Speaker 1: He is pet Life Radio. Let's talk pets. Welcome to
Animal Rights on pet Life Radio. That's your host, Tim Blink,
and I'm so glad you're joining us today. Got a
really fun and interesting show coming up. We're going to
talk about wolfs. We're going to talk about illustrations, We're
going to talk about all kinds of wonderful stuff to
do with our wolf companions and conservation, and of course
we'll mostly talk to the author Leo Kattia George about
her recent book Trumpet the Miracle Wolf Pup Trumpet Becomes
a Mom. So we're gonna talk a little bit about
the book itself, her work with the wolf conservation, and
also talk to her about writing. How's that going now?
Is it like to put the care of the book.
So it's gonna be a fun show, very interesting. So
over the hangtight. We'll come back right after this commercial break.
You're listening to Animal Rights on pet Life Radio.
Speaker 2: Take a bite out of your competition, advertise your business
with an ad in Pet Life Radio podcasts and radio shows.
There is no other pet related media that is as
large and reaches more pet parents and pet lovers than
pet Life Radio with over seven million monthly listeners. Pet
Life Radio podcasts are available on all major podcast platforms,
and our live radio stream goes out to over two
hundred and fifty million subscribers on iHeartRadio, Odyssey, tune In,
and other streaming apps. For more information on how you
can advertise on the number one pet podcast and radio network,
visit Petlife Radio dot com slash advertise today.
Speaker 3: Let's talk pets on petlifradio dot com.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to animal rights on pet Life Radio. Join
me now is author and superduper volunteer the Wolf Conservation Center,
Leo Katia George Leocadio. Welcome to the show.
Speaker 4: Hi, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: Oh, I'm so excited about having you on the show.
You know, we do a lot of different authors and
we don't often though, get to talk to those that
are involved in animal conservation and then turning that into
a book that has wonderful illustrations and gets a solid
message across. And that's what you've accomplished obviously with Trumpet
the Miracle Wolf Pup. Trumpet becomes a mom some congratulations.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, tell us a little bit about the book itself
and how it came to be.
Speaker 4: So the book is now a series, and it's actually
about one of the wolves at the Wolf Conservation Center.
She is a Mexican gray wolf. She is critically endangered,
and her nickname happens to be Trumpet. And when I
learned of her story, I thought this is perfect for
young kids, so I decided to write it down and
have her story help save her species.
Speaker 1: Is a wonderful cause and a wonderful way to go
about doing things, and getting our youth involved at a
very early age is the most important thing of all.
So in the series then I had to jump right
in there. Did you ever envision this being a series?
Was it more of volunteering to help a good cause?
And all of a sudden, I'm looking for ways to
do a little bit more and do something different. How
did all that come about?
Speaker 4: Yeah, So originally it was supposed to be one book,
but I did want it to be for younger kids.
So with that, to fit all of the into one book,
that would have been way too much for let's say
a three or four year old to kind of sit through.
So at some point I said, you know, this has
got to be broken up into different segments, and it
actually is now four segments, but with a fifth one
hopefully coming out next year, let's see. But yeah, each
segment is a little a different portion of her life,
and I like that it just kind of highlights also
a bit a conservation, just to kind of introduce young
kids to conservation, especially for wolves. I think that's very important.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, absolutely So when you put together then the various
books and breaking it down into a series, is it chronological?
Is it? Can someone jump into it right away in
the middle and go back to the previous books. How
did you decide which ones to put out first?
Speaker 4: Yeah, so I started off, you know, with her beginning
with her birth, her miraculous birth. But people don't have
to start from the beginning if they don't want to.
They if let's say, a child you know, really is
excited about, you know, seeing a pup development, then just
go for the second book, which is Trumpet Grows Up.
It goes through the different stages of pup development, including
some you know, little funny moments of you know, her
taking a tumble or her smelling mommy's poop. But yeah,
so people can choose it out of order and can
go back and forth.
Speaker 1: Fantastic, Now, why Trumpet obviously there's a lot of wolves,
a lot of them, I'm sure that you take care
of and are part of what makes Trumpet so special.
Speaker 4: Yeah. So she is the only descendant from her father's line.
They are critically endangered, and at the time he was
the most genetically distinct wolf in the entire program. They
didn't think that he could have puppies, and lo and
beholds he did have a puppy Trumpet. She was considered
a miracle birth. So when I learned that part about it,
and then also how she got her nickname, which was
spoiler alert, she was allowed like a trumpet. But I
just thought, you know, this is the perfect story for
younger kids to relate to. It's easier for a young
child to relate to one character versus let's say three
or four characters. And so with her being the sole
puppy in the family, I thought that was a great
opportunity to highlight her story.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's a real life story as well. Yeah,
because through the hearing, and I think that's a brilliant
part of it as well, because obviously through the book
we learned a lot about wolf conservation. We see the
story unfold and then we can reflect back that it
is a real live wolf.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you can watch her on the web cameras. The
Wolf Conservation Center has live web cameras. In fact, in
the fourth book, trump It becomes a mom, she actually
gave birth to the puppies that are featured and introduced
in the fourth book. She gave birth to them live
on those cameras. They have a den camera. She chose
that den and we got to watch her giving birth,
nursing her puppies, and just coming into her own becoming
a wonderful, caring mom.
Speaker 1: That is so nice. That is so nice. So when
you're putting the gear the book and you're breaking it
into various sections and the various serious parts of it,
how did you go about doing that i mentioned a
little bit earlier. Was it chronological or is it something
that you know, how do you define certain parts that
would be interesting as far as putting them down in
a book.
Speaker 4: Yeah. So obviously the first one introduces her. She's born
in that and it's really nice to see kids' reactions
to that, especially when you know the character Babs, who
is a real person. She lifts the top of the
box and there's trumpet and it's a big surprise and
I love to see kids' faces when they find out
that there is a puffy And so the second thing,
I really did want to highlight pupp development because it
is so fun to see how quickly they develop and
the stages. The third one, you know, obviously Trumpet had
to have puppies of her own to be able to
continue giving that genetic DNA through her puppies. So she
was introduced to another wolf, and that wolf was flown
in from Arizona to the Wolf Conservation Center by a
group of pilots that donate their flights to saving endangered
species called Lighthawk Conservation Flying, and as a thank you,
her mate was nicknamed Lighthawk. So that's the perfect way
to introduce to kids that you know, not only do
you have staff members working with the wolves to help
with conservation, but you also have a group of pilots
that do that as well. And it's just a fun
way to highlight various aspects of conservation.
Speaker 1: And I think that's important part of it as well,
because you know, there are wonderful stories to begin with,
and the illustrations that were done by Maddie Moore, a fantastic,
fun love. I love every part of that, but the
messages and the different aspects of it. I mean, because
if you're I could imagine, if you're a child, not
only do you love the illustrations in the storyline, but
then you hear about the wolves being real and how
to help them and how to help them thrive. And
then if you're a young child and you're interested in being,
you know, in aviation, all of a sudden you have
a group in there that's time, you know that that
does the work, the rescue work, and flies them in.
So there's different aspects that may trigger a certain child
that has a certain interest into the the theme of
the book as.
Speaker 4: Well, right, exactly, that's great.
Speaker 1: That's great. So as writing the books, I mean, is
your background in writing or did you get an epiphany
at some point or how did that all come about? No?
Speaker 4: I mean, I you know, I do like writing, but
I never envisioned myself writing a book or or anything
like this. But I you know, I really saw the
opportunity for her story to be to be given as
a children's book, and I said, you know, originally I
wanted the Wolf Conservation Center to do it, and I said,
you know, I'll help you write it, and of course
they're all like, yeah, we got a lot on our
plate right now. And so then I asked if I
could do it, and that's how it happened. You know,
I just didn't want to let this go. I wanted
her story to reach young kids.
Speaker 1: I love that. I love that. So he or she
who speaks up first often gets the pleasure, right, goodness, Well,
tell us a little bit about the Wolf Conservation Center,
where it's at and how people can get involved in that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's in South Salem, New York, probably about you know,
forty five minutes maybe an hour outside of New York City.
So people can go there to visit. They just would
need to sign up for a program and learn about
the wolves. But like I said, they can also follow
them on Facebook or go to their site and watch
on the web cameras learn about the wolves. They have
a lot of information on their site from you know,
activities that are great for school kids but also you know,
up to someone who's studying biology and they want to
learn about, you know, the various aspects of the wolf
conservation program. Nice.
Speaker 1: Nice, We'll definitely post the website and all the information
on the episode as well, so everybody can take a
look at that and tap into the cameras and learn
a little bit more about it. So we're going to
take a quick commercial break. We'll come back read this
and we'll talk a little bit more about the book itself,
which is of course Trumpet the Miracle Wolf Pup, Trumpet
Becomes a Mom, And then I want to talk a
little bit about the writing of it as well. So
everybody hang tight, we'll be back right for this. You're
listening to Animal Rights on pet Life Radio. Hi, this
is Tim Blake, animal communicator and pet expert and host
of Animal Rights on Pet Life Radio. Have you ever
wanted to know what your pet is really thinking? Do
you want to find out they truly understand what you're
trying to tell them, or wish you could build a
better understanding and closer relationship with your pet, Well now
you can. Learning to Communicate with Animals is a four
part on demand workshop. In the workshop, you'll learn the
essential techniques that are necessary to communicate with animals, including
what is animal communication? Reading correctly to achieve the perfect
state to communicate with your animals at a deeper level
using guided meditation exercises and method to communicate with animals
and how to send and receive information from your animals.
So if you're wanting to learn how to communicate and
connect with your animals at a deeper levels at Petlife
Radio dot com or slash workshop and purchase and download
Learning to Communicate with Animals, you'll be glad you did.
Speaker 3: Let's talk past it.
Speaker 2: Let's done, pet about Life Radio, HETLFE Radio.
Speaker 3: Pet Life Radio dot com.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to animal rights on pet Life Radio ten.
Conversation with author Leocadi At your words and look Trumpet,
the Miracle Wolf pup, Trumpet becomes a mom and of
course the whole series that goes along with Trumpet. So
put together the book. We talked a little bit about, Okay,
you wanted this done, they said they're kind of busy,
and so you did it yourself. Now, how did you
find the whole process? Was it super breezy easy, you know,
greet somebody to illustrate some stuff. Done in a week,
we're ready to go, or was there a whole lot
more to it than that?
Speaker 4: So the outline was obviously there. I really did try
to stay true to her experiences, the events in her life,
but some of it was also through observation of various puppies.
Obviously I was when she was born, and they actually
didn't have a lot of footage of her as a puppy.
They do have some some videos, but a lot, especially
with the second book, with the pupp development, a lot
of it I actually got from the web cameras watching
the other puppies, you know, kind of you know, the
tumbles that they take, you know, the crouching down with
the and I'll put the playing but playing with frogs
in quotes, because it was always playing with frogs. But
they definitely have a lot of frogs there, and so
that's kind of fun to watch the puppies bouncing around
with the frogs or chasing them. And so yeah, so
I really did try to stay true to wolf behavior
and observation, either of Trumpet and her family or of
the other puppies.
Speaker 1: And so you mentioned earlier about how do I you know,
I'm focusing on as an author on young adult young
kids to get them interested in what I'm trying the
message I'm trying to send while making it fun. How
did you peer that down? Because I could imagine, Okay,
you said, Okay, I've got all this, it's too big,
so we're going to put it in a series. But
yet I still only have you know, handful of pages
to get the message across. You know, how do you
go about weeding out saying Okay, here's the important bits,
here's the interesting bits. Where do they collide or where
what do I need to take out? Yeah?
Speaker 4: So often what I would find was, if I was
trying to explain certain aspects on a page, I would
really have to say, you know, do I really need
to say all of this? Can I make the point
just in a sentence or two sentences just to kind
of make it not so scientific? Let's let's put it
that way. And so that was that was a bit
of a challenge. But I thought I did a pretty
good job. And I also recognized that some of the
story is going to be told not only in the
written form but also through the illustration. So I really
did work with Mattie Moore as far as how I
wanted the illustration to look to also further that message
that I'm trying to create in that story.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and choosing the right illustrator, I mean, whether it's
someone you know or someone you've heard about to get
that message across. How was that whole process?
Speaker 4: So it was definitely interesting. There was a good we
had a good back and forth conversation, and she definitely
wanted to work with me as far as what my
vision was. I did throw her a little bit of
a challenge. I asked her not to show the people's
faces in the books. I just wanted the faces of
the wolves being shown. I really wanted the kids to
relate to the wolves, to make that emotional connection with
the wolves rather than the people. But obviously the people
do have an important role in her stories, and so
one of the things I would try to kind of
do is if someone had I guess, a signature look
that we could recognize, or a certain outfit that they
always were, I would have that person in that outfit
so that they could be recognizable. But I did want
their face to be either covered or them looking away
and that way, you know, and anytime the kids seeing,
you know, two eyes a face, it's going to be
of one of the wolves.
Speaker 1: Okay, Yeah, I love that. I love that. Who wants
to look at the people, We want to look at
the wolves. Yeah, So we'll skip back to the Wolf
Conservation Center. How did you get involved in that and
you've been doing it for close to a decade now,
I guess, yeah, yeah, isn't that amazing?
Speaker 4: Yeah? It was my sister in law. So she was
visiting with my brother from Italy and she loves wolves.
She found the Wolf Conservation Center. I didn't even know
it existed, and she want to visit. Unfortunately, it was
all booked out at that time, and so she wasn't
able to visit. Neither was I. And I tried to
go back a couple of times, and the plans with
my friends kept on falling through, and so I saw
that they had volunteer opportunities and I said, well, I
like to volunteer. So I just signed up to volunteer,
and that's how I got to see the wolves, and
you know, they really had me yet.
Speaker 1: Hello.
Speaker 4: I saw what they were doing there. I learned a lot,
and I just said, this is definitely for me.
Speaker 1: I love it. I love how it works out.
Speaker 4: Well.
Speaker 1: I've had the pleasure of working with wolves myself a
couple of conservation rescue organizations and gotten to go into
close encounters with them, some more wild than others. But
it's a wonderful species. It's a wonderful cause you got
going on, and big kudos for volunteering and now writing
about all the wonderful wolves there. So that's fantastic. Where
can people find out more about you, what's going on,
get the books and yeah, and maybe volunteer a little
bit themselves.
Speaker 4: Yeah, So if they'd like to visit the Wolf Conservation
Center's site, it's New York Wolf dot org. There they
can find out about Trumpet the other wolves that they
help save their If they'd like more information about me,
they can either look at my bio at Briley and
Baxter Publications. They have all the authors listed and I'm
Leocadia George, so they can kind of learn a little
bit more about me, or they can write me directly
on email Leocadia Georget books at gmail dot com. And yeah,
would welcome any dialogue with anybody interested.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, Well, we'll get all those posted. So those that
are in the area definitely come by and see the
Wolf Conservation Center and if you live in the area,
you can definitely volunteer or lind your tides or talents
or both to the organization, and definitely everybody pick up
the copy of the book and the series. It's Trumpet
the Miracle Wolf Pup Trumpet Becomes a Mom and the
whole series that goes along with it, written by Leocadia.
George Leocadia, thank you so much for coming on the
show today. Big kudos on the book and the series
and keep up all the great work.
Speaker 4: Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Well, we're coming to end the show today.
I want to thank everyone for listening to Animal Rights
on pet Life Radio. Want to thank the producers and
sponsors for making this show possible. If you've got questions, comments,
or ideas for the show or any of the shows,
you can drop us a line at Petlife Radio dot
com and we'll answer your questions, entertain your comments, and
bring on the people you want to hear from most.
And while you're there, to check out all the other
wonderful shows and hosts. It's a cornercopia of Howling Trumpet
Fun It's at pet Life Radio dot com. So until
next time, Radio, great story about the animals in your life,
and who knows, you may be the next guest on
Animal Rights on pet Life Radio. Have a great day.
Speaker 3: Let's talk pets every week on demand only on Petlife
Radio dot Com.
Speaker 1: Outport, Potford Transport, Barford Potport, Bamford Backport, pat Patportpotport, Bilbourne
Passport