The winter is taking a turn towards light

[Katariina Roiha]

Our days in dark polar night are soon over. The Sun is showing up for the first time in two months the 17th of January. Daylight is on a clear day somewhat enough for my lense...

Our little finnish-scottish A-Peli is partly enjoying the cold (we had -36 C for a week) and partly not. The not-part is the lack of exercise.No living creature can be out with those minus degrees!
Thank god the temperature warmed up to -15 and we had the chance to let go all our anxiety!

and off we went...

It got a little sweaty at times. A-Peli is so used to freezing cold weather that -15 seems nothing :)

When we reached the top of the mountain, two of our english setters we found on point...

No chance in seeing the grouse. They´re white and daylight is hardly enough for the eyes...

A-Pelis little nose was very much interested in the scent of grouse...

After 2 h of heavy running in the snowy mountain we were happy and all our anxiety gone with the wind!

some pictures of the River Teno

and the faint hint of sun somewhere

[Katariina Roiha]

The bag or tent where you put your dog to keep warm are like this

We use those on long hunting days when the breaks are longer. Trial days are long so dogs need to have a lunch as well as the owners...

Our lives here up north are similar with the norwegians. They´re much more of skiiers than we finns are. We call them "crazy skiiers" :) You really have to be fit yourself to manage in wintertrials! I love to attend norwegian trials, the atmosphere is humorous and encouraging.

Congrats on Greats achievements on trials! AK2 is a prize to be happy about! My friend is a friend of Greats owner, so I hear about him from time to time. I´m very much interested in him ;)

[Susan Russell]

Yes that is the one!

At the trial the first weekend I was terribly exhausted. We left the hostel area and skied for 30 minutes to the start line. Many people had their dogs pulling them. I did my best to keep up, having only been skiing once that year due to surgery earlier in the winter. By the time we reached the beginning I was ready to go back and drink tea!

Everybody was very nice and I did my best to keep up. It was an out and back course, so no chance to really quit. I was grateful of the lunch break. No matter how tired I was, though, each time a dog had birdwork, or made a spectacular move on the terrain, I could forget my own discomfort and revel in the beauty of it all. I have to admit that I was much too tired to ski the second day of the first trial, but I did manage both days at Arnoya.

It brought home to me how ridiculous it is that people here often do not even feed their dogs BREAKFAST prior to running because they worry it will slow them down, or cause bloat. Of course a belly fully of dry kibble might not be best, but to not feed at all seems assinine to me.

I think people here are tired of hearing about the Norwegian trials though...but I think the way it is done, the level of work required of the dogs, and the level of fitness required is very superior. We have some REALLY fine bird dogs over here, and I think the combinations improve both, but there is little doubt in my mind that the trial scheme over there is a greater test over all and far more practical. YIKES the North Americans might revoke my license to judge now! LOL!