Just for Fun

I finally got curious enough to do an embark on Princess Cricket. Jodi has her actual family history going back at least 6 generations, and I know that she is mostly Alaskan Husky with some houndiness (pointer). The pointer lines have been bred into sprint-racing Alaskan huskies for a while now, and while Cricket is not quite as houndy as they are, I guessed that she was about 10-15% hound. However, her results came back 100% Alaskan husky. She also has only 5% Coefficient of Inbreeding, which means Jodi has been very responsible with her lines! (Raven, the rando stray dog off the streets, has a COI of only 2%, which is excellent and very lucky considering how many relative-matings often occur in stray dog populations in small villages like hers.)

Like Raven's, Cricket's results also came back negative for all of the genetic health conditions that they test for. Wonderful news, but unsurprising since we know how careful Jodi is about breeding. She also has no known close relatives, hahahahaha. But the reason for this is obvious: Mushers who breed their own know what they have and do not do Embark tests! So none of her many known relatives are in the database.

But let us talk sled dog genetics. The Alaskan Husky was originally a landrace breed, and it is said that every Alaskan husky today has some of this lineage. However, nobody has DNA from dogs from pre-contact times. Post-contact, European and American settlers bred in lines that made the dogs suit their purposes, whether that was for delivering the mail, running traplines, serving as a main mode of family transportation, or, more recently, racing. And even among racing there is a split between distance and sprint dogs. So... while the modern Alaskan Husky does indeed have its own genetic signature, I suspect that that gene pool is quite large and quite deep, and is now so redefined that it includes the bit of hound in Cricket. Even dogs that have a known pointer ancestor are having their results coming back 100% Alaskan Husky. I do wonder what this ancestral ur-AK husky looked like. Then realized hey, the Malamute is the state dog! Is that it? But according to my friend Cole, who runs a trapline team of old-style Alaskan huskies and studies sled dog genetics as a hobby:

Okay, I asked. How about the prized Hedlund Huskies? Nope, says Cole:

Recently, animal geneticist Heather Huson took DNA was taken from the famous sled dogs of Leonard Seppala, but his dogs were Siberians. She did visit several local kennels around town to collect DNA from heritage Alaskan huskies, and I got to meet her and she was super interesting! She collected DNA from heritage dogs all over the Interior.

Here are some of my photos showing AK husky genetic diversity.

First up, my Autumn, who to me is the cannonical modern Alaskan husky. She probably could have trained to run the Iditarod, but she would not have loved it. She's strong, but not crazy strong. She's fast, but not crazy fast. She's versatile, and she lived to be nearly 18!

Then her sister, my Linden, who is practically her twin and has the same characteristics. Also lived to be nearly 18, and strong, active, and possessed of all her marbles until her very last few days.

My Starbuck-a-Roo. I always suspected she was part Golden Retriever, but who knows? She was soft of fur, soft of temperament, and very loving. But I'm sure if I had done an embark test on her, results would have come back mostly if not all AK Husky.

Queen Thistle would certainly have come back 100% AK Husky. She's from distance racing lines and full of perseverance and grit.

The data nerd in me was disappointed that Cricket's hound genes were not reported in her DNA results, but I think they were rolled into the modern definition of AK husky. Her hound genes added a bit of civility: She has the best recall of any husky I've ever known. Houndiness also adds strength and speed. She is bulging with fast-twitch muscles, and when she snuggles you, it feels like you are wearing a lead vest. When I used to skijor with her and Thistle side by side, she would be trotting very quickly while Thistle galloped! She was a star skijor dog with our friend ET, who is a Canadian long-distance skiing champion of some renown. She said once, she was in a 40-mile 3-dog race, and the leader started to lose interest. So she stopped, swapped them out, let Cricket lead, and won! The cost of the houndiness is the fluffy coat. Cricket's is not very thick, and she did NOT appreciate sleeping outdoors on the Iditarod. By the time I met her, she had taken to sleeping in the handler's cabin, snuggled up warm.

This is Cedar, also 100% Alaskan husky but physically Cricket's opposite: He's huge, fluffy, intractable, and did I mention huge? He's half Hedlund.

Here are four of his puppies. Very cute!

Here are a bunch of his nieblings. They ahhh let me think. Cedar's sister is their mama, if memory serves.

And here is Levon, the Sweetest Boy in the World. Like Cedar in build but like the Dalai Lama in temperament. I wish more mushers would make Levons! 100% Alaskan husky from freight lines.

And here is Pepper, the canonocal houndy-hound sprint dog. She is a pet and recreational mushing dog, but her family members who do competitive sprint racing can run 3-4-minute miles! Also 100% Alaskan husky!

And finally, here is my Raven, who is much to my surprise 0% Alaskan husky, although some folks would call her that since they use "Alaskan husky" as a catchall term for any Northern sled dog who lives in Alaska, as in a literal husky who is Alaskan. But she doesn't have any AK husky genes; her husky genes are Siberian!

Spring Greetings

Yesterday was the Equinox, so Happy Equinox! Let us welcome the light! I apologize for being remiss in posting, again. Like almost everyone, I have been quite distressed about happenings around the country since January. Also, the very day after I posted my prior post, the UAF Board of Regents voted to cave to Trump's Executive Order to scrub all language referring to Diversity, Equity, or Inclusion from the website or print materials.

I have been calling, writing emails, and attending in-person events, but I'm not sure what else I can do. In the meantime, I have determined that in order not to spend my entire days as a ball of seething rage, I've got to carry on doing the business of living my life, and that includes teaching, research, and hanging out with my Fuzzy Family.

I've recently come to admit that I have not been running strong the past few years, and now I realize that that is to be expected as I've been hit by repeated traumatic events nearly annually since 2021, and 2020 if you count the Pandemic, which was pretty much an international traumatic event. I gauge my running fitness by how long it takes to do our morning 3-miler. At my fastest, it was 30 mins (I'm slow!). At my slowest, it was 1:15 (walking slowly). Now I am at about 50 mins. My Challenges started in 2021 when I broke my left fibula. I started running awkwardly again in about 6 months, but then in 2022 I got my leg punctured very deeply by a mean dog, so another 6 months of walking instead of running. In 2023 another calamity: I fell in love with Raven! 🤣🤣 I had never had a yearling dog and was back to walking instead of running until she learned some Manners. Then Queen Thistle's health started to fail, and we all quit running and switched to walking (and skijoring) exclusively until she left us. Then my heart was broken and I couldn't run for another six months. Now finally I'm trying to recover running-strength again. I'm a bit out of shape, still walking half the time, and huffing and puffing a lot. Also, Middle Age! At 47, I do not expect to build up fitness as quickly as I did 10 or 20 years ago. On the other hand, I'm not exactly in bad shape. I mean I still cover 40 miles a week, even if slowly!

I appreciate the patience of my two Goodest Best Friends, Princess Cricket and Ravey Gravy, being willing to do snail-pace walking with me for so long. I hope to be running again this summer.

And we've still been enjoying CARTZZZ!

YESH CARTZZZ!

And KALESTEMZZZ!

YESH KALESTEMZZZ!

And we clean our fangs!

And we are still snugglin'

Even young'un Ravey Gravy is so snuggly.

The ski season seems to be ending early this year, alas. There has not been fresh snow in weeks, and the old snow is hard and slick. The overflow on Rosie Creek is also creeping ever higher:

I'm lucky the girls are pretty chill.

They comfy.

We don't have enough happy stories, so let us talk about some rescue success stories. It seems that the problems of the world are so big, and the good things are so small. But to these people, this small good thing is a piece of their hearts, and to these dogs, this small good thing is their whole world.

Here is Timber, the big sweet galoot! He was on death row at the shelter when he got sprung into the rescue system. Turned into a foster fail. Back for a visit while his parents are travelling. He remembers me and gave me some alarmingly violent hugs. So I squoze him back. :D

And here is Miss Ivalu, formerly known as Jill. Severely abused and dumped in a gravel pit with half a dozen or so others. Then rescued and became a foster fail. 🥰 She's back for temporary boarding while her family is travelling, and she is full of life and joy and silliness!

And finally here is my own Raven. A foster fail before her foster even started. 🥰

I hope all 14 of my loyal readers are having a lovely spring. Apologies for the poor photo resolution today. Uploading photos has become a bit of a process, and I took the easy way today.