September 2009 Archives

This creek has never been as high as it is this year. Someone has damed it up so it's just about over the dogs' heads. The dogs have gone through it great for a few days, but yesterday finally balked since it is so deep. Yesterday, my neighbor, and fellow musher, Mike Suman, undamed the thing. Worked great. Today the creek was 6-8 inches lower than it had been. I parked the dogs with just the leaders' noses in the water. After a bit, I called them up and the dove through to the other side. I really don't want to train these guys to stop once they hit water, so it was nice to be able to drive them all the way across the creek. They seemed to really enjoy it as it was a fairly warm day and I ran them hard, with no breaks till they got to the creek so they'd look forward to it.

Ran two 8 dog teams this afternoon. Was a nice 42 degrees even at 2:00 this afternoon. Both teams did just great. Our 4 mile loop takes us through a culvert, a creek that is nearly over the dogs heads, onto a road with a very difficult turn to get off the road, and across a rickety little bridge. Most of the dogs have done this route before - early last season, but some have never been through all that before. Hasty is one that I didn't run before. She lead the team through that stuff like she's been doing it all her life. So nice to be back into the swing of running dogs from here. The power I felt with just 8 of those dogs on the line.....going to be a really fun season!!!

I think Hasty likes to sleep under the stars. She thinks these houses work much better upside down.

Ran the dogs with Martin again on Sunday. First we ran his A team. Was a beautiful thing to see...all cylinders firing, all tugs tight, leaders responding to commands on a dime! Then we ran all "my" young group together. Ok, so this wasn't quite so pretty...trouble before we got out of the yard, just young dogs, overly excited, inexperience leaders.... After help from Magnus and Sean getting the tangle undone and dogs lined out, we were off again. The run went just fine. Dogs learned alot, I learned alot. Time to bring them "home" and be on our own.

Run starts off well...

OK, then a few issues...

and a much deserved water break once home!

First ATV run and I missed it! That dang job of mine just gets in the way. Oh well, my loss is the dogs' gain. Martin ran a mix of my crew and his crew this morning since it was nice and cold out. They went 4 miles and guess things went well, except that Rohn and Martin were a bit shy about going into the culvert. Don't think that fear will last long. We have a culvert here that we have to go through on all our ATV runs, so they know how to do it. Might just take a few runs to reintroduce them to it. Can be quite scary when the team gets in there and everything starts to echo. Not much for me to do today but, go over and play with all the puppies, brush them all and just play. They are all shedding that sunburnt fur from the glacier so they just loved the brushing! Plan is for Martin to run the dogs for the rest of the week so he can give them the experience of running with experienced dogs. I'm going over Saturday morning to ride the ATV with Martin so he can teach me some things. Love that idea!!

Things went much smoother with today's free run. We took 2 groups. Took half of Martin's (A team) and half of "my" group of youngsters for each run. First group did really well. Martin fired up the ATV and they just chased him all over. We walked them to different hay fields and they all stuck around nicely and got lots of exercise and pets. The second group wasn't nearly as active. Hasty, one of my little girls is just coming into heat so we left her tied to the truck. None of the boys would leave her alone, so no one wandered off too far. This is such great practice in socializing and truck loading along with getting some exercise without the worry of overheating. It's also very fun for us humans too!!

Martin, Magnus and Kathy

Do they look like they're having fun, or what?

So, the dogs are home from the glacier and all settled at Happy Trails. Saturday night Sean, Magnus, Martin and I had a meeting of the minds and each came away with a group of dogs to run for the year. Most of them are dogs I ran last year. All are two years or younger. Monday after school Magnus, Sean and Caleb (who handled the dogs on the glacier) and I loaded up all of this young group and drove to the hayfield near Martin's. Once there, we proceded to let the dogs out of the truck and by the time we had 10 dogs dropped, 9 of them took off and were headed for the road. We loaded back up and chased them a few miles down the road. Some guy had stopped in the middle of the road and the dogs were just milling around. We managed to get them all back and into the truck. However, Martin said he got a half dozen phone calls about it. So, today we got some "coaching" from Martin. He simply told us to take 10 young dogs and 10 older dogs who understand how this all works. He said to drop the 10 young dogs and put them on drop chains on the truck, let the older dogs go and slowly let the pups go. Worked like a charm!! We spent an hour or so having them chase the ATV and just romp and play with us. They had a blast and it was so awesome to ride the ATV with them running in front and beside and just getting to watch them run. It's a rare opportunity to see how well these dogs can move when they run full out. We usually only get the chance to see them at a controlled lope and then, only from behind! I am in love with this free running, chasing the ATV!

In case it's not obvious....I'm totally excited to begin this training season!!

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"Butkus" , a 15 week old pup belonging to a friend, came to visit yesterday. Oakley and Gopher chased him everywhere for a couple hours. Still haven't heard from either Gopher or Oakley this morning. Hope they can move today. All had a blast! The sled dogs all thought they had a new toy. I imagine Butkus slept well last night too. Canon just guarded the ball and HIS pool.

No post is complete without a pic of our girl. She got off the couch just for this pic.

You'd be tired too if you just lugged this big stick up the hill.

Beautiful weekend here! Couldn't ask for better weather for a long weekend.