Saturday, I went on my typical training run. I forgot to bring a stick that is needed for breaking up fights. Fights are fairly rare in my team. Just my luck: Sure enough, a veteran lead dog locked eyes with a junior wheel dog. The wheel dog glared back with a low growl, took em up on the offer and attacked. over 300 lbs of raging fury broke loose. Two sets of fangs. I'll be damned if some silver back gorrilla-lookin wheel dog thinks he runs the show. I can't loose a dog to injuries. I jumped in their and started punching the tops of their heads and kicking them apart. After 30 seconds of what felt like forever, there was blood everywhere. I lost grip strength and looked down at my cuff, it was wet with blood. I took a knee, I peeled back my cuff, and blood started pouring down my wrist, puddling in the snow under my finger tips. They got me good, right were the big veins and tendons run down your wrist to your fingers. Cinched down my velcro cuff right over the wound to apply the right amount of pressure. I favored the wrist and kept it high, with my fingers rested on my shoulder near my neck. I gritted my teeth, partly from anger, partly from pain, bellowed at them to line up and ordered them to take us home. The training run was over, cut short by 10 miles. I kept my composure and internalized my anger. They could smell my blood, they knew I wasn't happy. Not a word spoken rest of the way. At home: cold compress and tight gauze, swelling went down. Bleeding stopped fully by the next day and turned to clear fluid oozing from the puncture wound. Finally it clotted. Wrapped er up with a tight bandage, and decided to go after winter caribou on Sunday. After all, I needed to do something i enjoy for veterans day aye?

The typical way it seems to be done around here, judging what I've witnessed on the local trails: Many wake up late in the day, jump on a snow machine with semi automatic rifles, and a handgun for close-quarters side-shooting. Cover your headlight with a piece of cardboard(supposedly the caribou don't see you coming), and go chase em down.

With an old 12 ft wooden sled and some dogs, I realized I may be at a disadvantage so got up super early. Hooked up four of my strongest dogs, loaded a full camp and proceeded down the trail by headlamp at 7-8 mph pace. Nobody was on the trail. Finally, mid day a small herd crossed 600 yds up the trail. Wind right to my face, the dogs picked up speed immediately. They could smell them. Got within 100 yds, set the snow hook as quietly as I could and walked to the front of my lead dogs Mao and Prime. I took a knee, racked one into the chamber of the ole 9.3 mauser. Two fat caribou down, another fat one ran off some 400 yds. I held high, missed a couple times but saw the bullet hit the snow under the caribou, with my heart pounding, lined up my last shot, that one rang true. 3 caribou down.

I pulled the snow hook, called up the dogs on the first caribou, and loaded it in the freight sled. Through wind swept snow, we broke trail to the next caribou. Just then, a posse of snow machines jump up on a hill, and watched our recovery. Kinda weird, a posse of nosey men watching you from their tonka toys with their super-fly flashy Klim gear.. By the second caribou, the 4 dogs were overworked, so I decided to just drag the 3rd down hill, to their location. You can tell when a malamute is overworked. They have an ego, and won't admit to the exhaustion. They'll get these deep, heavy woofing sounds when panting. Their motions get sluggish and they loose their fleet footedness. I snacked the dogs real heavy, knowing that we had our work cut out for us. Each dog got a 2 lbs fatty chunk of expired beef that I bought from the local grocery butcher. The dogs became relaxed, with such a fat-rich snack, and just lounged, observing me gut the three caribou.

It was dark by the time I finally loaded the caribou. The dogs stood, and all four of the them slammed their harnesses, with me pulling a shoulder harness in front of the lead dog, to help. The sled cracked and groaned, over the wind swept tussocks. Just 10 ft from the trail, I hear a big "CRACK", followed by an instant stop. The three caribou over low-snow areas of frozen tussocks, strained the sled and cracked my runner. Luckily, the crack was way up front, where the runner sweeps up. A quick field repair: Fishing line and epoxy, and a few hand warmers to heat er up.

I buried one caribou in the snow, and stuck a six foot pole beside the caribou with a little red ribbon attached. Figured I'd limp the old freight sled home with just two caribou, and return for the third before first light. Me, the sled, full camp, food, two caribou: 800 lbs on them four dogs. I had to help up the steeper hills. By the time I got home, my legs started locking up with bad cramps. I'd stretch, lay back down, and they'd lock up again with the slightest of movement. Took a few hours of rest, before I recovered from those cramps. I drank some baking soda water, in hopes that the sodium would help.

Next day, back down the trail for the third caribou. The winds blew so hard, that all that was left of that six ft pole, was one foot tall end of the stick, with a little red ribbon. The winds blew strong, and drifted everything in. Thankful through my exhaustion, that I remembered to set a tall enough marker. That was an easy run home. There was a snow machine broke down on the trail, the lead dogs did a stoopid thing: they jumped in the freight sled and started eating snow from the sled because it smelled like fish or meat. Took forever to clear them out of that poor guy's UHMW sled, and line em up back on the trail. The guy got a chuckle at least and wasn't upset about it.

Anyhow, hope all of you vets had a good weekend too. Whew, now for some winter fish next weekend with the crazy Malamutes.........

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