Puppies and Puddles by Mandy

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It’s Fall in Alaska’s Interior! The birch trees are draped in beautiful orange leaves... and most are already losing them. But Fall also means rain and mud.

Currently, Ryno Kennel has 12 puppies across 3 litters that are too young to mush. In order to get energy out and some love-and-care in, we take them on Puppy Walks. These crazy furballs will play with anything they find: rope, sticks, leaves. They romp around and splash into every puddle found along the trail. We bring kibble as treats to work on their recall and sitting skills.

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My favorite part is watching a puppy run too fast and lose their careful balance, slipping into a puddle. Don’t worry, these guys are rubberbands and spring back into action—the only evidence of their mishaps are the splotches of mud covering their plump bodies.

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The older puppies, around 7 months old, get to run off-leash as we drive ATVs. It lets them sprint, play, and be dogs at high speeds. The goal is to tire them out but there’s a pit of endless energy and often they’re still playing with each other in the dog yard afterwards.

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Lastly, the race dogs. Before there’s snow on the ground, training begins with the gangline hooked to ATVs. We typically run between 8-14 dog teams. These dogs are power-houses and run through mud pits, puddles that overtake the trail, and even into rivers. I never realized how much they help keep the ATV from sliding around untiI driving the same trails without them—I got stuck once.

Puddles, and water in general, are great during Fall Training. It cools the dogs off as they run. We typically run in the morning for cool weather but even then, these dogs are built for snow and work hard. They’ll pull toward the puddles along the trail to make sure their paws soak it in.

Life of a Handler Written by Kalyn

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I (Ryne) asked Kalyn and Mandy to occasionally write blogs for the website, and being the amazing people they are, both have agreed!

What is it like to be a handler? You might see us scooping poop, cutting meat, digging holes, resting in the dogtruck at races in a position you can only assume is comfortable due to lack of sleep, packing drop bags, watching over resting teams, drinking obscene amounts of coffee…The list is nearly endless. 

The life of a handler is a variable one. We spend many winter months working for room and board and the chance to run a dog team. For most of us, our handling gig ends in March or April and we set out to find a summer job to feed the bank account. Many people handle for one or two seasons, then either start their own kennel or move on to the next adventure. Me? Let’s just say that this is my third season at Ryno Kennel and I’ve spent a couple years playing at another kennel before that. In the summer months, I’m usually guiding - aka getting paid to show people really amazing aspects of this earth. For several of the past few summers I’ve been guiding people on kayaking and bushwhacking adventures in southeast Alaska. 

Many other handlers move to doing dog sled glacier tours in the summer. This past summer, however, was a bit different. Tourism didn’t exist. So, I applied for the Alaska Fire Service and got a job as a Wildland Fire Dispatcher out of Galena, AK. It was quite the experience and it had been many years since I’ve had an office job. The job itself was extremely interesting and it’s always fun to learn new skills - skills I can use in the event that I can no longer do a more physically demanding job. But I’m sure glad to be back home at Ryno Kennel staring at dog butts on the trail.