Seppala Kennels 'SledDogBlog'

first winter storm

Yesterday saw the first winter storm of the season blow through the Yukon off the Gulf of Alaska, bringing strong winds, rain, sleet and snow and dropping our temperatures below the freezing point at night and a few degrees above in the daytime. The Miners' Range acquired a menacing cape of snow overnight. Amazingly, many of the trees are still hanging onto their golden leaves, although these now carpet the ground liberally. For some reason, if we look east from the kennel, the trees are nearly bare. If we look west, they are a riot of rich cadmium yellow. In the exercise yard this morning, my leader Tonya took a critical look at the treetops to judge how close winter was coming. She didn't inform me of her conclusions. Tonya has been acting rather crusty of late, feeling her age perhaps, or maybe she's upset at the changing parade of younger second-string "girlfriends" that have gone through my shack recently — Nera, Magick, Lizzy and now Tonya's daughter Mokka. Although Tonya is puritanically stuffy about open displays of affection towards her royal self, she would prefer that I not cozy up to the youngsters either.

Last night was a two-dog night in the shack, though. In the transitional seasons up here, minus two degrees always feels colder than minus twelve in real winter, because our winter cold is a dry cold, while autumn inevitably brings a lot of damp weather. This afternoon, though the overcast weather continued, the wind died and the ground was dry again, allowing us to resume our trail work in comfort. One more good session will finish the Northeast Bush trail cutoff. Then we can concentrate on clearing the new approach to the dogyard, made necessary by a nasty neighbour who doesn't want us crossing "his propitty" with dog teams. Each year the gradual buildup of this tiny community twenty miles north of Whitehorse makes our trail arrangements a little more tricky. Fences go up, ditches are dug, next thing you know they'll be paving the side roads. Even in the sparsely populated Yukon, civilisation encroaches.