Dogs

A Few Days Left to Vote – Who Wears it Best?

December 20, 2019 by

ONLY A FEW DAYS LEFT TO VOTE!

Help us make this Holiday Season something to smile about and join us for some SPK Holiday Fun. We are having a Santa’s Best Dressed Dog Elf Contest.  This Christmas entertainment will run until Christmas Day – December 25th.

As you know, Santa asked us if he could borrow a few dogs to fill out his Holiday workforce. The five Fire Litter pups – Amber, Commando, Nomex, Spark and Violet – gladly stepped up and volunteered for this Santa Duty. The one stipulation was that each dog got to dress in their own individual Holiday Best Elf Outfit and they want YOU to decide:

“Who Wears it BEST?“

VOTE for your favorite Santa’s Best Dressed Dog Elf

After the voting is tallied the winner will be announced and he or she will receive a thank you Christmas steak from Santa. In addition we will select five random Voters (that could be YOU!) who will receive a Dog Elf photo Thank You Cards from their favorite. (Not sure how we are gonna do this… stay tuned.)

Here they are:

Amber showed off her enormous cheer bow

 

Commando donned ‘black tie’ duds with a Brooks Brothers dark sequin tie

 

Nomex sported his bright green starred leggings ★

 

Spark enjoys his comedic look with a big yellow bow tie

 

Violet insisted that she wear special heart booties

 

Voting is closed!

Alaska | The Kennel

Sunrise or Sunset?

December 18, 2019 by

The southern horizon at SP Kennel is spectacular this time of year.

At one o’clock in the afternoon we aren’t sure whether we want to call this sunrise or sunset – or just the glow from the sunshine.

No matter what… it will make you take a moment from your busy day to pause and enjoy.

 

 

Dogs

10-Day SPK Christmas Contest

December 15, 2019 by

Help us make this Holiday Season something to smile about and join us for some SPK Holiday Fun. We are having a Santa’s Best Dressed Dog Elf Contest.  This Christmas entertainment will run for the next 10 days – until Christmas Day – December 25th.

Dog Elf? you ask. Well… yes.

Being only 10 days before Christmas, Santa’s regular elves are very busy. So much so that Santa asked us if he could borrow a few dogs to fill out his Holiday workforce. The five Fire Litter pups – Amber, Commando, Nomex, Spark and Violet – have always enjoyed life. They gladly stepped up and volunteered for this Santa Duty. Those of you who know the Fire Pups… know that they have an affinity for flair! While they agreed to help Santa, they did so with one stipulation: each dog got to dress in their own individual Holiday Best Elf Outfit. To top things off, the Fire Litter pups have always been competitive. (Duh! Ultra competitive racing sled dogs.) But now that they are dressed to impress in their Holiday best, they want YOU to decide:

“Who Wears it BEST?“

VOTE for your favorite Santa’s Best Dressed Dog Elf

After the voting is tallied, on Christmas Day, we will announce the WINNER. He or she will receive a thank you Christmas steak from Santa. In addition, because we love our Dog Fans… we will select five random Voters (that could be YOU!) who will receive a Dog Elf photo Thank You Cards from their favorite.

Here they are:

Amber showed off her enormous cheer bow

 

Commando donned ‘black tie’ duds with a Brooks Brothers dark sequin tie

 

Nomex sported his bright green starred leggings ★

 

Spark enjoys his comedic look with a big yellow bow tie

 

Violet insisted that she wear special heart booties

 

Oops! We could not locate your form.

This competition could not have been even remotely possible with the incredible Holiday Cheer of Wendy and Karolyn (sorry about the X-mas tree ‘watering’.) Additional holiday wardrobe assistants were Becky and Monica. Jeanne Schnackenberg is our photo editor extraordinaire.  Thank you all so very much. We sure had FUN!

(This is our second “Who Wears it BEST?” Holiday competition. You can read about the first competition HERE and HERE.)

 

Dogs

Almost Solstice

December 13, 2019 by

It was gorgeous yesterday on my 5-hour training run around the Two Rivers neighborhood.

Hope you enjoy the scenery without the wind chill!

ENJOY:

The team was:

  • Commando / Sanka
  • Nomex / Mismo
  • Razz / Sparky
  • Junior / Kodiak
  • Amber / Rodney
  • Driver / Clyde
  • Violet / Champ
  • Iron / Cayenne
Dogs

Scooby and Sam

December 7, 2019 by

My nephew Sam LOVES Scooby.

When you ask this 12-year old, “Who is your favorite dog?” You actually get a TOP THREE. The top dog of course would of course be his BBF and couch buddy, Starbuck. Another one of his most-liked pooches is Scooby. Tig ranks high on his “Fav List” as well. Tig and Sam were raised side-by-side. Neither of them can remember a time without the other.

These days when Sam walks over to the kennel he usually stops to chat with Scooby. It’s funny because Scooby is a high-strung, super hyper husky with tons of energy. When Sam comes calling Scooby sits on his dog house and cuddles. It’s super cute.

Sam was 7 years old when he named this cute one-day old puppy ScoobyDoo. Scooby was the ‘huskiest’ looking pup of the litter with a dark mask and stand up ears. Who wouldn’t fall in love with this pup?

Scooby has many young fans across the globe because of his awesome name. What child wouldn’t want to hang out with ScoobyDoo? Here is a snip it from my 2019 Iditarod Trail Notes:

We pulled into Shageluk and it was about 10 in the morning. Many community members were out walking through parked dog teams. It helped that we were right next to the school. A group of about 12 kids immediately came over to my team as soon as I parked. Their biggest concern was “Where is Scooby?” At first I was a little bit dumbstruck. Then I remembered last year I had Scooby in my team. He was the friendliest dog towards the kids, so I had I let them all pet him. We had stayed for the eight hours so Scooby had quite the fan base in Shageluk. Even if Aliy Zirkle doesn’t have admirers in Shageluk, Scooby sure does! I didn’t disappoint the kids because I introduced them to both Five and Rodney who were Scooby’s two brothers. They were pretty happy to meet his family.

Sam has followed Scooby’s racing career. He has watched him leave the starting line of Iditarod in harness and then greeted him 10 days later under the finish line burled arch in Nome. Needless to say, when Sam has a mushing day at SP Kennel… Scooby is always on the team!

Alaska

Holiday Book Opportunity

December 4, 2019 by

THANKS TO ALL WHO ASKED FOR A COPY.

WE HAVE SOLD OUT. 

Two Rivers Elementary is K thru 8th public school 5 miles from SP Kennel. Approximately 85 children are enrolled. The School Library is a small, yet interactive space where students can follow their dreams. Aliy’s sister, Ms Kaz, is the Librarian.

SP Kennel purchased fifty children’s books – ‘NORTH’ by Nick Dowson – through their annual Book Fair. Sales from this school fundraiser go towards purchasing new books and keeping the library shelves updated. We included a copy of ‘NORTH’ in all of our Dog Sponsor and Champion ‘thank you’ parcels.

We have five copies of ‘NORTH’ remaining. Instead of having them sit in the cluttered SPK office, we would like to get this fun arctic book in the hands of five children or libraries or interested parties. It seems to us that it would be a perfect Holiday Gift.

We will send a copy of ‘NORTH’ to your selected person if you pay the $8 shipping (US address/ additional for international.) Please email us and put Holiday Book in the subject line. The first five interested folks will get the book as well as a Holiday Card from the SPK Dogs.

Thanks for helping us support Two Rivers Elementary.

The simplest way to make sure that we raise literate children is to teach them to read, and to show them that reading is a pleasurable activity. And that means, at its simplest, finding books that they enjoy, giving them access to those books, and letting them read them.

Dogs

Fan Club Draw

December 3, 2019 by

We hoped to do a Dog Fan Club Draw at the end of November and here it is December already. How the winter mushing season seems to FLY BY this time of year.

Congratulations to Romeo Williams who is a fan of Bruno. He wins a packet of SP Kennel M&M’s plus a glam shot of Bruno and some other kennel goodies.

Bruno is SP Kennel’s Latin Lover. He is sexy, yet modest. With his dark brown coat and his milk chocolate eyes he could easily be the cover model of GQ ‘Canine’ magazine. His legs and chest are incredibly powerful and muscled due to his unyielding desire to run and pull. Bruno is one of our stronger boys.

Bruno was Rock Star talented last season and did the ‘Double-Double’ by racing and finishing in both the Yukon Quest and Iditarod. This is no easy feat. A husky needs skill and strength, but most of all enthusiasm to race and finish of two events. Bruno came across the finish line in both races with a smile. He had one minor hiccup on the Iditarod while racing with Aliy. Here is that excerpt from her Iditarod 2019 Trail Notes:

For about 4 miles before the Iditarod Checkpoint, I knew I was on the general route that the Iditarod took, but I didn’t know if I was on this year’s trail or the trail from 1981. Many times in the darkness of that night, I found myself in the middle of a sea of permanent reflective markers. When I stopped the team to decide which direction to proceed, every direction I looked had a reflector announcing,“Come this way!”

I had Dutch and Spark in lead together. I would shine my headlight beam back and forth across the area and they would run from one reflector to another. They look for and identify the different markers quite well. Unfortunately there were so many reflectors that soon Dutch was trying to go one way and Spark was trying to go to the other. Both of them were heading toward reflectors. I couldn’t chastise one leader when he was just as correct as the other. I tried to indicate which reflector to head towards but I was guessing as much as they were. Those two lead dogs quickly got fed up with each other and me. There was a lot of frustration in the team, and everyone was extremely tired. Bruno didn’t like the intensity and got fed up with the whole ordeal. He decided to return to the reflector behind us. He turned around and started to pull the sled backwards. This is where I couldn’t panic. I wanted to. Where is the trail? Which way is the Iditarod Checkpoint? We are almost there and now it’s impossible to find? Mutiny was on the horizon if I didn’t get everyone working together again. Each dog and myself was trying to do their best, but it wasn’t showing as team work. I needed to take command, and it needed to start with my attitude.

I stopped the team, walked up to everyone and told them that they were great dogs. No one was in trouble. We were still headed to the Iditarod Checkpoint. No panicking was necessary. We were going to get there. It’s never a given about how much effort a dog or musher must put forth to mush down the trail. This moment was on high side of physical and mental effort. That’s the way it goes.

I put poor confused Bruno into my sled bag. He’s a big boy, but he went willingly. He lay down and I zipped it up so he couldn’t even see reflectors. I moved Spark back into Bruno’s position. That left Dutch up in single lead. This is the first time on the race that I positioned a single leader. It would definitely not be the last. Dutch was both responsive to my commands and very excited about finding the route by himself. I gave him a lot of leeway up front. I tried to shine my headlight beam in the general direction that I guessed to be correct. We made little progress. I tried to stay positive but I started to doubt our direction. I even got it into my mind that we had skirted so far off this year’s trail that perhaps we passed the checkpoint altogether. I nearly convinced myself of that tragedy when I saw a bright flash of light along the horizon. It came from the direction we were moving toward. I learned later that the videographer who was waiting for my arrival had to calibrate his lights and camera. He said he had to turn it on for three seconds. He did that about 10 minutes before I arrived. That small amount of good fortune helped me stay on course. I’m sure we would have found the checkpoint eventually, but that flash of light helped me more than I’d like to admit.

We arrived at the Iditarod Checkpoint soon after. It was a huge accomplishment. I was very, very happy to be there. The folks who greeted us said that the team didn’t even look tired. They were. The dogs were just excited to see the lights, camera and people. So was I! I unpacked Bruno from the sled and gave the entire team a big,“Thank You.” What a dedicated group of dogs. They never stopped trying. It was physically challenging on them and me. My team could have doubted me, as I doubted myself, in the final miles before Iditarod, but they didn’t. Even now I wonder why they believed in me when I didn’t.

Sei bellissimo Bruno!

To find out more about our athletes look at the “Dogs” page. To join the Dog Fan Club you can hit the “Become a Dog Fan” tab at the top of the page or click here. We will have a Fan Club Draw twice a month or more during race time and special events. It’s fun. Support your dog or dogs!

Races

Allen signs up for YQ

November 29, 2019 by

Allen made it official this week by signing up for the 2020 Yukon Quest. 63 days and counting…

We are thrilled that we will now have 2 mushers and 26 dogs on the Yukon Quest trail (Karolyn for the first 300 miles.) We obviously have much dog training, human conditioning and logistics still to plan. The goal, of course, is to WIN!

Are ya ready?!

 

 

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