Frosty Meadow Husky Farm, Fletcher, Ohio

It’s that time of the year!  The wonderful mud and muck that arrives in the late winter and early spring.  While there wasn’t much in the way of snow melt-off this year, there hasn’t been a shortage of rain.  The play area for the dogs has become a muddy mess.  Bag after bag of pine pellets have certainly been helpful, but Mother Nature has been quite relentless of late.  The pine pellets break down into saw dust and do a great job in absorbing moisture.  A little goes a long way, but with a large play area needs numerous bags.  And, just when you think you’ve caught up, the next storm hits!  This spring, an early project will be to expand the fenced area to include many areas it hadn’t before.  There are grassy areas which the dogs will love.  Meanwhile, we intend to block off the current area and re-plant grass seed.  As time moves on, we will continue to expand these play areas.  The eventual hope is that all areas will be grassy all the time! 

In the last blog I mentioned the finalization of the cement floor, plus the implementation of the new stalls and the putting up of plastic and heaters to prepare for winter.  I am happy to report that all worked well.  I will say this though…I am ready for the barn to be opened back up and aired out!  With the plastic in place, there are pros and cons that go along with it.  The plus side is that the heat is retained and therefore the heaters are much more efficient.  For the most part, the barn temperature remained above 45 degrees.  During the coldest snaps, it dipped to the upper 30’s, but still did well.  On the down side, there was/is very little air circulation.  It got to be very stagnant in there, so whenever it was relatively warm we left the door open in hopes of adding air circulation.  We are ready to open things back up in the Spring!  Likely right after Easter, unless we decide beforehand.

Since the last post, there has been a lot of activity on the puppy front!  Aleu, Willow, and Ellie all had their litters go to their new homes.  Phoenix had her litter and they are now 7 weeks old.  They will all be going to their new homes next week!  Rose had her litter on January 30^th, and they are now coming up on 4 weeks old.  They are doing great and will soon be weaned from their mama, and off to the vet for a checkup!  They will go home in late March.

Next in line is Gypsy.  We expect the arrival of her litter any day now.  (Xander is the father)  After her, we are waiting to confirm River, Luna, and Quinn.  Meanwhile Nadia and Iris, who normally have litters in the winter, are delayed this year.  They are both just beginning their cycles, so the time frame of the arrival of their pups would be in late April.

On a sadder note, it looks like Holly’s days may be numbered.  Our oldest and original husky has been lethargic of late, and around Christmas began to swell up considerably.  We took her to the vet and they drained a bunch of fluid from her abdomen.  After an x-ray, our vet deduced that there was something wrong with her liver.  She said it was likely cancer, but would not be able to tell for sure unless she opened her up.  We discussed all the options, and it was decided that opening her up would highly likely cause cancer to quickly spread, if she even made it beyond the surgery.  The decision was made to not do surgery, and to let her live out her days on several medications.  Holly still seems somewhat comfortable, although she does have a hard time getting around.  She is still the same old Holly when it comes to food.  It is the center of her universe.  She still seems to have a good quality of life, so as long as that is the case, we will help her in about any way we can.

We’ve always felt that with a husky, the term “escape proof” (much like the word “perfect”) was always something that you would work toward, but never truly achieve.  You may think you have achieved this only to realize one day that it just took them longer to figure things out.  Rest assured, the moment you put “something” in place to prevent a husky from doing what he/she wants to do, they begin working on their plan to defeat this “something”. 

Case in point:  Our stalls in the barn have long been a fortress.  Many have tried and failed to escape.  Other than a few stories of Holly in her younger years, these stalls have been solid.  Most recently, the new stalls were going a step further, practically eliminating the threat.  We knew that threat existed of them climbing up and over the front gate, (Luna achieved this) but that part was already expected.  A plan is already in place to prevent this and will be installed in the spring.  As said earlier, they never stop trying.  I went out to the barn on Sunday morning to find Kallen out of his stall.  At first I assumed he climbed the gate, but was I ever shocked at what I found!  The picture shows what he had done to escape.  He literally pulled so hard on the bottom of the gate that he bent the heavy duty steel brackets holding it to the wall!  I cannot imagine force it took to bend those clips, and even moreso, how he was able to leverage himself to do it.  This was an escape that was Alcatraz-like.  So the chess game continues, and it’s my move!

Update on the new dogs:  In the last post I mentioned Sam, Vienna, Talia, and Tundra.  Sam and Vienna are doing great.  Now that they are well-adjusted, we are hoping Sam will father his first litter.  We are hoping Iris will be that litter.  Talia is growing fast!  I mentioned that she was stalled with Ice initially since Ice does so well with pups.  In the last blog, I said Talia had grown to about the same size as Ice.  Today, as predicted, Talia dwarfs Ice!  And she is only 6 months old!  The picture shows Ice next to Talia from the other day.  It was a muddy day so please excuse that part, plus I had to zoom way in to isolate those two so it is a little fuzzy.  :-)