西伯利亞雪橇犬

Here is my new pack member imported straight from Chongqing, China. I'm glad he wasn't too big and fitted well in the airplane :D. His name is Valdemar and he needs his sweater because it's sooo cold here in Finland. Wo xi huan gou! (I hope my Chinese teacher won't see that last comment).

1 week

So I'm having a vacation for a one week before work. Actually I'm still in school for a month and I've got many things to do but I'm staying away from the city for this one week. I'm also doing our Siberian Husky Club's magazine which should be printed soon and I should update our web pages and.... Oh, if you haven't noticed yet the SHCA have completed some illustrations of Lorna and Leonhard! 

We wrote about this project a year ago in our club magazine so this is not new information for anybody! The completed illustrations doesn't look too bad because I was expecting much worse and I knew they would differ from the old illustrations which is a shame. I was hoping they would look at the old photos from the 30's and 40's (or they should not be called Leonhard and Lorna) and make the illustrations based on them. Luckily the illustration of a moving Siberian is not the awful ”show movement” which is seen in the show ring way too often. My main concern is that the male looks too feminine which already is a fault seen often in the show ring.

There are many faults in the ”Leonhard” profile. This dog has the ”hanging chest”, the deepest point of the chest should be level with elbows... Very common fault with show winners. He also has too short and upright upper arm and he is too long in body. It's good that the hindquarters aren't exaggerated but they could be much better so I'm not even starting with that! I know how hard it is to make an illustration even when you know how all different parts should be but when you try to put them together... Well that's why I just used pictures of my own dogs when I was making illustrations for my pages. Link to already completed SHCA illustrations: http://illustratedstandard.com/shcacomp.htm

I've got so many things to write about but not the time for it. So here are few pictures for you!

Here is the team after a run. There were 10 dogs pulling the truck (oh, and the trailer for 12 dogs) and YES they can pull it without help and it's not animal cruelty, these dogs are working sled dogs under strict supervision. I guess we had 14 different dogs but BABY Sepe was way too young for pulling ;)

Almost 11 years old Sero wasn't the oldest one in the team. Here running in the wheel with his daughter Odessa and winking at the girls: How You Doin? This was first time for them both to run in front of a truck (and not seeing me :') ) and they did just awesome.

Lovely boy, I didn't even think of stealing him... This BABY HUSKY was supervising the team inside the truck... And being all cute.

I love this photo. Here is Joiku in his kennel and Henna outside roaming on her own. Henna is Joiku's 16 years old grandmother, both from Troika kennels.

Drinks at Kerubi

4.5.2012 Kerubi, Joensuu

Last week we went to test how the new law operates. Since January 1. Finnish restaurants have been allowed to let animals indoors. It's great that you can take your dog with you when you go out. Especially during summer when we often travel with a dog or when I have Odessa in the city with me and I can't leave her alone with our bunnies.

I'm not planning to take dogs in busy restaurants but it's great that I can take a dog on a terrace with me and my friends. In Joensuu there's been one place where dogs were allowed before this new law and it's a nice and cool place by water. It's important to have a chance to get the dog under a shade and that the place is windy enough. So we went to test if they let us in the Kerubi restaurant terrance. Place is nice and I often walk my dogs in Ilosaari. Water is close and the area is quite calm. I just hope that dog owners know how to behave and take only calm dogs with them. I think it's great to allow dogs on terrances but I wouldn't like to eat indoors next to a dog (unless it's a Siberian, they don't smell like dogs :D))
 
Odessa behaved very well and we felt cozy with our Siberian. After drinks we went to friend's place watch the hockey game and Odessa just relaxed and slept on the floor despite all the yelling guys.  

Valo and I continue to visit nursing homes and last week we visited a new place. There were two floors so we had to take an elevator to get to visit people who couldn't come downstairs. Valo is not a huge fan of elevators but we all just squeezed in one (3 people and 3 big dogs that Valo hadn't met before). He did great and he's such a sweet boy!

Sero didn't get extra attention last week so I harnessed him in front of my mountain bike and he really loved the run. We stopped by the lake to check if there's still ice covering the lake. And yes there was but it's too fragile to walk on. Sero also found a common lizard and we watched him sunbathing on a deck. I would have photographed it but two dogs running free interrupted us.

Thanks for this pic: anline.kuvat.fi

And here is Valo in the dog show celebrating the first of May. Valo has been like this since he was 8 weeks old, he just doesn't care what's going on around him! Japanese tourists came to photograph him and his blue eyes, I don't even know how many times Valo has posed for tourists because I feel we meet them almost every time we get out of the door. But we don't mind and Valo always want's to share his Siberian love around him!