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Day One of Iditarod 42

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It’s 8:00am on the first morning of Iditarod 42 and we are beginning to see different strategies once again emerge. I still haven’t been able to get my insider subscription to work so I’m currently relying on just the standings published by ITC at this time.

Martin Buser, Nicolas Petite, Mike Williams Jr. all currently sit in Rainy Pass this morning. I imagine they will rest here a few hours and then head out on the trail. It seems these mushers are doing an adaptation of Martin’s strategy last year of “rush to the front” but are choosing to add a little more rest.

Kelly Maxiner has currently pushed out of Rainy Pass and is en route to Rohn. He may opt to 24 there, once he gets there before trekking over “The Burn” but I imagine he will continue further along. Like Travis, Nick Petite, and Jeff King, Kelly Maxiner has a sled caboose (like Travis). It’s been reported that he has only been running 12 of his 16 dogs due to the hard fast conditions so even though he has rested little, his dogs have been getting rest.

The hard trail allows those traveling with dogs in their sled to maintain good, fast speeds despite having fewer dogs in the line. Petite, who probably has at least 1 or 2 dogs in his trailer was only a minute slower than Buser. Buser, who does not have a caboose, may have still had a dog in the sled – it just is a much tighter fit.

Unlike Petite, Buser, and Maxiner, Travis is running a more traditional schedule. We knew going into this race that the danger of this hard, fast trail would be that it is very tempting to go too fast and run too far. Combined with the warm weather, this can really sap a lot out of a dog team. But that energy drain, if it is seen, won’t be seen until several days into the race

Martin has definitely learned from last year. His team has performed consistently winning every mid-distance race they have been entered in. Translating that into an Iditarod win, however, presents its own unique challenges. Still Martin has the knowledge, skill, and talent as a dog man. I am not sure what to expect of him this year. His 17th place finish last year did not surprise me; I would be equally surprised if he hadn’t learned from it and refined his strategy.

Petite, who (I believe) only has 7 returning veterans from last years 6th place team, has had the consistent training. This guy was always out on the trail. Talking to Petite early in the season, he had a unique race strategy lined out for Iditarod 42. I’ll be interested to see how and if he chooses to execute it – but I wouldn’t be surprised. He likes to shake things up. He has one of the dogs we bred and raised, Levi, running on his team this year. His brother Wrangler, is running with Travis. Both are probably the youngest dogs on these mushers team, a nod to their talent.

So what is Travis doing?. He is taking his time, building up rest. This is going to be a trail that wears dogs down. The hard fast icy trail combined with the long stretches of snowless trail predicted later on in the race are going to be rough on teams. Wrist injuries will take lots of dogs out of the race. Taking extra rest now will pay off later. It is a tried and true method that has been proven year after year to yield good, reliable results…however only time will tell!

Chesney Goes Ice Skating

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Last weekend, I spent Sunday afternoon ice-skating with a friend out at Tern Lake. It’s a fun little spot where the Seward Highway & Sterling Highway meet and is usually one of the first places to freeze. I admit that I have never skated out there before and am not actually much of a skater.

Still, I used this as an opportunity to introduce one of our shier pups and to get him more familiar with me. We were really hard to socialize are dogs and it is important that lots of socialization occur at a young age. We try our best to work with dogs that show early signs of being shy by working with them more frequently. We often try to do plenty of 1-on-1 time.

Chesney was born this summer. He is the son of Fidget and Copper, both finishers from last year’s Iditarod team, both incredibly eager dogs, and both a little reserved when it comes to social interaction. I expected several dogs from this litter to show more signs of being shy. Fortunately, they are all very friendly dogs.

Here is a video of Chesney following along on the ice:

PS sorry…my voice over came out really loud, you might want to turn your volume DOWN.

In the last week after this video was shot, Chesney has been really friendly and out going — all very positive signs.

The New Dog Barn

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By now it’s no secret, but we recently built a new 10-dog indoor box (picture 10 cubby holes big enough for dogs) so that our dogs could come inside on less-than-favorable days. While I can’t say I am an exceptionally good wood worker, I will say I have certainly enjoyed the process.

What started off as a way to distract myself from Travis’ absence grew into a fun project that now has me, I will admit, somewhat obsessed with building things whenever I can seem to find the time. (which is never)

The process itself was somewhat bizarre. Two years ago we had started a 15-hole dog box for a small one-axle trailer that Travis had spent the summer living in. Although no gem, we were excited to have a way to transport our dogs. Well, long story short, although we built the box it was actually too heavy for our small trailer and we never finished it. There was no top piece and none of the “boxes” actually had sides.

So, for the last two years it has sat in our garage collecting dust, power tools, and any other object that needed a temporary (or even less-than-temporary) home. Well, all that, changed. With the help of a friend, I cut the top row off using a sawzall and now had the parts to what would be a new 10-hole dog box, to go in our basement, as well as a 5 hole dog box, also to go in the basement.

I know what you are thinking: But you have SLED DOGS…why do they need to come inside?

Believe it or not, there are several reasons mushers bring dogs inside during the winter. One of the biggest reasons is to work on the dogs — maybe we have a dog with a foot problem and we need to keep applying ointment or maybe one of our dogs has an ongoing sore muscle — regardless of what the problem is, being able to bring them into a warm environment is very beneficial for the healing process. Another reason is if dogs get sick — we recently had several sick dogs in the kennel which really rushed me to finish the box. Perhaps the least “practical” reason but perhaps the most important, was the simple fact that we like bringing our dogs inside to hang out — not just with us but also with each other. We believe it’s important for a team to have good camaraderie both on and off the trail. Plus, the whole reason we have dogs is because we love dogs…the more time we get to spend with them, in our eyes, the better!

So after cutting the the top part off, I moved the 10 whole piece inside. I then had to cut side pieces, a top, and make clips to ensure that the dogs stayed in their cubby hole…we need to maintain some sense of order after all 🙂

Here is a picture of it being put to use:

Photo Nov 13, 11 47 04 PM

It’s been especially having fun all the puppies inside…the one thing I forgot about however was there need to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night so usually when they come in I have to get up every four hours because they have tiny bladders. Well worth the extra effort in my opinion 🙂

This picture was taken after many of the dogs had been inside for awhile (at like 3am) and were tuckered out from playing. Faraday, the big grey and white siberian husky in the middle of the picture was not feeling 100% because she got into an open bag of kibble, gorged herself and had a rather full stomach. On the top from left to right we have Kip, Odin, Meena, & Faraday (sorry I can’t remember who the last dog in the right hand most hole is and I can’t tell from just the leg!). On the bottom we have Gracie, Coda, & Chesney.

Some of you may be thinking…”Wait…none of your puppy names go together?”

Yeah…so what! While I am not completely opposed to “themes” I would rather find a name that fits the dog even if it means waiting a little longer. We have had themes in the past but only if the theme really and I mean really fits the dogs.

Ok well hope you enjoyed the update!

P.S. As you can see, our dogs enjoy their blankets. If you have old fleece blankets, sheets or towels and live in the Seward area our dogs would certainly appreciate the donation. I like to change out the bedding and end up doing a LOT of laundry…someday we will have a washer and dryer just for dog blankets, harnesses, and booties. I just wish that day would get here sooner!

 

The Other Half of Iditarod

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Without saying, there is obviously a lot that goes into Iditarod. But, what exactly does it entail? For this kennel, what Iditarod has meant this year is lots of time apart. The realities of training a competitive distance dog team mean that you need to log lots and lots of training miles.

How many miles?

Well, different mushers have different strategies and that “special number” is something that many mushers actually like to keep “under-wraps.” Why? I have no idea…perhaps they think it is their “special” formula for success… But The reality is that most competitive teams have somewhere between 3,000-5,000 miles on their dogs before the start of the race. Of course, like everything, there are exceptions: older dogs who have travelled to Nome several times before often don’t require as much training as dogs who have only done the race once or twice. Still, miles are important

And miles, ultimately, means time apart — especially when our home base is Seward. There is a reason we are the only year-round kennel in this town: it’s because there are no trails. In the winter, when we have snow (which we don’t at the moment), we are able to put about 20 miles on the dogs by running out to Kenai Fjords National Park and back…in order to train the dogs, we often have to do at least a 60 mile run meaning we do the whole course 3 times. Because we run out to the Park and then back, we actually will cover the same trail approximately 6 times on one run. An

Travis training at sunset

This however gets very repetitive and the dogs often grow “sour.” Just imagine how you would feel if you had to run a marathon on a highschool track. It might be ok the first time. The next time you might get a little bored. By the 6th or 7th time, no matter how much you love to run, you are inevitably going to ask: why am I doing this?

We want to keep our dogs attitudes up and our own attitudes. So this year, Travis has been training all over the state. Most of the time, he is Knik, Alaska mushing with friend Wade Marrs. Together, they also travelled north to the Denali Highway where they did a series of camping trips.

But where exactly does this leave me?

Stuck at home.

With only myself and Travis currently working with the dogs, it means that I get to take care of the next generation of our kennel. We had several litters of puppies this year because our goal is ultimately to field two competitive Iditarod teams. So far, even though being at home means I cannot train, I have had a blast working with our puppies who are going to be the heart and soul of our kennel in the coming years.  Still, I will admit it is definitely tough staying at home. There a lot of work involved in the day to day running of a kennel; but more importantly, I just miss Travis. But, it’s all for the greater good… we are training to have a stellar season and being successful ultimately means we have to make certain sacrifices.

Wish us luck as we train. Have questions about Iditarod? Please, make sure to email us and we will post about them! If you enjoyed our post, please make sure you share it with your friends.

Handsome the Terrible and Midnight the Wonder Cat

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We recently added a new sled dog to our kennel, his name is Handsome…and there is a very good reason…he is GORGEOUS! We were given him because he is exceptionally shy dog despite lots of socialization and I have a long history of working with shy dogs and getting them to “come out of their shell” (or as the case usually is, dog house.) But all the shy dogs I’ve met and worked with before don’t even begin to hold a candle to Handsome. Although at home with his fellow canine companions, he is on full alert whenever I seem to come around…here’s a recent video I took of him resting inside:

The first three days at our kennel he lived in our house and at night I put him on the foot of my bed to sleep. On the third night, I woke up with his head resting on my stomach. You can imagine the joy I felt after having worked with him when I thought I had finally gotten through to Handsome that I was on his side. After all, I had bee feeding him, walking him on a leash, and at one point I even let him free run in our fenced in dog yard with all our pups. You could see although he was not at home with me that he, at least, felt at home…but maybe that was slowly starting to change.

Wrong!

That morning, believing that our bond had somehow deepened I decided to once again let him run loose with the pups. Letting our dogs play for an hour every morning 4-5 times a week is one of my greatest joys. Watching how our dogs interact, play, and “hang out” together is fun…more importantly I love that no matter what I am doing, whether it’s sitting on a dog house or scooping poop, that the dogs want to be around me. It’s cool to know that even though they have a huge yard to run around, they’d rather be hanging out playing next to mom.

What’s also awesome is that dogs as young as two months and as old as 10 years get along effortlessly. That’s not to say we don’t have occasional squabbles, we do, but they are always more interested in playing. Their favorite game is keep away. Inevitably, one dog always finds some treasured object whether it’s a bone, a ball, or a stick and then runs around trying to protect his treasure from everyone else. It’s hilarious. Occasionally, we get a “bad sport” who will take their treasure and dive into a dog house (“base”) to protect it and to stay away from the other dogs.

Well we had a great morning playing together and until playtime was over things went flawlessly. When playtime ended, one dog, Handsome refused to be captured. I have never had this problem. We have two shy dogs in our kennel — Willie and Sage — but both are dogs who respect, listen, and come to us. We work hard to socialize all our dogs, not only for our benefit but for theirs. One day, there will come a time when they cannot run or pull and they will need to retire. We can’t retire every dog to our kennel so it is important that our dogs have social skills. Plus, we mush because we love dogs…it’s only fun if they love us back!

Handsome is hanging out inside.

Handsome, unfortunately, was not at all like this. When I moved to the left, he moved to the right. No matter how close I got, he was always an arms length away. It seemed like we were magnets that repelled one another and no matter what I did I could not catch him.

So, I started pulling out every trick I have in my book. He is not the first dog who has not listened. Usually the puppies around 2-3 months old go through a brief “rebellious” phase where they do not want to be tied up and enjoy playing keep away. Max, my 1/2 husky 1/2 collie mix, Betty, our german shepherd, and Archie, our retired sled dog turned dog lot manager (I’ll post on this later), almost always come to my aid and help me coral the young ones — not so with Handsome. Their tricks at distracting would not work. Food did not work. Nothing worked. He was too fast and too smart.

I grew frustrated and started to think that I would never  catch him. He was in a fenced dogyard for crying out loud! How hard should it be?

But nothing seemed to work so Handsome remained loose.

Days passed. And I remained confused. Why wouldn’t he come? He always got so close but then whenever it seemed like I would reach out for him, would dart off in another direction.

One day went by. Then another. Then another.

Well, when I had given up hope of ever catching him, something miraculous happened: Midnight the Wonder Cat. Midnight cat has a thing for dogs and for some reason or another, they seem to have a thing for him. His best friend is a german shepherd and he routinely hangs out in the dog lot. Whenever we bring a sled dog inside he immediately goes up to it. For a long time I wondered about the expression curiosity killed the cat but now, I know. He is not shy whatsoever. See, look how he just helps himself to the dogs’ food.

So Midnight goes out to the doglot and Handsome immediately runs over and barks at him. They’d met earlier in the week and at one point I even caught them cuddled on the couch together — not a rarity with this cat. Midnight ran playfully around Handsome. There was no aggression. No sign of dog chasing cat or cat chasing dog, just playful gestures back and forth for about a half hour.

But eventually, Midnight decided it was time to go in. He came to do the door (I’d been watching this from inside) and I let him in. Much to my disbelief, Handsome followed Midnight not only inside but right up onto the couch to curl up with him. Quietly seated next to the cat, I easily snapped a leash onto Handsome who paid me no attention.

Handsome is still living inside. It’s clear he needs more time to learn how to trust us. For now, he’s happy snuggled up next to the coolest cat I’ve ever known.