Photo: Each of these dogs has made a significant contribution to our kennel.Liller (deceased), Timber (deceased), Chena, Sulatna, Frita (and Skinny and Medio on this walk but out of photo)... Fall, 2007.
This blog serves as our kennel journal and I've recently read they can be printed in hard copy.
Some of this is written in past posts, but this is a summary of where we've been and are as a kennel.
While many people read this blog with an interest in sled dogs, it is a bit personal as well, an archive of our life with dogs. I hope to print it at some point for my own personal keepsake of life with great dogs.
In 1994 we started our kennel with an Iditarod racing retiree from Alaska, Scuba. She came to us bred , the pups making our first teams. Scuba did race a bit here as did her pups, in Wisconsin sprint races, doing well, winning a bit, even though they were distance dogs. We lost her last pup this past summer as reported in the blog.
We've done just about
all fun things with sled dogs, including camping (winter and summer),
long runs, short runs, Sacco cart runs, ATV's, sleds of all types, free runs on our great trails, long runs to our river cabin, wildlife encounters, etc. and we've continued to enter races (sprint and middistance) almost every year. Along the way, we've taken more retirees from Alaska and some wonderful nonhusky rescues who were headed for not good things if we didn't take them.
Each dog has always found a 'job' in the kennel, from puppy day care/manners training/harness training pups, to livestock/border guardians, to racing sled dogs, etc. Each of the dogs has an opportunity to try living in the house, but for the tough huskies it is mostly not their preferred environment.
It has been our commitment over these past years to give lifetime homes to dogs we take in or breed. While we have sold a few pups over the years, we mostly keep the ones we've bred for our own racing/recreational sled and trail running. We do not breed any more.
So, with this philosophy, now we're meeting the
tough part, losing a number of these dogs who have lived 11,12, 13, 14 years with us as best friends/companions/racers. There are more dogs in their last stages here, but they have their choice of beds in the house and special foods, medications, etc.
Currently, we have 14 dogs over the age of 11. So, when the blog reports the loss of a dog, it is with much sadness, but also with much gratefulness for the fullness they have brought to our lives. The uniqueness of each dog here is hard to describe and certainly each is irreplaceable.
Dog lovers reading this know well what we are saying here.