Life Lessons Taught By Dogs

  Two of our regular racers at the Siskiyou Sled Dog Races have a new book out.  I highly recomend it to dog and non dog owners.  it is full of the lessons that dogs can teach us.  I believe in everything in the book.  Many thoughts that I have had, it is just that they have broken down the lessons and made them so easy to understand.  The book is called, ” Be the Lead Dog, 7 Life Changing lessons Taught By Sled Dogs”.  These lessons cover focus, patience,trust, transparency, drive, self-assurance, and perserverance.

Liz Parrish and Barbara Schaefer have tapped on to something beautiful.  Success speakers rant at how helpful this book can be for anyone, not just dog lovers.  They also do insperational speaking engagements.  To contact them to speak to your company, group, or want to order your book, e-mail contact@LifeThroughDogs.com     Or go to www.LifeThroughDogs.com

When I started training our sled dogs to race, I would hook up the dogs and run them, bring them home panting and tired, thinking we had a good run.  Wrong!

  After a couple of  seasons of not reaching the finish line at distance races, I sarted to re-evaluate my thinking.  If I am trying to build a team that won’t loose their confidence then why am I running them until they are tired.  Why not run them slower and bring them in happy and ready to run again.  Slowly, I saw their trust level build and their desire to go further increase.   They looked more excited and ready to go, even though it could be an above average warm day.

  They learned that I would not ask them to do more than they were able, and I wasn’t going ask them to go further than they are able.  It was then that the bond that is needed for a distance musher to succeed, is created.   It is slowly from that  bond that the most important connection that man and canine can form to produce their goals,…………………………………….TRUST

  It was that season that I finally turned it around.  After two years of not finishing with my alaskan huskies, we went on to finishes at Oregon’s Atta Boy 300 and Montana’s difficult Iditarod Qualifying Race, Race to the Sky 350.  We were the first team from California to complete the Race to the Sky, taking 14th place of 28 teams! 

Build the trust first and the rest will begin to fall into place in whatever your goals are for you and your canine buddy.

Next blog.  Different tools to use to get your dog into condition.

At one of the field trials Arleigh observed an excellent looking dog pulled up lame and couldn’t complete the day due his injury.  Arleigh asked him about the dog’s overall conditioning program and the trainer basically acknowledged that the conditioning was done while it did his retrieving training.  After some encouragment, Arleigh convinced the dog owner to put the dog on a year round conditioning program.  A year plus later, he got a call from the dog owner stating  that he had cleaned up on the compitition and the dog showed no signs of the injury from the previous season.

  The next couple of dog blogs will be about dog conditioning.  Some about mistakes that I have made and things that I have found worked for us.  Many of the lessons will be of those that I have learned from renound well know mushers with alot more experience than I.  I believe that the blogs will help you and your dog reach the goals that you percieve for your canine freind. 

•  Lesson # 1.  Never ask your dog to do something in competition that you haven’t practised before while training.

Stay tuned for more conditioning tips to come.  The advise won’t just include the physical end of the training, but also the mental side of fine tuning your canine athelete.

DOg Training

  This will allow me to start writing more fun blogs about this last season, the dogs and insights on living with sled dogs.  I am getting a file ready of dog songs and do features on the super dogs from our kennel.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all the wonderful people that took a tour with Dogsled Express this past season.  We had many repeat customers and numerous tours where people went home and told there freinds and they in turn went and told their freinds. (The best advertising of all.)

The calendar and reservation system really worked well and are always listening to your suggestions to make it more client freindly.

I will be taking a week off from running the dogs and will  then start training the pups and new leaders for next season.  We will have another 20 dogs trained for next year so we can have more fresh dogs and will be able scedule more trips, especially during the high demand periods. 

 Lisa, the dogs and I once again, thank you all for your patronage wish that you and yours have a prosperous and healthy summer.

It is your lucky day, for right here and now, I am going to share many years of knowledge on hot tips of scooping poop.

• Find the lightest long handled round headed shovel possible.  You will find that just a few ounces of weight will make a huge difference on your back.
• Don’t try and scoop with the front tip of the shovel.  The tip will often catch on the ground, or rocks and that is very hard on the back  muscles when it happens over and over.  Plus, with this technic, it takes two motions to fling the poo to the pile.  One to scoop and one to wind up and fling it.  This takes much to time and effort.
• Instead you would be much better off to use the front side of the shovel in a slidding motion that continues through the scoop directly into the fling to the compost pile.   The one smooth motion will be much easier on the body and save you alot of time.
• Now the fun part.  I will break down the previous mentioned motion into many useful moves or shots.  You see I have found that the action used takes me back to my childhood growing up in Minnesota where I fantisized of being a professional hockey player.
• Of course all these moves can be performed in the forehand or backhand motion, which offer a bit of diversity.  If you can only make your shot from one side then you will only be able to work in one direction and will always have to clean the kennel in the same direction.  Just kidding!
• The first move,  is the simple wrist shot.  Best when you have a short distance to fling your s–t.  It is a smooth forward scrape continued and finished with the flick of your wrist.
• Next, is the reverse wrist shot when the compost pile is behind you.  This can be broken down into three shots.  The low to the ground for close shots and the 45 degree shot for longer distances.  Then of couse there is the overhead 360 when the pile is directly behind you.  This move should only be used be the most experienced poop scooper for obvious reasons.  When taking it to this level remember to keep it a continous motion or you may not get the results you may want.  A note: make sure of the texture of poo when contemplating this move.  Trying  this with a loose stool could result in an immediate need for a shower!
•  There is also the “Slap Shot”,  used when you have a really long distance to the pile.  You will start the scoop in a backward motion then step forward with the shovel moving forward in a long sweeping action, followed by lifting the back foot up behind the forward foot, thus allowing a complete follow through for the power needed.  It looks just like a hockey player making a slap shot.
• Then there is the most advanced of all shots, the figure eight.  When you have an obsticle such as a rock in front of the direction that you need to fling to, this is by far the most effective and difficult move.  It starts with the scoop in an upward motion alongside the obsticle, then start a backward sweeping motion while dropping down the shovel head down into the upward loop and then  down into the shot, followed by the forward-upward follow through to complete the full figure eight.
• Once you have mastered all these moves, then you can challenge your newfound abilities by improving your accuracy.  What fun! 

 On a more serious note.  Maintaining a clean kennel will keep your dogs more healthy, beautiful, and happy.  Your kennel should be cleaned daily and if you pick up a virus in a dog, you can sanitize the area by spraying the area with a bleach/water mixure. 

Good Luck at keeping it fun and remember to that it is a good time to talk to your dogs to better the bond between you and your canine kids.

Love those fancy mittons.  Look for more photos like this one of Penelope cheerleading the dogs prior to her tour with Grampa Jerry, on the newest addition to our website.  Click on the Tour Photos to see the latest snow and trail conditions and pictures of happy dogs at work and people at play.  The fresh snow pictures were just a week ago!  We have unbelievable snow and trail conditions this season.  We will be giving tours through March and into April.  We may have to only offer the 9am and 2pm rides as we get into April due to the warm afternoons in April.   So check out our calendar to see what times are already booked and availability of tours.  This is the year for great trails and  fresh winter photo opportinities.  Hope to hear from you soon.

  We will continue our fun blog stories as the season slows down.  Lot’s of fun stories to tell you.

My first dog team/ old friends gone by

  You know what the experts say.  To create excitment towards an evening of romance is not to take them to a movie (boring) but to start the date on a roller coaster!

That’s right, you to get the senses and endorfins flowing early in the day and what could do that better that to be snuggled up with your sweetheart in a dogsled, powered by 12 highly trained canine athletes?  There are  some time slots still available for Valentines Day weekend.  Follow it up with a romantic dinner at one of our many fine eating establishments and spend the rest of the evening  privately with your love at one of the many romantic resorts, bed & breakfasts, or hotels,  that our area have to offer. 

We are looking forward to help making it one of  your most memorable Valentine’s ever.