Sundance joined the Big Pack in the Sky on September 12th, 2025.
She was assisted at 10 years old due to ascites, either via cancer or bloat.
Sundance was born on March 18th, 2015 and arrived at Wild Spirit from Indigo Mountain Nature Center on April 9th, 2025.
In July of 2024, tragic news struck the wolf and wolfdog world when a beloved member of the community, Sue Cranston, passed away. Not only was Sue a tremendous advocate for these animals, she was also the Founder and Executive Director of Indigo Mountain Nature Center, a non-profit sanctuary located in Lake George, Colorado. With her passing, Indigo Mountain was on the cusp of shutting down, which would have left their 25 canid rescues without a home. With the over-saturation of wolfdogs already in sanctuaries (and more requiring placement each day), there was nowhere for these animals to go.
Losing a sanctuary is much like losing a life boat on a sinking ship, which is why Wild Spirit stepped up to offer a solution. Our first idea was to save the sanctuary itself; to purchase the Indigo Mountain property and in doing so, preserve the home of the 25 wolfdogs. The objective was to dissolve the Colorado sanctuary into our own, allowing Wild Spirit to operate in two neighboring states. This was called our “Save Indigo Mountain Campaign,” which saw an unprecedented amount of support from our incredible followers, as well as celebrities such as Kate Linder, Diane Warren, Bo Derek and many others. Unfortunately, the total up-front cost of this project (which included the purchase of the property itself, facility upgrades needed to acquire USDA licensing, and vet care for each rescue) would be approximately $1,500,000–a steep hurdle to save their lives. Regretfully, we were unable to amass the fund necessary to purchase the property before the owner’s deadline, and the land was sold in February of 2025.
Luckily for the residents of Indigo Mountain, Wild Spirit does not know the meaning of defeat. Though they lost their home, we were adamant to save their lives. One life boat was now officially gone, so we instead committed ourselves to building a new one! This began an even greater task of expanding Wild Spirit Wolf Sanctuary and creating 18 new enclosures to bring the animals here. We knew it would not be an easy endeavor. In fact, we were fully aware it would be far more difficult than simply purchasing the Indigo Mountain property, due to the limited space and resources here at Wild Spirit. Additionally, we had a new deadline of only 3 months to make it all happen; failure to do so would mean the 25 wolfdogs at Indigo Mountain would lose their homes, and their lives. Thus, the “Save Indigo Mountain Campaign” became our “Unite the Packs Campaign.“
The first step was securing enough money to make this transition possible, which we estimated to be a grand total of $171,729.44. Our donors, once again, proved their commitment to these animals by allowing us to reallocate a portion of our funds from the previous campaign to this new purpose, immediately securing $148,450.76 across 806 donations. Those who could not support us financially instead volunteered their time for enclosure construction, or donated enclosure materials (shout out to our good friend Jesse at Arkansas Wolf & Wildlife Center). All that was left was to construct the enclosures, and get the animals off property in time . . .
On March 12th, 2025, we officially rescued our first 12 animals from IMNC: Chappa, Tioga, Cassidy, Tahoe,Jaeger, Sonoma, Tippy, Blizzard, Stella, Summit Frisco and
The remaining 10 IMNC critters were brought home on April 9th, 2025, which included: Milo, Sundance, Aspen, Sable, Sarah, Sophie, Oakley, Dakota, Gunner and Skysong.
This is, by far, the largest rescue that Wild Spirit Wolf Sanctuary has ever conducted, and we cannot possibly express our endless gratitude to every human who helped make this possible. Thank you.
Finally, in order to share the full stories of our Indigo Mountain rescues, we’ve included their original bios below:Sundance came to us in 2015 after she and her three sisters Calamity, Cassidy, Oakley and their parents had been surrendered to an animal shelter. She is quite friendly with us and very playful with Milo.
Personality
Sundance was another shy gal from the Indigo Mountain Nature Center rescue, but she was one we saw a lot of social potential in. From time-to-time, she had moments of bravery, where she would approach for food, or for a brief sniff. We truly believe if we spent more time with her, she could have made many human friends at our sanctuary. When it came to other canines, she was a relaxed and easy-going partner who loved to play. She never made a fuss and had more of a “water off a duck’s back” attitude toward most situations.
Likes & Dislikes
Sundance liked playing with Milo, sunbathing, and meal time!
Fun Facts
Sundance is, like most of our Indigo Mountain Nature Center rescues, another big den digger! So much so that she actually went viral online when Wild Spirit released a video of a staff member needing to crawl into her den to bring her out and load her up for the transport to our sanctuary. Not to worry, she was sedated at the time for her safety and ours.
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