SPK Dog Log

You will notice that some of the faces on the “SP Kennel Dogs” are missing. This is true. So the questions is: “When do you retire a dog from SP K Racing?”

That’s often difficult to answer because, you guessed it: everyone is different.

The long answer to this question starts with our belief that each dog deserves quality individual time. In order to give the youngest SP Kennel members an honest, quality shot at becoming the absolute best sled dogs that they can become – we must spend enough time and effort with each youngster during their training years.

Let’s be honest… I enjoy watching the SP youngsters. And it is critical that we get to know these future All-Stars while they are developing. I have no desire to turn our young dogs over to someone else to raise and train. They are our future. We want to know every little detail about them. Imagine the high we’ve felt while watching Quito grow from a scrawny puppy; to a tall, thin yearling; to a novice, budding two year old and now a two-time Yukon Quest Golden Harness recipient and Iditarod All-Star lead dog. It is incredibly rewarding to know that we have been with her through all of these times of her life.

So, in order to have enough time, effort, space and money to care for, train and race each SP Kennel dog, we have to keep our overall dog population in check. That means we carefully select who will retire from SP Kennel racing, who will move to the couch and who will move on to a new home. The number of dogs that we retire each year is correlated to the number of puppies we raised the previous summer. It only makes sense that the SP K ‘newbies’ will try to replace the SP K ‘retirees’.

If you have followed the kennel for any length of time you know that the ‘Puppy Class’ from 2013 – now the ‘Yearling Class’ – is very large. There are 11 Fire Pups plus Champ and Cayenne – a total of 13 one year old dogs. Due to our kennel management technique, this summer we needed to retire the same number.

It was incredibly challenging to choose who would retire. And just as challenging to let go some of these guys to far away homes. Not only did a few of these dogs have another year or two of racing under their harnesses, but also because they were part of the SP Kennel family. But, the knowledge that we find every dog the right home at the right time makes the process doable.

All of these dogs went to forever homes. Sometimes it’s an easy transition and sometimes it’s more challenging. The most important thing is that these new owners can find the joy that each individual dog has to offer.

1. Bonita
2. Boris
3. Fang
4. Honda
5. Kipper
6. Malibu
7. Pud
8. Ranger
9. Shiner
10. Spicy
11. Spoog
12. Tatfish
13. Tug

Everyone loves Tatfish; Pud and new puppy buddy, Aria; Spoog and new BFF, Edie.

Tug (right) and friends look for squirrels; Yes… that is a cat couch surfing with Malibu!

As part of the “Meet the Dogs” series back in January 2009, this video spotlights Dingle who was entering his first season as a “proper” racing dog. Since then he has gone on to compete in six Iditarods, three Copper Basic 300s, one Yukon Quest 1000 and two YQ300s. He’s also raced in three Sheep Mountain 150s, three Two Rivers 50s and one each of the Denali Doubles, Gin Gin 200 and Aurora 50/50. What a dog!

The youngest dogs in training have just turned one year old: Cayenne and Champ. They have coloration and body structure similar to their Mother, Nutmeg. But their spunk and ‘get up and go’ is from their Father, Nacho. These two yearlings are about 2 months younger than the Fire Litter.

Cayenne is smaller and racy. She is super confident around other dogs. She was nervous at the first introduction of a harness. Moira even had to carry her as a ‘lap dog’ for a short distance. But, Cayenne’s comfort level in harness is now perfect – she’ll even put her head up when we approach her with a harness. We are VERY excited about this Gal.

Champ is tall and leggy. He is a talker and will scream and howl with excitement. Champ had no hesitation when first introduced to a harness. His only original issues was an ‘oral fixation’ with the main line. Dogs are not allowed to chew but he learned his manners rather quickly. Champ pulls extremely hard in harness so we will have to work on pacing him as the season continues. So far Champ looks fantastic.

Allen grabs Cayenne to bring her to the team; Aliy harnesses Champ

We had a warm day at the kennel earlier in the week, so we did not train the dogs in harness. Instead we put a few dogs on the treadmill – actually the entire 2 year old Golf Litter: Driver, Chipper, Wedgy, Woody, Sandy and Iron. None of these dogs had ever been on the treadmill before. You can imagine what they thought about “the floor moving under their feet”!

So, here is a video of the first time these dogs ever got on a treadmill. Aliy does a bit of “cheering” and most of the dogs get after it!

HERE YOU GO!

The SP Kennel Dog Log has been in existence since February 2007 and it is very close to reaching the “2000 posts” milestone. Since that time we have posted hundreds of videos, photos and stories and we’d like to revisit some of them and share them with you regularly throughout the season. We’ll post stories, informational videos and other fun and interesting stuff.

For those of you who have not been following us since then it will give you an opportunity to fill in some pieces of the puzzle or simply give you some background information about your favourite dogs (and their parents!) For those that have been supporting us since that time we hope you enjoy these trips down memory lane.

If you take a look down the left hand side of the blog you will see links to post and video archives so you can go exploring yourself when you have the time.

Our first Throwback Thursday (TBT) is from February 26, 2007; just a few days before the Iditarod. Kaz posted about “The Top Eighteen” dogs in the running for Aliy’s team. See how many names you recognise here!

The Top Eighteen

Well, time is just flying by. Iditarod is less than a week away. Soon the family will be heading to Alaska and we will be packing up the dogs and heading down to Anchorage. So who are we bringing? That is a good question. Let’s start with Aliy’s “A-Team”. Many of the dogs were on Aliy’s team last year and most of those and a few others were on Allen’s Championship Copper Basin Team. Here they are – the 2007 Iditarod Team.
1. ChaCha (5yrs) – Main Leader. Iditarod: ’06, ’05, ’04. In ’07, CB300 & T200.
2. Venus (5yrs) – Main Leader. Iditarod: ’06, ’05. In ’07, CB300 & T200.
3. Pingo (8yrs) – Main Leader. Iditarod: ’06, ’05, ’04, ’03, ’02, ‘01. Yukon Quest ’00. In ’07, CB300 & T200.
4. Teddy (5yrs) – Team Dog. Iditarod: ’06, ’05, ’04. In ’07, CB300 & T200.
5. Skittles (3yrs) –Leader/ Team. Iditarod: ’06. In ’07, CB300 & T200.
6. Butterscotch (3yrs) –Leader/ Team. Iditarod: Rookie. In ’07, CB300 & T200.
7. Reeses (3yrs) –Leader/ Team. Iditarod: Rookie. In ’07, Kusko 300 & T100.
8. Manhattan (5yrs) – Leader / Wheel. Iditarod: ’06, ’05, ’04. In ’07, CB300 & T200.
9. Hoss (4yrs) – Leader / Team. Iditarod: ’06. In ’07, CB300 & T200
10. Oddball (4yrs) – Team Dog. Iditarod: ’06, ‘05. In ’07, CB300 & T200
11. Tony (4yrs) – Team Dog. Iditarod: Rookie. In ’07, CB300 & T200
12. Heeeler (3 yrs) – Leader / Team. Iditarod: Rookie. In ’07, CB300
13. Bullet (4yrs) – Leader / Team. Iditarod: ’06. In ’07, Kusko 300 & T100
14. Pepper (4yrs) – Leader / Team. Iditarod: ’05. In ’07, Kusko 300 & T100
15. Sparky (4yrs) – Leader / Team. Iditarod: ’06. In ’07, Kusko 300 & T100
16. ROSEmary (2yrs) – Leader / Team. Iditarod: Rookie. In ’07, Kusko 300 & T100
17. Kingston (4yrs) – Team Dog. Iditarod: ’06. In ’07, T200 (Dean Osmar Dog)
18. Hawke (4yrs) – Team Dog. Iditarod: ’06. In ’07, T200 (Dean Osmar Dog)

NOTE: the final make-up of the teams were:

Aliy’s team was Hoss, Heeler, Venus, ChaCha, Butterscotch, Oddball, Skittles, Manny, Kingston, Hawke, Tony, Teddy, Pingo, Bullet, Pepper and Sparky.

Allen’s team had Girlfriend, Doña, Blossom, Heidi, Reeses, KitKat, Snickers, Rolo, Petunia, Peterbuilt, nutMeg, Rose, Hera, Imac, Mouse and Betty.

Chica and Clyde’s puppies are running, romping and loving life. They live in a raised wooden pen that can be washed and scrubbed throughly. The pen has two houses and many puppy toys. Olivia resides next to this pen and she is the perfect auntie (‘half’ auntie genetically.) The pups often spend the daytime in one of the other SP “play pens” on the property.

Chica visits periodically, but does not nurse them. She likes to check that they are okay but she isn’t over concerned about being near them all the time.

This litter is very food motivated — which isn’t a shocker, considering Clyde “the food fanatic”– is their father. They come when called, especially when there are biscuits or a dish of food involved. Their daily walks are sometimes abbreviated when one of them thinks “Hey… there might be more food back at the kennel!” Then they all ‘high tail’ it back to their pen in hopes of finding a random piece of kibble.

We did Past Hasting’s 8 week old ‘Puppy Puzzle Tests’ last week. Each pup is looked at very critically in terms of personality, conformation and overall body structure. Since we don’t often sell or give away pups, these tests are simply for our in-house records. It is fun to look back on the tests years later.

Aliy looks at Ernie’s body structure (he is a miniature Beemer); Scooby wonders what all the fuss is about as Mickey takes notes.

We also took some 8 week Puppy Portraits. As you can imagine, these kids will change tremendously over the next few months, so we will update the portraits soon. But, here they are:

  L to R: Rodney: big loudmouth; Ginger: confident little girl; Scooby: a bit of a bully

  L to R: Ernie: real sweetheart; Five: a little sensitive.

We have had a consistent schedule for the dogs since the start of training. The veterans are excited to be out tromping through the puddles. The youngsters are eager – sometimes a little too much so!

Here is a video of our last of five training teams for the morning. We ran quite a few dogs single to get them used to lining out and listening to commands. At the beginning of training you want everyone to start learning what you expect. (Youngsters have an easier time focusing when they don’t have their brother or sister yelling in their ear.)

The team is: Viper and Waylon (Lead), Schmoe and Chemo, Clyde and Amber, Violet (single), Spark (single), Iron (single), Felix (single).