Anika

Anika ("Ani") is a Siberian Husky rescued from the Orange County Anmal Shelter. She is my first northern breed dog and the reason I got into mushing. She is the classic talkative Siberian Husky and will "Awooo wooo wooooo!" to let you know she wants something. She is very vocal and extremely outgoing and friendly.

Very little phases her and she has to be in the front of everything and involved in everything (or everyone will hear about it).

I have to say Ani chose me, but I was lalready ooking for an all white dog anyways as I had a special situation at home. I had an older (16 yrs old) dog at home that was suffering from strokes & other health issues, who I figured would be passing soon but who only liked all white dogs (I'll post about Cassie later). I also had another dog (all white mixed breed also resuced from the OC Animal Shelter) who had separation anxiety (I'll post about Jiko later also).

As fate would have it, there was no line at the cashier/information line and there were no names on the waiting list for this dog. I had them bring her out to the meeting area & there was just something in her that said "Take me!" I paid the fees and then had to wait for them to spay her before they'd release her to me. I got home & realized I was going to bring home a Siberian Husky. I knew the breed had special exercise needs (lots of physical & mental exercise), so I spent the weekend on line doing research & ordering books.

I found out about "scootering," but decided to order a 4-wheeled cart instead of a 2-wheeled scooter (one of the better decisions I've made) and I started reading my books and setting about training my dogs to mush.

Between what must be my dogs' intelligence & natural abilities and my abilities to learn and adapt, we were "sidewalk surfing" with the cart on our neighborhhod sidewalks in no time. I figured there had to be more to it, so I got online again in search of additional training opportunities. I came across Plettner Kennels and sent a few inquiries to Lynda Plettner. I bought a video of a PBS Nature show episode "Sled Dogs: An Alaska Epic" that featured Lynda and her dogs and as I watched the video, I knew she was the one I wanted to learn from. So I took Ani to Alaska with me and left Jiko at home (he was too old to go on the trip). We learned so much in that week and met Button.

Lynda offered Button to me while we were there, but since Button had a slight chance to run the in the upcoming Iditarod, I didn't want to ruin that chance & we left Alaska without her. But a month later I'd be back to get her (see Button's posted story).

Ani ran lead for years with Jiko and Button and can still run lead, but she is rather A.D.D. and just loves to "sightsee" too much. When Mattie started training and running in lead in 2008, Ani was moved into wheel position and ran ocassionally in lead.

Ani is not as fast a runner as the rest of the team, but when the going gets tough on those uphills, Ani focuses, puts it in low gear, and she pulls hard in that wheel position! She and Cricket work very well together in wheel. When running with our "extended pack" (The Hunts: Cyndie, Randy, "Stormy" & "Jacob"), Ani gets to run co-lead with Jacob on Cyndie's scooter team.