I am thankful for dogs. All breeds, colors, traits. They make me happy.
Mismo and Ziptie are two that make me particularly happy.
These two dogs are different breeds, have different personalities and different goals in life but they still remain besties. Their friendship is quite refreshing from a human perspective. It would be so nice if humans of different cultures, beliefs, personalities and goals could put aside some of these differences and simply appreciate life. Each of us only have one.
You know me and pretty sunsets… whew. I can never get enough of them.
The big PLUS to Interior Alaska this time of year is that our sunset is almost at midday. So I got to see a pretty sunset at 4:00PM yesterday afternoon.
ENJOY!
We are fortunate this season because it looks like winter is here to stay. It started snowing over a week ago and has been on and off since then. We have plenty of white covering the ground.
I did a long day of errands in North Pole and Fairbanks yesterday and honestly the road conditions were not good. Most people were talking about sliding through busy intersections or barely avoiding crashing their cars in the congested North Pole roundabouts. I drove rather slowly and had a smile on my face the entire day. It’s winter! I can’t help but smile.
I will admit that a snowy winter does complicate life, but it also enables us dog mushers to actually… mush.
Our real world “to do’s” of plowing the SP Kennel driveway, shoveling the out building roofs or actually finding the dog poo under layers and layers of white stuff does challenge us. But, now we can hook up 10 to 12 dogs to a sled and mush to the east, the west or the north… not quite to the south yet because the Chena River hasn’t frozen.
We constantly check the National Weather Service website for updates to our winter status. This week looks like more of the same. Yay!
It’s Dog Fan Club Draw day!
We have so many excited fans that we decided to draw two winners.
Congratulations to Becky Green who is a fan of Commando.
Congratulations to Missy Williams who is a fan of QT.
The human winners each will receive a packet of the treasured SP Kennel M&M’s plus a glam shot of their dogs. We took our dog winners out for a romp in the fresh snow to give them their biscuits:
Commando is one-in-a-million dog. He is in lead often, but also runs back in the team in order to give some ‘up and coming’ lead dogs a chance to train. He is healthy, happy and still has non-stop energy. At six years old he is a main player this season and has the savvy to be able to race fast yet pace himself for a 1,000 mile race Championship. Commando has supreme confidence and enjoys being who he is.
Funny thing… QT is an ‘up and coming’ Commando, so to speak. She has a swagger and a strut that almost matches his. She LOVES being a sled dog and LOVES being a long-legged, pretty gal. She has been running in lead periodically, but she has so much extra energy that whenever we stop for a break she can’t handle standing still. She will circle around and look back impatiently and inevitably tangle herself with the dogs behind her – sometimes even with the dogs behind them! She is learning 😀. We don’t want to teach he to NOT be excited so it’s a work in progress.
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!
I’ll take mine thank you.
People sometimes wonder why our huskys stay outside and not always indoors on the couch. For one thing… we only have one couch. Also, most of the dogs feel comfortable in their own house. This doesn’t mean that they don’t enjoy being in my house. They do. But, I can say with certainty that each dog enjoys having its own house. A dog has a sense of independence and pride with its own house.
Each dog’s house is located in a particular spot in the yard, next to particular neighbors. Many dogs have lived in the same spot for years. They know where their house is and return to it after training runs, dog room weigh ins, play pen romps or simple kennel meanderings.
How do they know which house is theirs? Well, the simple answer is: They are not dumb dogs. It’s their house. How do you know how to return to your home at the end of the day?
At their house they keep their treasures. Each dog has bones, kongs and chew toys, as well as fresh straw bedding and their own food dish. It’s their food dish. If they choose to eat their entire meal, great. If they don’t then they can clean up the remnants when they want. The house and space around it is their own ‘personal area’ – no one else should intrude.
Each dog returns to their house willingly. But you still have to expect them to be dogs: they take the loooonnnng way home or they pee on their neighbor’s first house or they visit the dog room and clean up 8 kibbles on the floor or they get sidetracked because the play pen gate is open… Oh! Yay.
The other day, Gravy and Chipper did not go on the training run. They each had a scheduled day off. Instead of going out with the teams they spent the afternoon in one of the play pens. When the time came to return to their houses for the evening, they were let loose to run and ‘find their house.’ Now I have to admit that Gravy saw Karolyn walking in the rear of the yard with a full bucket of dog food and took off to accompany her. Can you blame him? But, once he focused, turned around and galloped back to his house, he was rewarded with an enormous, tasty warm meal. Chipper was pissed off that she sat out of the training run, so she ran to her house, ignored her meal and visited with her two neighbors, Champ and Commando. Both boys ignored her and eventually she flitted back to her house. Hurmph.
We added a human feature to the dogs’ houses. New name plates. Of course, all of us at SPK can tell Sanka, Amber, Junior and Violet apart, but it’s nice when we have visitors to able to say, “Please go harness QT” and our guest doesn’t come back with Bruno in tow. Oops. Plus Karolyn worked very hard on the name plates and I LOVE them!
Dogs take pride in their houses. How do I know? Well, every boy dog who lifts his leg to claim his property is outwardly proud of his house. It shows as winter continues and a pride pee-cicle gets larger and larger. Yes… this is gross in our judgmental human brains, but not in a dog’s brain. They think it’s awesome! (FYI Kodiak is currently winning in pee-cicle size.)
Hi everyone,
I’m loving New Zealand! It’s coming into summer here and the days are quite long. It is starting to get warm during the day so I am continuing to shed my winter coat. Moira says I’ll likely never grow my thick winter coat back again as it rarely gets below freezing here.
My favourite thing to do is run over at the park next-door. We go early each morning and again in the afternoon. Sometimes I go out a third time in the evening too! I have lots of new friends we meet over there. My best friends are a pair of border collies – Sika and Echo that live down the road and are often at the park at the same time as us in the morning. We run and run and run. They have a Goldie brother Harley who doesn’t run as much but I like to say hello to the old fellah. There is a Lab called Bella, a Visla named Rusty and a Kelpie called Ace, I never know who I’m going to see so it’s always fun.
I have discovered the couch! I mostly sleep in one of the many dog beds around the house but I noticed that Nugget sleeps on the couch so one day I tried it. I didn’t get asked to move so have been getting up there more often. It’s really comfortable!
I’m very happy to be here. Thanks to everyone that helped!
Bill, Wu and Gravy. All very different individuals. Bill and Wu share brotherhood, but that is the limit of their similarities. Gravy is their distant cousin.
Check out SPK family tree diagram.
Editor Note: Scooter’s Father was Ranger, not Pingo.
Bill is crazy, high-strung. He is his father, Rodney, incarnate. He is playful with everyone, but mostly his tail. Bill slobbers and drools as soon as you start walking with a harness in his direction. He is always the last dog to get hooked up and often the musher is ready to go before he is on the team. Bill will chew and bark and has no sense of calm.
After the training run begins, Bill is a head down, hard-working husky. He pulls whether we are going fast along a flat trail or whether we are grinding slowly up hills. At this point Bill does not get distracted… he is all about work.
Wu is a sweetheart. He is sensitive and likes to cuddle. He is aware of what’s going on in the yard and others around him. We are able to harness Wu without the complete wrestling effort that his brother requires. He is even helpful and will step into the harness.
After the training run begins, Wu is a worker. He is strong and stands a little taller than Bill. Since Wu is smart and aware he will sometimes look around while in harness. He is very curious when we pass other dog teams. Where did they come from?
Gravy is hilarious. He has unlimited energy in the yard and in harness. We have yet to get ‘The Gravy Train’ tired. On his days off he is back to his silly antics of fly-leaping off his house and play tackling his neighbor, Cloud. Cloud is literally three-quarters the size of Gravy. She is fast and can get outta his way, but when his bulk hits her she is sidelined. Gravy still has the habit of ‘talk howling’ as a conversation. As Karolyn does chores in the morning, Gravy will ‘talk howl’ all the gossip from the day before. We’re not always sure what he is saying but he keeps the conversation going on and on and on…
After a training run begins, Gravy puts his bulk into the harness. He is a strong, big-bodied dog.
These three boys have lots to learn but their first true season of mushing has started of tremendously positive. We are very excited about the places they will go with their talent, genetics and training.
Do you want to become a Fan of one of these up-and-comers?
You can do that on the Become a Dog Fan Page.
SP Kennel shut down for the day and went to the movies! ‘The Great Alaska Race.’
How rare is this you ask? Well… the last movie that Allen saw in a theatre was ‘Hildalgo.‘ That came out in movie theaters in 2004. Yup it’s been 15 years … why not go to a dog mushing movie, eh?
The movie theatre manager even gave us the poster!
