Memorial Weekend

KoyukRanger

Taylor

We had a nice and relaxing weekend with Ana and the dogs. It was beautiful ALL weekend. Did some kennel chores, worked in the yard and went to tons of garage sales. Thought I'd post some pics of the dogs relaxing. They all got a special bone to chew on to keep them quieter while all the "flatlanders" were up camping. Glad they all went home!!!

Star after the Run. Look at her back feet, I have no idea why she sometimes picks them up like that. She looked so sad and pathetic that I just had to snap a picture of her. Windows & Lilly after the run. This was Lilly's first time in lead for us and she did a great job!

Fender & Taylor


Ana giving Peavey & Odessa treats after the run

We went on another puppy training run today. It was nice and cold, 42 degrees. We ran all 7 Odessa/Elrond pups with 7 adults. They are the guitar litter: Tak, Peavey, Fender, Taylor, Gibson, Jackson, and Martin. The 4-wheeler ran out of gas about halfway through, so we had them pull us in neutral the rest of the way. They did so great and pulled us the whole way up the "BIG" hill (.7 miles long). We let them go a bit faster on the way home between 12-14 mph at times. They were flyin and having a great time. This was their 10th hookup and probably their best. All in all, a GREAT run.

Ana & KoyukAna & Windows

Ana loves to come out into the kennel with me and help feed dogs. Lately, she has also been going with us on our training runs. We have all of our calmest dogs tied in front in the kennel so she can go and visit them without being jumped on. Star, Odessa, Windows, Koyuk and Ranger are very good with her.

Ana & Larry training dogs

Jackson Fender


Gibson & Star

2007 spring puppy training

Yesterday evening we went out for two puppy runs, 5 pups in each 11 dog team. All 10 pups are doing very well. We went 2.8 miles and they handled it like pros. Gibson and Tak both got a chance to lead and did a great job. We took Ana along with us and she LOVED it!! Looks like we have a future musher!!

Zoey

Strider

2007 Breeding
Thought I'd post a picture of Zoey & Strider..

2007 recap

We had a decent year racing this year. We ran the Tahquamenon 8 dog pro, Apostle Islands 6 & 8 dog and the Midnight Run. We finished in the middle of the pack in every race, but learned a TON this year that will help us in the coming years with the dogs. We have a very young kennel and are gearing these dogs for a more competitive future. We are tweaking our fall training and sled training a bit for next season and also continuing a lot of similar training from last season. We learned a lot about dog care in the past few years and finally got to apply it during our first checkpoint race (the Midnight Run) this year. We thought we did everything right as far as dog care went, and I made it through the race in one piece (even though it was a very dangerous first leg and we had a lot of problems, lost team etc.), but all in all we finally finished and will use all we learned for next season to be more competitive.
Last weekend we picked Zoey up from the Curtice's. She was there being bred by Strider. This is a repeat breeding from last season. We really like the yearlings we have now out of that cross, so had to repeat it again, since we only have 3 from that breeding. Zoey is out of Doug Swingley's kennel and Strider is a Caesar (Swingley) son who has been on the Curtice's winning teams for the past 2 years. Last year we also bred our Odessa (Swingley) with the Curtice's Elrond (also a Caesar son) that has also been on their winning teams for the past 2 years. We got 7 awesome pups out of that breeding as well. This year, only one breeding, I was too busy last year with all those puppies!! Zoey is due July 1st, I can't wait!!
We are hoping to get a couple more hookups this spring on the Odessa yearlings before it gets too warm. If it cools down, they will get run this weekend a couple of times. The Zoey yearlings already have 14 hookups, so they are ready for fall. All are training well. I can't wait for fall training already!!