SPEARFISH - A wolf and a dog can have pups. That's one of the facts 8-year-old Jesse Garness of Newell said she learned on a recent trip to the Spirit of the Hills Wildlife Sanctuary.

"I never knew that," she said, with a shrug.

A nearby friend wasn't thinking about wolf hybrids; she was focused on one of the tigers.

"It was way, way pretty," 8-year-old Kylar Reitz said.

The girls took a lunch break with other students from the Newell Harvesting Opportunities to Promote Education program, who recently came to the sanctuary for a tour.

Students like Reitz and Garness are the reason sanctuary director Mike Welchynski would like to offer more educational opportunities at the 290-acre facility.

"More and more teachers depend on us to educate," he said. Student groups who used to come for an hour now stay half a day, which is why volunteers are in beginning stages of building a new educational center to accommodate those needs.

The new facility would provide bathrooms, a classroom, rooftop patio and an underground storage and animal food preparation room. One of the highlights of the upgrade is a webcam that could capture the animals in their daily routines as well as surgeries performed by veterinarian Dave Elsom, who donates his time and services to the sanctuary and will soon move onto the site.

The surgeries could be broadcast statewide at educational institutions, said Don Balyeat, who is in charge of education at the center, including plans for the new facility.

"This is big for South Dakota," he said. "The education runs from little kids to the university level."

Black Hills State University volunteer coordinator Richard Raridon said he hopes to get students involved by assisting the sanctuary with media, videos and promotion through a grant the school received. Western Sky Media has donated technological support for documentaries and the webcam, which will be put on the sanctuary's Web page and YouTube.

"It's really pretty neat," Raridon said. "Before, we've always worked on maintenance or feeding and watering; now, we can help them with a different aspect."

But there's still plenty of work to do before YouTube, Balyeat said.

"None of us have done this before," he said. "Raising the money will be difficult."

The work will be worth it in the end, said certified vet tech Whitney Mathern, because students throughout the state will be able to witness operations on exotic animals. It's something she wished had been around when she was in school.

"Every surgery you can learn something new," she said.

During lunch, the Newell students munched on sandwiches and kept a close eye on one of the peacocks circling their yellow school bus, its long tail feathers of iridescent purples and greens dusting the ground.

Where else would the students get to worry about a peacock trying to hop onto their bus with them, Balyeat said, laughing.

"It puts them closer to the animals than a zoo ever could," he said.

Contact Kayla Gahagan at 394-8410 or kayla.gahagan@rapidcityjournal.com