Husky News

Today, many Arizonans will take advantage of sunny skies and enjoy a balmy day outside. But “north to Alaska,” 63 mushers will embark on a more-than 1,150-mile journey in very different conditions in the 2008 Iditarod sled dog race.

Local veterinarian Michael Walker will volunteer there for the fourth year, helping keep the stars of the race - the driven, athletic Alaskan huskies - healthy.

Walker, a Prescott native who owns Bradshaw Mountain Animal Hospital in Prescott Valley, heard about the Iditarod, which commemorates a serum run to save Nome from a diptheria epidemic, throughout his career. In 2004, he and his family took a vacation to Alaska and met Dr. Stu Nelson, the race’s chief veterinarian, at Iditarod headquarters in Wasilla. Nelson encouraged Walker to put in his application to volunteer as a race veterinarian.

Volunteer race vets must have five years of clinical experience, and a background or specialty in dogs or horses. Add to that “a little bit of luck and the right timing,” and Walker was in for the 2005 race.

While he normally spends about 18 days in Alaska, he will arrive a little later in the race this year because he will be returning from a church trip to Cambodia.

The Iditarod is not for couch potatoes, whether racers or race support. Vets might get to sleep in a cabin or town building in the primitive checkpoint locations along the race, but sometimes they bunk in tents. They are on call 24 hours each day, and generally snatch a few winks of sleep between mushers and their teams coming in to vet checks. Conditions are grueling.

“If you ask me, I think the mushers are crazy,” Walker said with a grin. “(Conditions) are extreme for me, and they’re out there in worse than I am.”

The dogs’ health is paramount. As each musher pulls in, vets immediately begin to assess the team.

“We evaluate them as they run in,” Walker said. “We look for lameness and attitude, and hydration. We look for dogs that are lagging or have something obviously wrong.”

Each dog undergoes a complete physical exam at the checkpoints, 24 in all over the course of the race. Veterinarians can request a musher “drop” a dog that is not in condition to go on. Mushers know their dogs well, and most will make the decision to leave a dog themselves, Walker said. Volunteer pilots fly those dogs back to a holding area where they receive care until the race is over. Mushers start the race with up to 14 dogs, and many have finished with just five to seven, having left the others at checkpoints for their wellbeing.

Vets make notes on the dogs’ condition in a waterproof book that racers must hand in at the finish. If they notice possible problems, Walker said, the information “goes up the line” to watch a certain musher or his dogs.

Iditarod organizers have a “zero tolerance” policy for any kind of abuse or neglect. Most of the racers have the kind of relationship with their animals that Walker observed in musher Karen Ramstead and her lead sled dog “Snickers.”

Walker helped treat Snickers, who suffered from a bleeding gastric ulcer, a condition that not only plagues the athletic sled dogs but human marathon racers as well.

Walker said Ramstead came in to the checkpoint concerned about the dog, which was not as energetic as usual. Three vets examined her and found nothing unusual, but several hours later, she collapsed. Even after emergency treatment, including a field blood transfusion from a kennel mate, Snickers died.

“It hurt (Ramstead) so much, she didn’t go on,” Walker said. “Later she sent a note thanking us for trying to save Snickers.”

Ramstead later created a research foundation in Snickers’ memory. Mushers like her are the “best of the best,” Walker said. They sleep with their dogs, play with them, and talk to them throughout the race. The dogs are their lives. The Leonhard Seppala Humanitarian Award, recognizes the musher who exhibits the best care of his or her dogs during the race.

Walker said he also has great regard for the winner of the 2007 Iditarod, Lance Mackey, who made history by winning the Yukon Quest race and the Iditarod in the same year.

“He was down-to-earth, smiling the whole time, and his dogs were in good spirits,” Walker said.

Mackey won the Yukon Quest again this year and is in the field of Iditarod hopefuls. So is Ramstead, who races purebred Siberian huskies and made history by owning the only show champion Siberian husky to finish the Iditarod.

Walker said his Iditarod experience has helped him better identify orthopedic difficulties and soreness. He has learned a lot about conditioning, food and pet care. He loves the dogs and he loves to go.

“Alaska is beautiful country, it’s an adventure, and I come back refreshed and ready to do better at home.”

That is after he has rested, he said with a laugh, because he usually comes home “dog tired.”

Source: The Daily Courier