Friday, January 20, 2006
Pluto, the one eyed skijor dog
Read about Pluto, the one eyed skijor dog that's racing in the 2006 season.
Note: The above link is to the print view of an article in the Fairbanks Daily Newsminer. The article was written by Danny Martin and published Thursday, January 05, 2006.
Note: The above link is to the print view of an article in the Fairbanks Daily Newsminer. The article was written by Danny Martin and published Thursday, January 05, 2006.
Wednesday, March 02, 2005
A second chance for Schandelmeier's team
This article orginally appeared in the Fairbanks Daily News Miner, Wed. February 16, 2005
A second chance for Schandelmeier's team
By ERIC GOOLD, Staff Writer
McCABE CREEK, Yukon--Go ahead and call John Schandelmeier the dog whisperer. Watching the two-time Yukon Quest champion feeding his dogs Tuesday at McCabe Creek, where Schandelmeier rested up before pushing on to Pelly Crossing, it was clear that the Paxson musher has a psychic link with the animals on his team.
He moved up and down the line, bringing each animal a bowl of food containing some of the estimated 9,000 calories per day that each will need to get through the 1,000 miles of the 2005 Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race.
Schandelmeier spoke softly to each dog as he fed them, rubbing Cookie's head, scratching Streak's ears, gently chiding Henry for being too protective of his food dish. He chuckled when he saw Chucky obsessively licking his back right foot, occasionally inserting the entire paw into his mouth.
"Chucky, stop itching your foot!" chided Schandelmeier. Chucky, a medium-sized black and brown dog, tried to hide his paw from Schandelmeier's sight and kept licking it.
Schandelmeier looked at a handler and said, "If you needed to itch your foot but didn't have a hand, what else could you do but lick it?"
Schandelmeier may be a little more permissive with this particular team. Ten of the 14 dogs he left Whitehorse with last Sunday are so-called Second Chance dogs, adopted from the Fairbanks/North Star Animal Shelter via the Second Chance League as well as other dog adoption agencies.
While he ate dinner at the checkpoint in Carmacks on Monday night, Schandelmeier was asked if he was trying to prove something in his attempt to finish the Quest, which bills itself as the world's toughest sled dog race, with a bunch of castoffs and dogs that other people had already given up on.
"I don't know if it proves anything," he said. "Realistically, you'd have to be nuts to say that I could win with them."
Schandelmeier ran last year's race with a handful of Second Chance dogs, then decided to make them a majority on this year's team.
"I knew a while ago that I wanted to try this," he said. "We've been training for 10 months, and we're continually working forward. They don't feel too put-upon, and they're getting better and better."
Schandelmeier said he hopes a strong finish for the Second Chance dogs will make people think a little bit more when they're considering taking an animal to the pound.
"People need to take a closer look at it," he said. "Maybe some mushers need to think twice before they decide to have another eight-dog litter and just keep three of them.
"Obviously it would have been better if we could have gotten 50 dogs," Schandelmeier added. "But we picked 18, and then picked these 10. It's been interesting."
Schandelmeier captured the 1996 and 1992 Quests with dogs from more traditional--and competitive--mushing bloodlines.
"I'll have a better idea how these dogs (Second Chancers) compare when I get them a little more sorted out at Pelly," said Schandelmeier, who ended up dropping one dog in Carmacks and then one more at McCabe Creek.
"But they're starting to look good," he added. "They're starting to look like
a real dog team."
A second chance for Schandelmeier's team
By ERIC GOOLD, Staff Writer
McCABE CREEK, Yukon--Go ahead and call John Schandelmeier the dog whisperer. Watching the two-time Yukon Quest champion feeding his dogs Tuesday at McCabe Creek, where Schandelmeier rested up before pushing on to Pelly Crossing, it was clear that the Paxson musher has a psychic link with the animals on his team.
He moved up and down the line, bringing each animal a bowl of food containing some of the estimated 9,000 calories per day that each will need to get through the 1,000 miles of the 2005 Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race.
Schandelmeier spoke softly to each dog as he fed them, rubbing Cookie's head, scratching Streak's ears, gently chiding Henry for being too protective of his food dish. He chuckled when he saw Chucky obsessively licking his back right foot, occasionally inserting the entire paw into his mouth.
"Chucky, stop itching your foot!" chided Schandelmeier. Chucky, a medium-sized black and brown dog, tried to hide his paw from Schandelmeier's sight and kept licking it.
Schandelmeier looked at a handler and said, "If you needed to itch your foot but didn't have a hand, what else could you do but lick it?"
Schandelmeier may be a little more permissive with this particular team. Ten of the 14 dogs he left Whitehorse with last Sunday are so-called Second Chance dogs, adopted from the Fairbanks/North Star Animal Shelter via the Second Chance League as well as other dog adoption agencies.
While he ate dinner at the checkpoint in Carmacks on Monday night, Schandelmeier was asked if he was trying to prove something in his attempt to finish the Quest, which bills itself as the world's toughest sled dog race, with a bunch of castoffs and dogs that other people had already given up on.
"I don't know if it proves anything," he said. "Realistically, you'd have to be nuts to say that I could win with them."
Schandelmeier ran last year's race with a handful of Second Chance dogs, then decided to make them a majority on this year's team.
"I knew a while ago that I wanted to try this," he said. "We've been training for 10 months, and we're continually working forward. They don't feel too put-upon, and they're getting better and better."
Schandelmeier said he hopes a strong finish for the Second Chance dogs will make people think a little bit more when they're considering taking an animal to the pound.
"People need to take a closer look at it," he said. "Maybe some mushers need to think twice before they decide to have another eight-dog litter and just keep three of them.
"Obviously it would have been better if we could have gotten 50 dogs," Schandelmeier added. "But we picked 18, and then picked these 10. It's been interesting."
Schandelmeier captured the 1996 and 1992 Quests with dogs from more traditional--and competitive--mushing bloodlines.
"I'll have a better idea how these dogs (Second Chancers) compare when I get them a little more sorted out at Pelly," said Schandelmeier, who ended up dropping one dog in Carmacks and then one more at McCabe Creek.
"But they're starting to look good," he added. "They're starting to look like
a real dog team."
