Wildlife encounters and animal sanctuaries to visit in the Northeast
In a thrilling close-up look at an often misunderstood species, visitors at the Wolf Conservation Center in South Salem in Westchester County recently watched Silas, a 3-month-old gray wolf cub, enjoy his first snack in front of a live audience.
“Wolves have a really strong sense of smell, about a hundred times more sensitive than ours,” program educator Sean Seary said as he hand-fed bits of chicken through the fence around Silas’ enclosure, which includes a den, swimming pond and a packmate, a gray wolf, 9-year-old Nikai.
At programs open to the public on weekends, Seary advocates for a greater understanding of the center’s 30 Mexican gray and red wolves — all members of endangered species protected by federal and New York state law.
“There’s no such thing as a big bad wolf,” Seary said, with a laugh. He ended his presentation with a realistic howl that made Silas come running.
Here are other wildlife travel adventures you can experience throughout the Northeast, packed with interactive learning and safe encounters with great white sharks, giraffes, moose and more.
Wolf Conservation Center, South Salem, New York
See resident wolves at the Wolf Conservation Center in South Salem, New York. Credit: Wolf Conservation Center
Visitors can see up to five wolves and learn about their biology, ecology and the mythology surrounding them at Wolves of North America programs held at 11 and 2 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays. Admission is $15 (ages 12 and up) and $12 (kids under 12). The center also offers photo sessions ($100 per person) and Sleeping with Wolves overnight camping. ($150 per person or $340 for up to four people per tent; includes movie and pizza party.)
INFO Registration is required to visit; 7 Buck Run, South Salem; 914-763-2373, nywolf.org.
Animal Adventure Park Preserve, Harpursville, New York
Guests visiting the Animal Adventure Park in Harpusville can see resident animals and join a new drive-thru experience. Credit: Animal Adventure Park
Meet a Noah’s Ark-worthy collection of exotic animals on safari at the park’s 100-plus-acre preserve, which opened last summer boasting close encounters with giraffes, rhinos, zebra and other species rarely seen here outside a zoo. The preserve is across the street from the Animal Adventure Park’s “more conventional zoo exhibits in enclosures,” said spokesperson Kerry Gallagher.
At the formerly private preserve, water buffalo, antelope, elk, llama and ostrich and hundreds of other animals may come up to your car to say hi. In “the comfort of your own vehicle,” Gallagher said, you’ll drive 3 miles of roadway through grassland, scrub brush and forest habitats.
“You can open the windows and interact with the animals in their own environment,” Gallagher added. You can buy leaves to feed to giraffes ($6) and other specially prepared feed for the other animals ($10 to $20).
INFO Open daily, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., April through October, $17.99 (ages 12 and up), $14.99 (ages 3 to 11), kids under 3 are free; 85 Martin Hill Rd., Harpursville; 607-760-4429, theanimaladventurepark.com.
Stewart B. McKinney National Wildlife Refuge-Salt Meadow Unit, Westbrook, Connecticut
Explore nature at the Stewart B. McKinney National Wildlife Refuge in Connecticut. Credit: Shaun Roche
Bird-watchers can have a field day seeing the Atlantic Flyway in full feather at the national refuge’s conservation lands stretching 70 miles across 1,000 acres of Connecticut forest, barrier beach, tidal wetland and fragile island habitats.
“It’s a great time to see egrets and little blue herons, and sometimes if you are lucky the glossy ibis will still be here,” Shawn Roche, visitor services manager, said of the refuge’s 370-acre Salt Meadow Unit in Westbrook, Connecticut. “In the shrub land area we regularly have phoebes and swallows, pileated woodpeckers, hawks and owls,” Roche added.
For the best vantage point, hike to the wildlife observation platforms at Salt Meadow, the Great Meadows Unit in Stratford and the Milford Point Unit in Milford.
With bird parents staying around “to teach the young ones in the beginning of the fall,” Roche said, you might even see a fledgling’s first flight.
INFO Open daily, one half-hour before sunrise to one-half hour after sunset (free admission); 733 Old Clinton Rd., Westbrook; 860-399-2513, fws.gov/refuge.
Catskill Fish Hatchery, Livingston Manor, New York
New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) Fisheries staff collect brown trout eggs to raise at the Catskill Fish Hatchery in Livingston Manor, New York. Credit: NYSDEC
More than 350,000 brown trout are released here and in other state public waters by the Catskill facility, the closest to Long Island of the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation’s (DEC) 12 hatcheries.
Visitors can see a range of sizes of spotted brown trout, up to the 17-inch brood fish used for reproduction, in the hatchery’s rearing raceways, according to state officials. Feed the fish with a 25-cent handful from a dispenser, and learn more about this fish story on signs newly installed throughout the grounds.
INFO Open weekdays, 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday, 8 a.m. to noon.(free admission); 402 Mongaup Rd., Livingston Manor; 845-439-4328, dec.ny.gov.
Atlantic White Shark Conservancy, Chatham, Massachusetts
Take an excursion to spot sharks when visiting Atlantic White Shark Conservancy in Chatham, Massachusetts. Credit: Atlantic White Shark Conservancy
A life-size replica of a 12-foot-long great white shark is a centerpiece of the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy’s (AWSC) new Provincetown Shark Center, which opened in May with exhibits focusing on shark research, education and public safety.
The conservancy’s other museum, which is open year-round in nearby Chatham, features a new interactive touch-screen exhibit on shark anatomy, as well as a fossil bin where kids can hunt for shark teeth and a shark cage visitors can climb into for photos.
“There’s a lot of false information out there,” AWSC education director Marianne Walsh said. “Our museums offer opportunities for people to learn the truth about sharks.”
To that end, the museum takes visitors to see the apex predator in its natural habitat — the clear waters off Cape Cod. Charters run through Oct. 15 ($2,500 for up to six passengers), and there’s a white shark and whale watching boat tour planned for Sept. 10 ($195 per person)
INFO Open daily, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., $10, free for children under 6. Open through Labor Day; 235 Orleans Rd., Chatham; 508-348-5901, atlanticwhiteshark.org.
Pemi Valley Moose Tours, Lincoln, New Hampshire
Take a night excursion to spot moose in the wild with the Pemi Valley Moose Tours in New Hampshire. Credit: Pemi Valley Moose Tours
Long Island is home to plenty of deer, but to see Bambi’s largest relative, head north to moose stomping grounds in the wilds of New Hampshire’s White Mountains.
Moose stand up to 6 feet tall from hoof to shoulder (not counting their antlers) and weigh as much as 1,000 pounds, according to the National Wildlife Federation, but they can be hard to spot by novices. The experts in New Hampshire's north country claim an approximately 95% success rate.
“We find them at the wallows on the side of the road in the evening,” said Larry Hartle, owner of Pemi Valley Moose Tours in Lincoln, New Hampshire, which runs nightly, three-and-a-half-hour excursions aboard a 51-passenger bus with picture windows.
Hartle said riders can take photos and videos of wild moose, which he called “magnificent creatures that haven’t changed in millions of years.”
INFO Open 8:30 p.m. daily; $45 for adults, $35 for kids 12 and under; 136 Main St., Lincoln; 603-745-2744, moosetoursnh.com.
