Tag Archives: dogs

Go dog, go – local mushers and their pets race for the joy of it

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In spite of last weekend’s stormy weather – or perhaps because of it – thousands of Coloradans flocked to the high country to play in the snow. Sure, the great majority went to ski, but there’s more to winter in the Rocky Mountains than standing in lift lines and paying way too much for poor rations. On Saturday and Sunday, there was also the Silver City Sled Dog Classic, the last major dog sled race of the year and one of the season’s best-kept secrets.

Despite the sport’s visual appeal, precious few spectators turned out for the Classic – somewhat surprising in light of most Coloradans’ fondness for winter activities and the love all right-thinking folk have for dogs. On the other hand, the sporting grounds are a bit off the beaten track.

Tradition places the Classic in the long, narrow valley at the entrance to Camp Hale, which is often a busy place in winter, though not obviously so. Once home to the illustrious 10th Mountain Division, it’s now primarily a domain of deer, foxes and solitude resting in grand isolation amid the peaks and pines of White River National Forest about halfway between Leadville and Minturn. Nordic skiers, folks on snowshoes, even a handful of snowmobiles can do little to disturb the peace in that alpine fastness. Incredibly, neither could the 200 cheering people and at least twice that number of tightly-wound and extremely vocal dogs who traveled to Camp Hale from all over the Mountain West.

Though it’s not generally known, the region between Bailey and Evergreen is a hotbed of mushing activity. “We hide well,” says Debra Su Stephens who, with her husband Mark, has been driving huskies for 15 years. “There’s probably 30 mushers living within 20 miles of Conifer.” In the interest of clarity, it should be stated here that dog sled racing is referred to as “mushing” by its practitioners, a term linguists believe derives from the French word “marche,” which means something like “march” or “onward” or “move your tail, you lazy mutt.”

In a sprawling fenced compound on their 36 wooded acres off Pleasant Park Road outside Conifer, the Stephens see to the safety, health and happiness of no fewer than 41 purebred Siberians and 6 Alaskan huskies. If that sounds like a lot of dogs, consider that the number is down from the 72 they owned a few years back and a fraction of the hundreds that have passed through their lives in the last 15 years. “The average around here is probably 20 dogs,” Debra Su says, “and I’d like to get it down to about 30, which would be plenty for racing.”

It could take a while to reach that goal. While many of the dogs are effectively retired from racing, they can look forward to several years of graceful retirement and, when they die, they’ll be buried on the property beneath hand-painted stone markers. Though bred and trained to pull a sled, they’re pets, plain and simple. “I always keep the older ones in the house at night,” Debra Su says, “and when it’s cold, I’ll bring in some of the younger ones, too.”

Always dog-people, the Stephens weren’t always mushers, or especially husky-happy, for that matter. “I accidentally bought a husky in 1985,” says Debra Su, by way of explanation. Immediately charmed by the creature’s intelligence, spirit and good nature, by 1990 she and Mark had several more of the variety, a sled, and a new reason to look forward to the season’s first snow.

Inside their home – an original frontier log cabin dating to 1868 – the walls are virtually papered with everything husky. A skillful Siberian breeder, Debra Su proudly displays pictures of both her award-winning show dogs and particularly successful racing animals. Such is the reputation of the Stephens’ kennel, “Snow Runner Siberian Huskies,” that 25 of their dogs are now in the hands of Alaskan mushers preparing for the sport’s main attractions.

Racing at the Stephens’ level isn’t cheap, though. Providing a high-protein diet to 47 dogs costs 600 bucks a month. Add to that the price of nutritional supplements, veterinary bills, travel expenses, contest entrance fees and equipment costs and their hobby – make that passion – sets the Stephens back in the neighborhood of $17,000 dollars a year. The Stephens are fortunate that their business, Stephens & Co. Building Services, provides the wherewithal to keep their animals in kibble. “We sponsor ourselves,” Debra Su said. “We’re lucky, that way.”

Given the price tag, one might think bringing home ribbons and trophies is job-one. In fact, for the Stephens and the other members of Colorado Mountain Mushers – one of two principal mushing leagues in the state – the animals are top priority. “It’s all about the dogs,” Debra Su says. “I love each and every one them, and all the mushers I know are the same. Some people think we beat them; that we’re mean to them. But nobody takes better care of dogs than a musher.”

And not just their own dogs. When the High Meadow and Snaking fires threatened homes and lives throughout large areas of the foothills, the Stephens put their dog truck to work transporting hundreds of domestic animals out of the fire zones, and recruited many of their fellow mushers to do the same. In the process, they founded Animal Evac Volunteers, a nonprofit group composed largely of sled dog racers and dedicated to keeping animals out of harms way during emergencies. “Because we’re already equipped to move and board large numbers of animals,” Mark says, “mushers are the logical ones for the job.”

The truth is, Colorado’s top mushing purse wouldn’t buy breakfast for a decent sized kennel. The real attractions are the excitement of the race, the camaraderie of fellow mushers, and the majestic beauty of Colorado’s wild places. “It’s a very family-oriented sport,” Mark says, “and mushers are the best group of people you’ll ever want to meet.” And, while the Stephens’ operation runs into money, a person can easily break into the sport on a shoestring. “All you need to get started is one dog and a pair of skis,” he says, “or three or four dogs and a second-hand sled.”

Just ask Dick Nichols of Bailey. His 6-dog team is composed entirely of older animals he rescued from local animal shelters. “They’ll never win anything,” Nichols said, “but they like to race and it’s a lot of fun for me, too.”

Next time: It’s soooo on…

Dogs in the News

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“To his dog, every man is Napoleon, hence the constant popularity of dogs.”

Aldous Huxley

 

Near as we can figure it, Homo sapiens sapiens and Canis lupus familiaris have been bffs for about 35,000 years.

After sampling the genomes of wolves and dogs from hither and yon, scientists now believe the unique and intimate association between Man and Dog began at least 15,000 year earlier than previous supposed somewhere in Southeast Asia with the domestication of the Taimyr wolf. Given the long stretch of time since then, you’d think we’d have learned just about everything there is to know about our four-legged besties. In fact, until very recently our understanding of humankind’s closest animal companion has been remarkably superficial, a two-dimensional portrait more closely resembling ourselves than our pets.

True, humans quickly became adept at dog-handling. They used their animals to guard the camp and to bring down the mighty mammoth. They taught the doting beasts to watch the flock and fight by their side in battle. And they carefully and patiently bred their dogs to satisfy specific human needs and tastes, resulting in the more than 300 breeds that exist today. One thing people never did, though, is give any serious thought to what their dogs thought about it all.

“Dogs have been used as tools, and they’ve been kept as pets, but there’s been very little study of what makes them tick,” explains canine clinician Jean Weller. “We know a lot about what they do, but not why they do it. It’s only in the last 25 years that there’s been any real scientific research into the emotional and cognitive characteristics of dogs.”

Considering the bone-deep affinity that exists between peeps and pups, it’s hardly surprising that we tend to ascribe human motivations to our pets. For example, most dog-lovers assume that their beloved beagle wags its tail when it sees them because it loves them right back. Scientifically speaking, that’s taking a lot on faith. Is your dog really glad to see you? Or is it just excited because it’s almost supper time and you’re the only one who can operate the can opener?

dogAndToddlerWhile standard observation has softened the rigid “alpha” pecking order into a more flexible canine social hierarchy, neither has much to do with you and your dog. Behavioral research increasingly suggests that the relationship between person and pet is less leader-to-follower or peer-to-peer, and more akin to the bond between parent and toddler. To cite just one example, when frightened or distressed a dog will always and instantly run to its owner for reassurance. Dogs are also prone to jealousy. Studies indicate that when a dog’s owner showers undue attention on a third party, be they man or beast, more than 60 percent of the time the dog will find some quiet, sneaky way to disrupt that interaction and redirect its master’s interest back where it belongs.

smart-dogProbably the most intriguing discovery on the canine front is that dogs can infer. It’s a simple thing, inference, and incredibly useful. Merriam-Webster defines it as the ability to “deduce or conclude from evidence and reasoning rather than from explicit statements.” Humans infer a thousand times a day without consciously thinking about it. And yet our closest evolutionary relatives, chimpanzees, can’t infer. Of all creatures, only people and dogs are able to predict an event or circumstance based purely on observation. It’s how your dog knows when the mailman is coming. It’s how it can tell you’re hiding a snack behind your back. And it’s why, even though you take your dog to the park every day at 2 o’clock, you can’t get it into the car for a 2 o’clock veterinarian appointment.

Curiously enough, dogs also have a well-developed sense of fairness. Austrian researchers devised a scenario whereby two dogs were made to perform the same trick, but only one was rewarded for it. The un-rewarded dog invariably began scratching and licking itself in frustration until the account was balanced. Interestingly, the quality of the belated reward didn’t appear to matter. Even if the first dog received sausage, the second was perfectly satisfied to be given bread. It was, it seems, the principle of the thing.

Three hundred and fifty centuries later and we’re only now finding out that our dogs know when they’re getting the shaft. There’s still a world of work to do, but early results paint a far richer, nuanced and loveable picture of Man’s Best Friend than the one we’ve been looking at since Paleolithic times. On the other hand, not every discovery has come as a surprise.

Neuro-imaging studies conducted by animal cognition researchers at Emory University have learned that the scent of its human master lights up the “reward center” of a dog’s brain, just as the appearance of a loved one does in ours. What’s more, canine MRI results suggest that, of all the complex universe of odors packed into their daily experience, dogs prioritize human scent above all others.

Those big floppy ears aren’t for nothing, either. Scientists at Eotvos Lorand University in Budapest find that dogs are equally attuned to human vocal signals. Just as in people, “happy” sounds spark a pleasurable commotion in a dog’s auditory cortex, while negative noise tends to depress. And when your dog cocks its head to one side, it’s not doing it just to be cute. Dogs, we now know, are keenly sensitive to our every stance and movement. When in doubt of your emotional status, your pup will shift its head to remove its snout from its line of vision, allowing it to examine nonverbal cues from the top of your head to the tips of your toes. Taking these findings together, scientists conclude that dogs aren’t merely skilled at perceiving and responding to your every temper and emotion, they’re biologically hard-wired to do so.

In other words, your dog really is glad to see you.

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“I am convinced that basically dogs think humans are nuts.”

John Steinbeck

 

Son of Go Dog Go – Doggone

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Without question, the world’s best-known dog sled race is Alaska’s grueling Iditarod, a 1,150-mile slog across the desolate center of the self-styled Last Frontier. While less epic, the Silver City Classic presents challenges enough for man and beast.

In preparation for last weekend’s races, organizers plowed a narrow lane reaching about 100 yards into the valley from Highway 24, a slim track that served as access, parking lot and staging area for 43 mushers competing in categories from 2-dog skijoring to 10-dog endurance races. Besides a rudimentary starting gate, it was the only feature of the venue not provided by nature.

To someone who’s never attended a sled dog race, the most fascinating aspect of the affair has got to be the dogs. Not because they’re cute and funny, which they are, and not because watching a team launch out of the chute like a string of furry rockets is thrilling, which it is. It’s because they’re plainly experiencing a level of fun that’s unattainable by human animals, and their raw excitement and manic enthusiasm is impossible to resist.

By 8 o’clock on Sunday morning, dozens of dog trucks had squeezed into the tight snowplowed corridor and hundreds of dogs – still snug in their cubbies – were already in full throat, filling the valley’s east end with noise and anticipation. Both Debra Su and Mark were entered in the seven and a half-mile 8-dog race, scheduled to start at 10:30. Back at the truck, under the watchful eye of their assistant, Nate Quinn of Evergreen, their huskies were busy working themselves into a fever pitch, yammering and yapping and snapping at one another, their competitive instincts in overdrive.

Dogs being what they are, and sled dogs somewhat more so, mushing is a fairly hands-on sport. Removed from their temporary quarters one at a time, dogs were immediately fastened to long chains strung along the running board of every vehicle, secured at every step from home to harness by human hands or stout tether. The reason for all that attention is simple – the dogs were there to run and, given the least opportunity, they were apt to do just that, with or without their master.

To make life easier on everybody, the dogs aren’t hooked to the sled – which is prudently attached to the dog truck – until minutes before launch because, once hooked to the gang-line, the animals simply go nuts, leaping wildly in the air, pressing furiously against the traces and barking madly at no one and everyone. That being the case, mushing is a necessarily cooperative sport, since no sled driver can easily restrain their team when its blood is up. Like hot air ballooning, dog sled racing is a team effort but, as few mushers travel with a retinue, sport etiquette requires any available mushers to assist in calming the dogs as much as possible and guiding them into the chute. It’s an important courtesy by which all racers abide, and typical of the sports friendly, familial character.

At about 10:45, Debra Su and her eight frantic Siberians pulled up in the chute. The mercury stood at about 8 degrees and a thick mantle of cloud pressed nearly to earth, the white sky and snow-covered ground blending seamlessly into a single colorless palette that hid the trail as effectively as a foot of new powder. In addition, the flurries that had been spitting fitfully all morning had organized themselves into a snowstorm – the high-altitude kind in which solid ranks of flakes seem to materialize in the frigid air just overhead, forming a dense, swirling wall that mutes sound and pulls visibility back to nothing.

The race official began counting down at 15 seconds, sending the team into renewed frenzies. At “go”, the pack of barking, fractious, distracted
huskies were instantly transformed into sleek, silent racing machines – stretched out long and low, utterly focused, all straining muscles and undiluted purpose. In moments, Debra Su was lost in the pallid gloom. A minute later, Mark and his eight pups followed.

While the course was relatively simple – a reasonably level route down the valley, around Camp Hale’s old artillery bunkers and back again – the flat-light conditions and heavy snowfall rendered the trail virtually invisible to even experienced sled racers like Debra Su and Mark. If that sounds like a problem, it isn’t. Even the dullest sled dog carries a detailed map in its head of every trail it’s ever run. While that kind of biological auto-pilot is a useful feature in poor weather, it can cause disagreement. “Occasionally, they’ll change the route,” Debra Su says, “and the dogs will fight you on it.”

It was all familiar territory on Sunday, though, and 30 minutes and 9 seconds after take-off, Debra Su and her team steamed back into view. It was a reasonably good time which, added to her Saturday performance, earned Debra Su the second-place spot in her category behind John Perry of Sterling, Colo., who’s team of husky/pointer crossbreeds has been known to average a blinding 22.7 miles per hour on the trail. “John’s got the fastest 8-dog team in the world,” Debra Su said, “but it took him four miles to catch me.”

Mark finished fourth in the class, a respectable finish considering the limitations of his young lead-dogs, Keeper and Montana. “They’re really fast,” Mark said, “but I can’t get ‘em to pass anybody because they like to stop and play with the first team they catch up with.” Well, dogs will be dogs, which is the whole point of mushing.

By 2 p.m., Colorado’s four-month dog sled racing season was over and, one by one, the dog trucks surrendered the high valley to the silently falling snow. Before long, the narrow plowed lane would be filled and all signs of the Silver City Sled Dog Classic would be obliterated.

Just because there aren’t any races during the warm months doesn’t mean mushers and huskies sit around playing Nintendo and filing their nails. Training, for example, is a year-round chore and, in summer, the Stephens take their huskies up to Kenosha Pass and let them pull a four-wheeler around.

Dog sled racing is nothing if not a social hobby, and local mushers attend frequent picnics, barbecues and husky-meet-and-greets held throughout the year, many of them sponsored by Colorado Mountain Mushers. In the end, though, it’s still about the dogs.

“Mushers are really just dog-lovers,” Debra Su said, “and mushing is just an excuse to spend quality-time with our pets.”