Vega has occasionally made a trio out of the Beavis and Butthead brothers Socrates and Kiri. Both have been vasectomized and she was able to spend the 1997 breeding season with them. When she came in season, it took the brothers a while to get interested in her instead of bullyragging on each other. When they did, Vega was not pleased. There'd be shrieks of outrage as she chased one and then the other suitor around the enclosure. He jaws gaped and snapped like a cartoon crocodile and Beavis and Butthead fled precipitately. Even in flight, Kiri was almost terminally optimistic in the matter of his relationship with Vega. He acted as if "NO ABSOLUTELY NOT EVEN IF YOU WERE THE LAST WOLF ON EARTH GET AWAY YOU'RE ICKY." Meant ‘Well, give me a minute to think about it, Dear." Eventually Kiri's blandishments took effect. Vega and he trotted around as if hitched side by side. Their tails wagged together like a matched set of metronomes, and they smooched a lot.