7 Arctic dogs
DAW
. . . continued from herding dogs..
7) THE ARCTIC DOG CLAN:
Hardware: endurance, long speed running, good winter coat.
Software: the desire to run with a pack. Lead dogs need ice smarts and snow sense.
Use: to pull sleds, sometimes to lead sled teams, to find seal breathing holes.
Your dogs find the seal's breathing holes or you and your family starve to death in the winter.
Today's sled racing dogs, do they know how to find the seal's place in winter, or do they specialize in running fast?
Bio: from the late first winter stage through the second winter stage. Where young grown wolves would drive large game for the pack, and help the parents hunt large game. They might be full grown at this stage but have not dispersed.
Wolf cubs stay with their parents for two years, and help raise their younger siblings from the second spring, before leaving the pack to form their own pack.
Running in front of a sled is not the same as running with the pack after a running elk, deer, or caribou, but it is close..
With the Arctic dogs, it is almost like they have started to diverge into so many little groups (like Darwin's finches did), that you could almost have the Arctic version of herding dogs, the Arctic version of bird dogs, the Arctic version the pit bull, the Arctic version of long distance running hounds, the Arctic version sprinters, the Arctic version a Guard dog, the Arctic version of house dog etc. .
Maybe when you read that, you picture the same breeds that I do..
Arctic dogs are one edge of the horseshoe's gap. They are where the tail joins the Q's circle..Their group flows into, and over laps with the wolves, but it also flows into the Turkish Flockbonders.
High in the mountains the winters are cold, just like where the Arctic dogs live..The Arctic dogs travel, they are more agile, but the dogs of snowy mountains are heavy. But they have much in common.
Think of the Akita, the Alaskan Malamute, think of the original Alpine Mastiffs..
The Arctic Dog Clan is almost a complete group in itself, dogs that look alike because they endure the same winters, but inside of the dogs, they are different because they have been bred by different people's who want the dog to do different things.
Some people want their dogs to herd, some to hunt, some to pull..It is too hard for me to try to separate these breeds by looks - I don't think I could. I don't personally know the Arctic breeds well enough to sort them.
What would I be adding, that you could not have read in a 100 year old book?.
But I will say this:
If you sell Arctic Dog puppies to people who want sled dogs, then only bred your dogs if they are good sled dogs.
If you sell your Arctic Dog puppies to people who want pets, then only breed your dogs who are healthy and good pets.
If you breed Arctic Dogs for dog shows, I think you ought to raise fish or rabbits instead..I am getting too edgy? I get tired of repeating the same thing.
People were saying how dog shows are ruining dogs since I went to my first dog show.
People have said "Mutts are healthier than purebreds" since before I was a little kid. .
If you inbreed a little group of dogs, letting mother & son, grandfather & granddaughter, and brother & sister mate with each other - then the puppies start to have health problems.
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Those were the traditional stages of arrestment in domestic European dogs.... next wolves, coyotes, dingos, foxes, dholes, jackals, and the wild dog clan..
