ST. VINCENT ISLAND (WTXL) - While the U.S. Government will not be shutting down again, the first shutdown this year impacted more than just federal workers.
In the U.S. there are about 200 red wolves left and four of them live off the coast of Franklin County on St. Vincent Island.
During the shutdown, staff and volunteers were not able to tend to the two younger wolves who needed to be tagged.
The problem, wolves body heat rises when scared, so staff try to tag them during the colder months.
One volunteer explains what tagging them in the later months can cause.
"It can and has caused death, so the staff always tries to do the trapping in the coolest part of the year, and if that trapping gets pushed out and the weather is warmer the probability of those type of events happening increase," said Nancy Stewart, Volunteer at St. Vincent Refugee.
Both wolves as of Friday have not been tagged, but volunteers tell me they should be able to tag them before the summer without issue.
