A Little Bit of Knowledge

I have been asked a few questions about thing up here so I wanted to take a moment to answer some of them.  If you ever have a question for me or for Deedee let me know.

A lot of people question what type of dogs race the Iditarod. They are referred to as Alaskan Huskies, part Siberian Husky part something else.  All of these dogs are considered "mutts" just mixed breeds, but Deedee has a very good breeding program as do most mushers. Here are some of here dogs and what they may be made up of.  Keep in mind these are different breeds that are mixed together and have been done so through many generations to get to these dogs. 

Jack (left) and Colby (right) are part of the cheese litter. Not pictured are the girls Gouda, Brie and another boy Cheddar.  Cottage and Blue are very white colored and are recreation dogs for a different owner.  This litter is called a hybrid litter meaning the parents had very different back rounds which makes for a very unpredictable litter.  Some are all black with litte red, 2 very white and grey, and the 2 boys pictured here. They most likely have husky, hound, Irish Setter and some other lines in them.  

Volt, part of the V litter have Norwegian short hair mixed with husky.

Jarvi has husky and most likely some Irish setter and hound.  Most likely some other types as well.

Dragon is mainly Shepard and husky.

Fudge here is mostly red with blue eyes.  He came from a line called Aurora Husky. Siberian husky mixed with Irish Setter.  This blood line had to have blue eyes and be mainly red.

Crush here has a lot more hound in him.

So even though these dogs average around 50 lbs and have shorter hair than Siberian Huskies they all thrive out here.  They still have double coats like the huskies, but also get other traits which help them with endurance. They are most comfortable at low temperatures, if we run the dogs and it is 20F out they get hot and start rolling in snow to dry off and cool down. They eat dry dog food mixed with beef and beef fat plus they get snacked with turkey skins, lamb, beef, fish, and power (basically a mix of all the parts of cow we don't eat.) I found an eye in some of it. :) We do give the dogs water after they run, but it can be hard to get them to drink. To fix this we mix there food with water. Since we give them so much fat in their diet they are actually able to stay hydrated from that. When fat is broken down it creates water so the dogs can actually keep themselves hydrated by just eating fat, a lot of fat. Dogs in Russia are now basically fed fat in their diets instead of giving them water since it freezes so fast. Some people wonder what we do when it drops to -35F, do they sleep out side? Answer is yes, they do just fine in the houses. We do bring some inside if they are really thin, injured, or if they are lucky enough to get spoiled. These are incredible athletes that run over 3,000 miles in a season between training and racing the Iditarod in all sorts of crazy temperatures!

The wheels that dogs are on do not spin around. They are that way so it can be easily raised as more snow falls.

If you have ever been to Alaska you understand the light and dark seasons.  It is hard to explain but right now its dark most of the time. The sun comes up for about 5 hours a day, getting long each day now though! So the sun comes up, but not like I'm use to back in WI. It usually gets just over the trees here at the kennel then rotates around the horizon. It does not go up and over the sky. However the moon does get all the way up in the sky. This makes for some really beautiful sunrises and sunsets. Its neat actually seeing the sunrise everyday I work since it happens around 9am. 

I get asked a lot about what I actually do everyday here.  This is hard to answer since it changes a lot. Basically depending on when Deedee goes out for a run we start a few hours before that and mix up food. We feed all the dogs, sometimes snack them or give them beef water. Then we go around and pick up what they don't eat so the house dogs and ravens don't get it. Then it is time to go around and pick up all the poop. We switch out the water buckets twice a day for the puppies and old dogs. Once all that is done we get the sleds out load them up with weights, snack bags, and depending on how long of a run we will put in food and extra booties or jackets. Also depending on the condition of the snow it determines if we have to put booties on all the dogs. So bootie, harness, and hook up 28 dogs or however many they run with between Mike and Deedee. Lunch time! Most days we have to get out food, wash buckets, and get booties and food ready for races. We also have to chip beef and fat to mix up for food and cut snacks for training runs.  Lately we have had lots of trees to cut up since it got warm and the snow got heavy on them and they all fell down.  This caused a lot of power outages so then we had to set up generators sometimes 3 times a day.  Don't forget we also unhook all the dogs collect all the booties and store the sleds away once they get back from running dogs. This is when we give the dogs water before we feed them again in the evening. If we are lucky and have some down time we will take out our 6 dog teams which I absolute love. I also keep track of all the illnesses and injuries that occur and hand out medications once or twice a day.  I also get to massage and stretch dogs that are stiff along with applying ointment to any paws that get torn up.  So basically every day is different here and most days are 8 hours we have had a few that are 12-13 hours as well.  Never a day off, but we do have slower days when they don't run so we can relax a bit. Hard work everyday, but I enjoy it all. How can't I? I get doggie hugs and kisses everyday :) 

All the buckets we clean, harnesses to clean and organize plus jackets

Very small amount of the booties we sort through. throw out the ones with holes, wash the used ones and put them back in groups of 4  and sort by size....

I help fix harnesses and jackets that break and have also made some bootie inserts for dogs with sores on their paws.

Don't forget if it snows we have to shovel off all the houses and raise them up.

We help to break in trails and clear out fallen trees when we can

Just a few of the fallen trees by my cabin...

Still have to clear off houses that aren't in use as well

Dratini helping us to pick up poop or maybe he wants to eat it who knows :)

ugh, probably my least favorite task every now and then we have to go to every house take the lid off shovel out all the old hay and replace it.... this takes hours since there are close to 50 houses to do... plus the old dogs kennel

The Butcher Boy... this is how we chip all the meat to mix with the food.

Beef, beef fat, and dry dog food... yum

All the meat comes to us in 50lbs blocks, we got to help unload 6 tons of meat from the semi truck a few weeks ago

I hope this helped to answer some questions you might have had about Alaska and what I actually do.  If you have anymore feel free to ask.  So much will be happening in the next few weeks with her first race coming up so stay posted!! Take care!