The Wild Bunch

This afternoon I needed to haul some scrap wood to the dumpster station and a snowblower to my friend's house, so I elected to run only 1 team today.  I ran the dogs that didn't get to run yesterday. 

The team this morning had Orion and Capella up in lead, Aumaruq and Midnight's Son in swing, Amazing Grace and Cassiopeia in team and big old Eskimo dog Innoko running in single wheel position.  Innoko is a brawler, especially when he gets excited, so he requires a bit of extra management and I'm not comfortable putting another dog beside him.  On the other hand he's so strong and powerful that he doesn't need another dog beside him.

We still have some behavior issues to work on, especially Orion's continuing habit of chewing up harnesses and Amazing Grace and Innoko both like to grab and jerk on the mainline while waiting to start.  Overall I can't complain too loudy, though.  We got out of the yard and made our little training loop in pretty good fashion.  Here is the entry from my training journal and some video clips.

Date, Day, &c: Thursday, October 18

Mileage & Speed:  1.25 miles.  Speed not recorded

Equipment: Four wheeler

Route, Trail & Terrain Conditions:  Home to Rod and Julie's loop and return, powder and packed powder

Weather:  Partly cloudy, 19F

Team:  Orion - Capella Aumaruq - Midnight's Son Grace - Cassiopeia Innoko (single wheel)

Narrative:  Today the focus was on running those dogs who didn't run yesterday. Orion shredded another harness, but at least it wasn't an expensive one this time.  My bad for thinking he would be OK standing on the drop line in harness.  He was also a bit of a wild child to hook up. Grace and Innoko were both grabbing and jerking lines while waiting to run.  I'll work on a solution to that little problem later today.  Once we got launched, the dogs again tried to head toward the old gate location, but did some nice gee / haw work to get us out on the trail.  Cassie was crowding Grace through a goodly part of the run and Grace was a bit snarky about it, but nothing so extreme as I've seen in the past.  I can't blame her for being snappish when she's being crowded on her own side of the gangline.  Leaders missed the 'gee' cue to enter the loop, but corrected quickly.  Run back home was uneventful, though Innoko slacked his line as we passed by Jeff's dogs.  Leaders missed the straight ahead cue at the driveway, but corrected on their own and brought the team home nicely.