Sled dog

A sled dog is a dog trained and used to pull a land vehicle in harness, most commonly a sled over snow.

Sled dogs have been used in the Arctic for at least 8,000 years and, along with watercraft, were the only transportation in Arctic areas until the introduction of semi-trailer trucks, snowmobiles and airplanes in the 20th century, hauling supplies in areas that were inaccessible by other methods. They were used with varying success in the explorations of both poles, as well as during the Alaskan gold rush. Sled dog teams delivered mail to rural communities in Alaska, Yukon, Northwest Territories and Nunavut. Sled dogs today are still used by some rural communities, especially in areas of Russia, Canada, and Alaska as well as much of Greenland. They are used for recreational purposes and racing events, such as the Iditarod Trail and the Yukon Quest.

History

Sled dogs are used in countries such as Canada, Greenland, Siberia, Chukotka, Norway, Sweden, and Alaska.

Sled dogs and husky safaris are not native to Sápmi (Lapland) and Finland and are considered a major nuisance by reindeer herders as they directly impact their livelihoods. These and glass-domed "iglus" have been appropriated from other cultures by the tourist industry in the 1980s and falsely portrayed as being part of the Sámi and Finnish cultures.

Russia

A 2017 study showed that 9,000 years ago, the domestic dog was present at what is now Zhokhov Island, northeastern Siberia, which at that time was connected to the mainland. The dogs were selectively bred as either sled dogs or hunting dogs, implying that a sled dog standard and a hunting dog standard co-existed. The optimal maximum size for a sled dog is based on thermo-regulation, and the ancient sled dogs were between . The same standard has been found in the remains of sled dogs from this region 2,000 years ago and in the modern Siberian Husky breed standard. Other dogs were more massive at and appear to be dogs that had been crossed with wolves and used for polar bear hunting. At death, the heads of the dogs had been carefully separated from their bodies by humans and was thought to be for ceremonial reasons.

The Kungur Chronicle and the Remezov Chronicle, created at the end of the 16th century and 1703 respectively, tells about the people living along Siberian rivers, whose primary means of transport was riding on reindeer or dogs. In these documents, the rivers Olenyok, Yana, Indigirka and Kolyma were called “dog rivers”, as they were rich in fish for the dogs to eat. Rivers with no fish or not enough to feed the dogs were called "deer rivers", as reindeer where then used for transportation.

From the 1940s to the 1990s, Russian dog sled numbers were in decline. Breed population reached an all-time low of 3000 in 1998 before revival efforts took off. Reasons for their decline include
* introduction of mechanization in the Arctic
* reduced capacity to keep dogs, especially with reduced fish catches and collectivization of farming and reindeer herding.
*decline of fur hunting.

Greenland

The Greenlandic Inuit have a very long history of using sled dogs and they are still widely used today. As of 2010, some 18,000 Greenland dogs were kept in western Greenland north of the Arctic Circle and in eastern Greenland (because of the effort of maintaining the purity of this culturally important breed, they are the only dogs allowed in these regions) and about half of these were in active use as sled dogs by hunters and fishers. As a result of reduced sea ice (limiting their area of use), increasing use of snowmobiles, increasing dog food prices and disease among some local dog populations, the number has been gradually falling in decades and by 2016 there were 15,000 Greenland dogs. A number of projects have been initiated in an attempt of ensuring that Greenland's dog sledding culture, knowledge and use are not lost.

The Sirius Patrol, a special forces unit in the Danish military, enforces the sovereignty of the remote unpopulated northeast (essentially equalling the Northeast Greenland National Park) and conduct long-range dog sled patrolling, which also record all sighted wildlife. The patrols averaged per year during 1978–1998. By 2011, the Greenland wolf had re-populated eastern Greenland from the National Park in the northeast through following these dog-sled patrols over distances of up to .

North America

In 2019, a study found that those dogs brought initially into the North American Arctic from northeastern Siberia were later replaced by dogs accompanying the Inuit during their expansion beginning 2,000 years ago. These Inuit dogs were more genetically diverse and more morphologically divergent when compared with the earlier dogs. Today, Arctic sledge dogs are the last descendants in the Americas of this pre-European dog lineage.

Historical references of the dogs and dog harnesses that were used by Native American cultures date back to before European contact. The use of dogs as draft animals was widespread in North America. There were two main kinds of sled dogs; one kind was kept by coastal cultures, and the other kind was kept by interior cultures such as the Athabascan Indians. These interior dogs formed the basis of the Alaskan husky. Russian traders following the Yukon River inland in the mid-1800s acquired sled dogs from the interior villages along the river. The dogs of this area were reputed to be stronger and better at hauling heavy loads than the native Russian sled dogs.

The Alaskan Gold Rush brought renewed interest in the use of sled dogs as transportation. Most gold camps were accessible only by dogsled in the winter. "Everything that moved during the frozen season moved by dog team; prospectors, trappers, doctors, mail, commerce, trade, freighting of supplies … if it needed to move in winter, it was moved by sled dogs." This, along with the dogs' use in the exploration of the poles, led to the late 1800s and early 1900s being nicknamed the "Era of the Sled Dog".

Sled dogs were used to deliver the mail in Alaska during the late 1800s and early 1900s. Alaskan Malamutes were the favored breed, with teams averaging eight to 10 dogs. Dogs were capable of delivering mail in conditions that would stop boats, trains, and horses. Each team hauled between of mail. The mail was stored in waterproofed bags to protect it from the snow. By 1901, dog trails had been established along the entirety of the Yukon River. Mail delivery by dog sled came to an end in 1963 when the last mail carrier to use a dog sled, Chester Noongwook of Savoonga, retired. He was honored by the US Postal Service in a ceremony on St. Lawrence Island in the Bering Sea.

Airplanes took over Alaskan mail delivery in the 1920s and 1930s. In 1924, Carl Ben Eielson flew the first Alaskan airmail delivery. Dog sleds were used to patrol western Alaska during World War II. Highways and trucking in the 40s and 50s, and the snowmobile in the 50s and 60s, contributed to the decline of the working sled dog.

Recreational mushing came into place to maintain the tradition of dog mushing. The desire for larger, stronger, load-pulling dogs changed to one for faster dogs with high endurance used in racing, which caused the dogs to become lighter than they were historically. Americans and others living in Alaska then began to import sled dogs from the native tribes of Siberia (which would later evolve and become the Siberian Husky breed) to increase the speed of their own dogs, presenting "a direct contrast to the idea that Russian traders sought heavier draft-type sled dogs from the Interior regions of Alaska and the Yukon less than a century earlier to increase the hauling capacity of their lighter sled dogs."

Outside of Alaska, dog-drawn carts were used to haul peddler's wares in cities like New York.

Alaska and the Iditarod

In 1925, a massive diphtheria outbreak crippled Nome, Alaska. There was no serum in Nome to treat the people infected by the disease. There was serum in Nenana, but the town was more than away, and inaccessible except by dog sled. A dog sled relay was set up by the villages between Nenana and Nome, and 20 teams worked together to relay the serum to Nome. The serum reached Nome in six days.

The Iditarod Trail was established on the path between these two towns. It was known as the Iditarod Trail because, at the time, Iditarod was the largest town on the trail. During the 1940s, the trail fell into disuse. However, in 1967, Dorothy Page, who was conducting Alaska's centennial celebration, ordered of the trail to be cleared for a dog sled race. In 1972, the US Army performed a survey of the trail, and in 1973 the Iditarod was established by Joe Redington, Sr. The race was won by Dick Wilmarth, who took three weeks to complete the race.

The modern Iditarod is a endurance sled dog race. It usually lasts for ten to eleven days, weather permitting. It begins with a ceremonial start in Anchorage, Alaska on the morning of the first Saturday in March, with mushers running to Eagle River along the Alaskan Highway, giving spectators a chance to see the dogs and the mushers. The teams are then loaded onto trucks and driven to Wasilla for the official race start in the afternoon. The race ends when the last musher either drops out of the race or crosses the finish line in Nome. The winner of the race receives a prize of US$50,000. It has been billed as the "World Series of mushing events" and "The Last Great Race on Earth".

Antarctica

The first Arctic explorers were men with sled dogs. Due to the success of using sled dogs in the Arctic, it was thought they would be helpful in the Antarctic exploration as well, and many explorers made attempts to use them. Sled dogs were used until 1992, when they were banned from Antarctica by the Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty over concerns that the dogs might transfer diseases such as canine distemper to the seal population.

Carsten Borchgrevink used sled dogs ( Samoyeds) in Antarctica during his Southern Cross Expedition (1898–1900), but it was much colder than expected at Cape Adare. The dogs were used to working on snow, not on ice, in much milder temperatures. The dogs were also inadequately fed, and eventually all of the dogs died.

Erich von Drygalski used sled dogs in his 1901–1903 expedition, and fared much better because his dogs were used to the cold and he hired an experienced dog handler. His dogs were allowed to breed freely and many had to be shot because there was no room on the ship to take them home. Many that were not shot were left behind on the Kerguelen Islands.

Otto Nordenskjöld intended to use sled dogs in his 1901–1904 expedition, but all but four of his huskies died on the journey south. He picked up more dogs in the Falklands, but after his arrival in the Antarctic, these were all hunted down and killed by his four surviving huskies hunting as a pack because of dog handler Ole Jonassen's failure to tether the dogs. These huskies were later able to pull over in three and a half hours.

Robert Falcon Scott brought twenty Samoyeds with him. The dogs struggled under the conditions Scott placed them in, with four dogs pulling heavily loaded sleds through snow with bleeding feet. Scott blamed their failure on rotten dried fish.

Douglas Mawson and Xavier Mertz were part of the Far Eastern Party, a three-man sledging team with Lieutenant B.E.S. Ninnis, to survey King George V Land, Antarctica. On 14 December 1912 Ninnis fell through a snow-covered crevasse along with most of the party's rations, and was never seen again. Their meagre provisions forced them to eat their remaining dogs on their return journey. Their meat was tough, stringy and without a vestige of fat. Each animal yielded very little, and the major part was fed to the surviving dogs, which ate the meat, skin and bones until nothing remained.
The men also ate the dog's brains and livers. Unfortunately eating the liver of sled dogs produces the condition hypervitaminosis A because canines have a much higher tolerance for vitamin A than humans do. Mertz suffered a quick deterioration. He developed stomach pains and became incapacitated and incoherent. On 7 January 1913, Mertz died. Mawson continued alone, eventually making it back to camp alive.

Roald Amundsen's expedition was planned around 97 sled dogs. On his first try, two of his dogs froze to death in the temperatures. He tried a second time and was successful. Amundsen was covering a day, with stops every to build a cairn to mark the trail. He had 55 dogs with him, which he culled until he had 14 left when he returned from the pole. On the return trip, a man skied ahead of the dogs and hid meat in the cairns to encourage them to run.

Sled dog breeds

The original sled dogs were chosen for size, strength and stamina, but modern dogs are bred for speed and endurance Most sled dogs weigh around , but they can weigh as little as , and can exceed . Sled dogs have a very efficient gait, and "mushers strive for a well balanced dog team that matches all dogs for both size (approximately the same) and gait (the walking, trotting or running speeds of the dogs as well as the 'transition speed' where a dog will switch from one gait to another) so that the entire dog team moves in a similar fashion which increases overall team efficiency." They can run up to . Because of this, sled dogs have very tough, webbed feet with closely spaced toes. Their webbed feet act as snow shoes.

Sled dog breeds can typically be divided into further sub-types:

* sprint dogs, bred to pull sleds quickly
* freight dogs, bred to pull massive weights
* long distance dogs, bred to travel hundreds or even thousands of miles, and
* Aboriginal multipurpose sled dogs, such as Russian laikas who pull sleds as well as herd reindeer and hunt game.

A dog's fur depends on its use. Freight dogs should have dense, warm coats to hold heat in, and sprint dogs have short coats that let heat out. Most sled dogs have a double coat, with the outer coat keeping snow away from the body, and a waterproof inner coat for insulation. In warm weather, dogs may have problems regulating their body temperature and may overheat. Their tails serve to protect their nose and feet from freezing when the dog is curled up to sleep. They also have a unique arrangement of blood vessels in their legs to help protect against frostbite.

Appetite is a big part of choosing sled dogs; picky dogs off trail may be pickier on the trail. They are fed high-fat diets, and on the trail may eat oily salmon or blubbery sea mammals. Sled dogs also must not be overly aggressive with other dogs. They also need a lot of exercise.

Breeds

Alaskan husky

The most commonly used dog in dog sled racing, the Alaskan husky is a mongrel bred specifically for its performance as a sled dog.

The first dogs arrived in the Americas 12,000 years ago; however, people and their dogs did not settle in the Arctic until the Paleo-Eskimo people 4,500 years ago and then the Thule people 1,000 years ago, both originating from Siberia.

The word ''husky'' originated from the word referring to aboriginal Arctic people, in general, Eskimo, "...known as 'huskies', a contraction of 'Huskimos', the pronunciation given to the word 'Eskimos' by the English sailors of trading vessels." The use of ''husky'' is recorded from 1852 for dogs kept by Inuit.

In 2015, a study using a number of genetic markers indicated that the Alaskan husky, the Siberian Husky and the Alaskan Malamute share a close genetic relationship between each other and were related to Chukotka sled dogs from Siberia. They were separate from the two Inuit dogs, the Canadian Eskimo Dog