It Began With a Bit of Drama.

Yesterday a big storm and a bunch of hail hit the kennel.

Not good for the gardens...

BUT .... GREAT for sled dogs!!!

We had a pretty lovely run...

Until....

The tree was still partially attached, so Plan A was to take my ax and fully detach it. Down on the ground with a bit of 'this and that' I would be able to get the ATV over the tree.
Then I realized I my ax was not where it should be in my carryall. (Still haven't managed to find it)

After stomping around (and swearing a bit) I accepted the fact that I was going to have to turn 14 jazzed dogs around on a narrow, wooded trail.

Certainly good training for the dogs, but I would have preferred it a bit later in the season when a bit of the summer 'edge' was off everyone!

I undid tuglines on all but the front 4 dogs - can't undo the leaders and since the swing dogs were experienced and responsible, I wanted them to have the power to help hold the team stretched out. I   repositioned the quad as best I could and walked the leaders around.

It went remarkably well!

Not even a tangle to undo. I did up tugs, gave all a pat and we were ready to roll!!

Hope this is setting the tone for the rest of the season!!!!

This One is Just Right...

It's been a hot summer. Usually I can get a few teams out in July, but it isn't looking like that will be the case this July. Temperatures just haven't been cooperative.

We are passing time trying to stay in shape and trying to stay cool.

Snap says holes help!

See says hanging in the river is good!

Yesterday I decided to do one of my favourite fall training trails - a 20 mile loop through Perryvale and home - on a bike.

This trip on a bike covers a LOT of different terrain so skinny tires were too small...and fat tires too big - but my Surly Karate Monkey was JUST RIGHT!

Bit of pavement...

...bit of gravel....

....some dirt...

...and various other surfaces....

Made for a challenging but lovely afternoon!

And riding, under your own power, the trails the dogs are asked to run gives you a MUCH greater appreciation of what they actually do!

R-E-S-P-E-C-T - Bet

I don't get any.

Howdy Ho Everybodies, yes it's me, your Sheepie Thing Herding, Pretty Curly Tail Training, Roving and Non-Roving Border Collie Reporter, Bet.

Sigh.

Sometimes I think I get taken for granted around here.

Bait and Tic won't do anything with me.

I thought KD would make a great pet and we could talk about ensembles and stuffs and things, but she hates me.

The Pretty Curly Tails all have their own little social inner circles, and besides, all they do is talk about is that time on the trail.

I've heard all of the stories.  That time on the trail when the stompy moose tried to hurt us.  That time on the trail where we ran a bazillionty miles and got to Nome.  That time on the trail where we rolled in the dead elk.

Euw.

Anyhoo, I really like it when we have puppies and I can teach them stuffs and things and play with them and they don't have any "that time on the trail" stories.

But then they grow up, and they start their merge into the kennel area, and they start listening to the professional Curly Tails and listen to the "that time on the trail" stories, and the next thing you know, they don't want to hear about my ensembles any more, and they don't want to hear about how I herdy herded a bunch of sheepie things into a pen... they want to roll in dead elk!

Euw.

That time has come with the Poutines of Anarchy.

HEY, want to hear about how I rounded up the sheepie things and made them run into a corral, it's was fantabulous!!!

No?  What do you mean no?  Why are you laughing??

You WILL listen to my sheepie thing story!!!

... and then the sheepie things tried to get away, but the Musher whistled to alert me and... are you falling asleep?

See?  They want to pull the sled, and run, run, run, run, run, run and then run some more.

HEY HEY HEY, Wanna hear about how I herded the sheepies into a cage and then saved the whole world?

OH Auntie Bet, you didn't save the world, and how hard is it to chase sheepie things, they're silly!

Sigh.  Sometimes I wish I had someone around that would appreciate the skill and art of sheepie herdy herding and also play dress up with.

- Bet

Live in the Fast Lane

I think when you are experienced at something, things slow down. An experienced person watches the events of their experience happen in near slow motion - the more experience, the slower things happen.

The less experience you have at a task, the faster it happens.

I am an experienced dog musher. When I go about the tasks of my job they happen at a pace that I can easily make the decisions and do the tasks required. Everything in my actions is relatively calm and controlled.

This summer Bet and I have been learning to herd sheep. EVERYTHING there for me happens FAST. Sheep are flying, Bet is flying - and I'm standing in the middle of the field or pen slack jawed and stunned. What just happened?

My friend/ever patient instructor Lisa hides her smirk at my flapping jaw and says "Do you know why that happened?" NO - I'm not even sure WHAT just happened. She once again, explains draws, balance and pressure. I get the concepts - honest - it just all happens so fast I can't process it as it is happening.

Maybe that is it. Maybe a brain experienced at something can make decisions faster and more accurately and all those extra 'milliseconds' make it seem like it is happening slower. Who knows?

It would be nice to be learning this in the fall/winter when I could occasionally jump behind a 16 dog team and enjoy the nice relaxed pace! ;)

Bet and I are now 'renting' sheep from Lisa several times a week (a big compliment, I know. Lisa is very protective of her sheep) and taking about one actual lesson a week. I have played with learning enough new things in my life that I know I do best with a combination of instruction and time to fumble on my own to move forward.

Renting sheep means Bet and I have to gather the whole flock, move them to the sorting pens, sort out 3 or 4 of my 'marked' lesson sheep and move them out to the field to work. We 'work' for about 15 - 20 minutes and then put all the sheep back together and move them back to wherever we found them.

Today gather and moving the sheep was a big chore. There was some new challenges for Bet and she decided that today was a good day to see what she actually HAD to do when working with sheep.

It's a step all my sled dogs go through too. Any of us (dogs and humans) that do what they love for a living go through this. Doesn't mean we don't LOVE what we do, but just that we begin to see it as a 'job we love' rather than just 'playing'.

AND ... for the first time today as she tested me everything seemed to be happening at a pace that I could follow, deal with and calmly correct!!!!!

How SWEET is that!!!???

Obviously, I am a LONG way off of things happening as slow with sheep and sheepdogs as they do with sled dogs for me.

Plunging down the Happy River steps is still a more natural thing for me than recognizing and correcting a bad out run. It's mind blowingly frustrating - but also intensely satisfying as it all starts to come together and slow down.

I encourage you all to take a step into the 'fast lane' and challenge yourself with something new - and then stick with it long enough that you can feel it slow down.

It's a RUSH!!!

Sockeye Fire - Help Willow Rebound - Bet

Everybodies,

It's not a very howdy ho day because of the horribly horrible events in Willow, Alaska this past week.

As you may (or may not) know, there was a horrible, very icky fire that struck the town of Willow this past week.

As of last count, 26 homes were lost, and one of those homes included our 2012 North Wapiti North HQ.  Thankfully Jamie, Harry, and the pups, cats, and horsies of 2014 North Wapiti North HQ were spared, but they did have to pack everyone up and evacuate just in case.

This nasty fire struck right in the middle of Iditarod Musher central.  Most of the homes lost were musher homes.  THANKFULLY there was time to evacuate almost all of the dogs.  The entire community reached out and got all manner of animals out of the fire before it was too late.  We are saddened to hear of a small few who did not survive, but it could have been much MUCH worse if not for the mushers, their families, the community, and other mushers not affected by the fires helping out when needed.

The mushing spirit is strong, but they will need some help rebuilding and getting their lives back together.   Some lost everything they owned and from the ashes comes reminders of better times.

Bob Chlupach's 1977 Iditarod finisher belt buckle

The Willow Dog Mushers Association (WDMA) has started a YouCaring site to help raise funds to help all of those affected by the fire.

Click on this link to donate online:  WDMA YouCaring Site

For those of you who want to donate using a check, make the check payable to WDMA
In the memo line write: Fire Relief Fund

Mail your check to:
WDMA
PO Box 858
Willow, Alaska 99688

WDMA will be distributing funds to those in need.

Here is the list (as of recently) of mushers who have lost their homes:

Scott Smith (Individual fundraiser here)
Bob Chlupach and Jan Steves (individual fundraiser here)
Justin and Jaimee High (Individual fundraiser here - this is their second loss to fire)
Sue Firmin
DeeDee and Mike Jonrowe
Mary Helwig (who bought NWN from Donna Quante recently)
Peter and Joyce Duncan
Joar Ulsom and Millie Porslid
Leo Lashrock (Individual fundraiser here)
TC Wait and Dave Wurts

You can also send a check directly to a specific musher if you wish.  All of them receive mail at the Willow Post Office, and according to Donna Quante, they will get it as Willow is a small, tight knit community.

Mail your donation to individual mushers by addressing the envelope:
Musher Name, General Delivery
Willow, Alaska 99688

The Musher and I have some VERY fond memories of Willow, Alaska.  It's like the Musher's second home there, and she's very sad that her friends and fellow mushers are going through this ordeal.

The Musher has been in touch with WDMA and we are finalizing some stuffs and things for a hugey huge item to be donated to WDMA that they can use to raise big monies... or something, so we'll let you know, when we know, and then everybodies will know.

If you can spare some money to donate, please do.  If you can't, then your prayers and good thoughts are equally appreciated.

Update from a kind anonymous commenter (thank you)

Additional mailing info for those who don't want to send General Delivery:
Deedee and Mike Jonrowe, PO Box 272, Willow, AK 99688

Jaimee and Justin High, PO Box 1096, Willow, AK 99688

Jan Steves and Bob Chulpatch, P.O. Box 931 Willow AK 99688

 or send to Musher Name C/O Happy Trails Kennel, PO Box 520997, Big Lake, AK.
Make donation checks to the specific musher name and Martin Buser will see that they get it.

New Blinky Blinky Blingity Bling - Bet

OOOOH Howdy Ho Everybodies, and boy howdy am I excited!!!

As you may (or may not, depending on whether or not you do or don't) know, I'm the semi-official Spokesdog for the new Head-lites collars!!!!

I KNOW!!!  Isn't that FANTABULOUS!!!

They even posted my glorious new collar on their Facebooks pagey thing and stuff.  Go "like" them, and tell them I sent you!

Head-lights Pretty Pretty collars with ME on the top!

Anyhoooooooooo, IT ARRIVED TODAY!  It also came with snacks.

Didja notice something?  No, stop staring at the tasty snacks!  It's PURPLE!  I love the purple!  Purple looks so good on my furs, and it makes my eyes pop.

I wanted the Musher to put the collar on immediately!

Um, Musher, put the collar on....

COME ONNNNNNNNN put the collar on!!!!!!!!!

Ok, seriously, put the COLLAR ON!!!

So she did (finally, eeesh) and then I activated my Coolie Wonder Powers and....

OOOOOH, AHHHHHHH!!!!  Look at meeeeeeeeee!!!!  I'm shiny sparkley and very visible and look at my furs!!!!

I'm never taking this off... and I bet I scare the bejeezus out of KD when I come running across the kennel at night, hehehehehe

Your pups should really get some Head-lites (officially official sponsor of the North Wapiti Pretty Curly Tails) blingity bling very bright collar of their very own.  You wouldn't want them to suffer, so just get out that credit card thingie and get one, you won't regret it!

- Bet

Teaching the Musher - Bet

Howdy Ho Everybodies!!!

As you may already know (and if you don't, where have you been, my goodness, keep up peoples!) I'm teaching the Musher how to herd sheepy sheeps.

Yes, yes, I flunked out of the Alta-Peet Stockdogs school of herdy herding, but it was a lifestyle choice really.  I had a higher calling to herd Pretty Curly Tails, but whatever, the Musher started going to her friend's house and they have sheepy sheeps, and they have herdy dogs, and she seemed interested in the whole process, and she also likes whistling really loud, so seeing her interest in the job I figured I'd oblige her by giving her some training.

Frankly, I hope she loses interest in this soon because I'm the one doing all the running around, but I can't resist giving her something fun to do.

Anyhooooooo, so we went out to a real field the other day.  It seemed as though she was ready for that next step.  You start out doing it in a small field because if the sheepy sheeps go all wackadoodle and run off... well, that's never a good thing

Photo: Alamy

Instead of going big, we went small, with a nice bunch of sheepy sheeps.  I didn't want to overwhelm the Musher on her first big field event.

It's ok Musher, they're very nice sheepy sheeps, they won't stomp on you

I had a talk with Manny, Frankie, Lou, Nelly, and Lucinda and told them to go easy on the Musher, as she was new to all of this.  Then I took the Musher aside and told her that she would do just fine, just lay off the "down" stuff.  Even though it's a big field, things still poo on it, and I'm not laying down in poo.

So I started them off for a leisurely run to get some real estate between them and the Musher, just to see if she remembered the whole "come here" command.

Beautiful grouping guys, but don't make it too easy on her!

The Musher is having a LOT of difficulty remembering to say Come-Bye or Away to Me because she's so used to Gee and Haw.  When that happens, I just glare at her.

Seriously?  Gee?  Do we not remember our sheepy commands?

Sometimes I just can't help myself and just take over... I mean I don't want to go chasing the sheepie things when she lays out a Walk Up while the sheepies things are running full tilt bozo in the opposite direction.  The Musher gets a bit frustrated when I take over, and I try really hard to let her make mistakes, but eeesh.

Watch out Musher!  Don't walk in front of the sheepie things, they'll smoosh you!

She gets frustrated too, so when that happens, I ask the gang to cut her some slack, and hopes she remembers the "There" so I can "Walk Up" and move the sheepie things at her.

Ok, seriously?  How much closer do you want them, and NO, I'm not laying down, there's a bug on the ground here

She also likes to have things "just so" and all perfect.  I guess she's never heard "close enough for sheepy things work", so I asked Manny to step on her foot.

There!  Um... how about a "That'll Do?"  I'm thirsty you know

She did very well today, despite some challenges, and I think she has a lot of potential, if she can forget all of those mushing commands, but I have a feeling that this winter, she's going to be out on the training trail and TOTALLY freak out the team by yelling COME-BYE!!!

That'll be fun to watch.

- Bet