Plenty of schools go on pumpkin patch field trips. Some get to visit grizzly bears at Northwest Trek. But there’s only one school where you get to grow pumpkins, then hide them for grizzly cubs to find – and that’s Weyerhaeuser Elementary, whose second- and third-graders came to Northwest Trek early this October (and last year too) to do exactly that. It’s all part of the school’s focus on outdoor STEM education, helped along by volunteer expertise from Trek horticulturalist Jake Pool. “Look, this one’s enormous!” cried one boy, stepping between vines to a giant Cinderella pumpkin. “And this one’s …

It couldn’t fly, but it had all the tiny, angular cuteness you could possibly want. In a small meshed container in the Northwest Trek veterinary clinic, a little brown bat hung in folds of soft pink cloth, sleepily chomping a mealworm and getting ready to be an ambassador – a new lease on life, thanks to Northwest Trek staff. “One of our keepers found him on the floor of the exit breezeway,” explained keeper Wendi Mello, gently lifting the sleepy bat out of its temporary house. “It was injured and couldn’t fly, but we knew we could help.” Keepers brought …

For Bailey and Fairchild, the morning started like any other. Northwest Trek keeper Dave Meadows drove up, unloaded buckets of food from the truck and divided it into piles on the road in the Free-Roaming Area. The two mountain goat kids, now just over one year old, ambled up from the lakeside with Klahhane, Elwha and Rocky, and began munching. But today was going to be very different for the two female goats, who came to the wildlife park last summer as part of a multiagency effort translocating mountain goats to the Cascades (where they are native) from the Olympic …

It’s something you don’t realize about bald eagles until you’re two feet away from one: just how big they really are. It was a Thursday afternoon at Northwest Trek, and the veterinary clinic had a very special patient. Sequoia, a recently-arrived bald eagle, was getting a wellness exam in preparation for joining her fellow eagles Salish and Sucia in the new Eagle Passage exhibit. Sequoia was already under anesthetic, and keeper Wendi Mello carried her into the clinic, cradled like a child in gauntleted arms. Rescued from the wild with a shoulder injury that prevents her from fully flying, Sequoia …

In the raccoon habitat at Northwest Trek, McKenna and McChord are snuggled together, gently licking and nibbling each other’s gray-white fur. The pace is calm, the grooming serene. You would never know that one of these raccoons had cancer – and that well-being is exactly what their keepers and veterinarians are striving for. McKenna, the eight-year-old female of the duo, has bladder cancer, but thanks to the very best of therapies and ongoing care, she’s as content as she can be, hanging out with the animal she’s closest to. “We first noticed her straining, with some blood in her urine, …

Q: What does it take to move bald eagles into a new home? A: An expert keeper and animal care team – and plenty of patience. It was the week of the Eagle Passage Grand Opening, and two of Northwest Trek’s new bald eagles were ready to move in. Quiet, please Early one morning, before the park filled with guests and noise, veterinarian Dr. Allison Case gathered with curator Marc Heinzman, keepers Wendi Mello and Miranda Mauck and a team of keepers and interns. All were ready to gather up the eagle pair from where they had been living behind …

They’re smart, strong and full of personality – and they’re back at Northwest Trek Wildlife Park. Brother-and-sister wolverines Rainier and Ahma, both born at Northwest Trek, have returned home, and they will make their official public debut July 13-14 in a newly renovated, 10,800-square-foot habitat. You can meet their keepers at Keeper Chats 11:30am and 1:30pm Saturday July 13 and Sunday July 14 They’ll be visible at different times as they get used to their new home – come back later if you don’t see them at first. They have plenty of trees, boulders and logs to climb and explore, …

Soar like an eagle on a zip line Our bald eagles are coming this summer to Eagle Passage, and you can swoop with the same grace and speed (well, almost) on one of our five exhilarating zip line course, from Super Kid (ages 5 and up) through Sensation (ages 18+). Book here.   Build like a beaver at Kids’ Trek Beavers are nature’s engineers, reshaping their environment to build dams and lodges. Build a fort of branches in our Kids’ Trek playground and test out your engineering skills! Then come visit our beavers in the Forest+Wetland habitat, resting, swimming or …

Spring means baby animals – and ours are here! In the Free-Roaming Area, take a Discovery Tram Tour and keep a lookout for fuzzy orange bison calves or tiny white bighorn lambs hidden in the ferns. Stay tuned for more animals as they are born! And don’t forget our other young animals. Grizzly cubs Hawthorne and Huckleberry are nearly 18 months old now, and growing up fast.: digging, swimming, climbing. Our mountain goat kids are nearly one year old and still roam in a big, fluffy white pack in the Free-Roaming Area. Happy spring! (Click on a photo to open …

Mountain goat kids from the Olympics introduced to new home at Northwest Trek Wildlife Park. A group of mountain goat kids scampered into the vast expanses of our 435-acre Free-Roaming Area Tuesday morning and began exploring their new home. There were five altogether. Four of the young goats – females Fairchild and Bailey and males Klahhane and Elwha – will remain at Northwest Trek where they can choose to roam through meadows, forested areas and rocky hillsides. The fifth eventually will move to another zoo. We are delighted to provide a permanent home for these mountain goat kids. We know …