Girl Scouts meet Siberian Huskies
my name is laura anderson and my kennel is Ninkasi siberian I am a member of the Garden State Siberian Husky Club today’s event was about educating young girls in our community about dogs dog ownership and the sport of sled dog racing we have been asked many times for people to see us out of the dog we’ve done community public demos but we really didn’t have an organized educational event it was more of a demonstration when we bring the animals to show them off for a couple of hours for the participants that were there my husband wanted to start a project where we did something warm and the scouts wanted to have a program for the girls so we decided to develop a program that included the elements required for a badge in the state of Alaska and there were several elements to the program that needed to be included for the girls to understand sport and for them to earn a badge so we included the meeting the musher the meeting of the dogs the visuals of skiing the dogs run and understanding teamwork with the human sled-dog team understanding volunteering with the Iditarod the projects to go on with the Iditarod the junior Iditarod we also included all the equipment and understanding the pieces of the equipment involved in sled dog racing whether your bike during where you ride your bikes and your dogs pose here or your can across running where the dog is on a harness and pulling you as you brought it behind them whether you’re running on a rig which could be a three wheeled or four wheeled cart I think it’s important for every breed Club to educate the young about their breed and about the sports that they do this is this is where you get the biggest opportunity to make an impression on the future dog owners the future of children and even adults who might want to participate in dogs school each club and each breed has activities that they participate in their ability there’s the obedience but there’s other things like field trials lure coursing hunting for rock sizing water sports with the dog there are so many different activities that these clubs are doing and I think it would be great if people took the time to put together an educational program about their breed that was more than just come to the dog shilling meet the breed there’s always the one child at the event that grabs your heart and makes you realize why you do and each year there’s always a different child and in almost every year it starts with that one child that is terrified dawn that is terrified of a dog looking at her or doesn’t want to touch a dog or doesn’t want to approach a dog and there was one year we had this child who we spent time with with the dogs and we had her come up with and she felt the hope of the dog you saw her hands go into the coat and she just like she had a lost her and she ended up sitting down with the dog and the dog sitting on her lap and just wanted to hug and hold the dog and at the end of the vent her parents were trying to get her to leave and this child did not want to leave and she was not going to leave the side of that dog and it was this moment that we realized that we have we have taken this this individual that grew up with a fear of the animal that grew up with a lack of understanding of what companionship they could get out of dog that just you just saw it happen you saw the smile on the girl’s face you saw them embrace the animal and then you saw the dog and the two of them connect and your heart just sunk in this it this is the girls who we want to touch these are the people who we want to make that impact on and it’s always won every event [Music]