Anyone else take their dog(s) joring or mushing?

[PotterWatch]

I do urban mushing with my dogs. Right now I am using a bike (bikejoring), but I will be ordering a scooter from Diggler within the next couple months, I hope. I am champing at the bit right now because I only have one harness and two dogs. I recently ordered a new gang line and harness from Alpine Outfitters and I received a box on Thursday. Unfortunately, it had the gang line, but no harness so I am still waiting for that. Due to the heat here I can't run my dogs in the summer.

I took one of them out yesterday and he has definitely forgotten some of his trail etiquette. The biggest problem I have with him is getting him to run on the right side of the trail unless I tell him to haw around something. Anyone have any good tips for training him to run on the correct side of the trail? He is the first dog I have ever done bikejoring with so I am not always sure of the best way to go about training. Most of the training I have done so far has just been to take him out and do it, correcting him along the way.

I have a new dog that we just started training at the beginning of summer this year. He has probably only been out 3 or 4 times so far and that was a few months ago. I would also love to hear any tips for running two dogs since I will be doing that for the first time as soon as the new harness arrives.

Hope to hear someone else on here does joring or mushing of some kind!

 

[Rosalind]

I cart with my dogs when there isn't enough snow to take them mushing. The Pyrenees is a bit skittish, but the Newfie is solid as a rock and loads of fun to work with. Sometimes I hitch them to a doubletree, and they make an awesome pair--the Pyr has more stamina, the Newf has more focus, so between the two of them you can get quite a long ways with a pretty big load before they get tired.

Dunno how to teach them trail etiquette, other than what you are already doing. Whenever mine go off the trail, which is rare these days, I just say, "Eh!" or whistle, and they get right back in line. They're pretty smart.

 

[Wolf-Kim]

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You definately need to share a picture of both your pups hitched to the cart!

 

[Kansaseq]

Years ago I had visions of sledding with my Tervs.I even ordered a couple of harnesses, and still have them. Unfortunately, we got less and less snow, and the idea died. And I am not foolish enough to think my dogs wouldn't pull me down if I tried 'skate'-joring.

My pitty would definitely love to pull me around, though.

 

[tharrell]

We used to have our husky pull our son on a sled. Not exacally the same thing, but I never saw him happier. He killed one too many chickens (our fault not his. That's what you get when you have a dog with a high paey drive!) and we rehomed him with friends.

 

[Tala]

I think I trained my dog a little *too* well not to pull. We ended up doing the bike thing "Springer" style off to the side instead of having her actually pull the bike.

I crashed on our first attempt at roller blading together. My skates don't have brakes

I had better luck backpacking her, rather than having her pull me, but I am STILL gonna attempt to build her a little cart and see how it goes. I already have the harness for it.
hehehe I just like to try things.

 

[GAChknGirl]

This sounds like so much fun i have heard of it i might try and get into it with my Siberian Husky Max!!

 

[PotterWatch]

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I highly recommend it! The dogs love it and it's fun for people too!

We went out today and I took our younger dog (turned a year old in September). It was only his 3rd or 4th time out but he did wonderfully! I have high hopes for my two dogs working well as a team. My older dog is faster, pulls harder, and is less inclined to go after small animals that run across the trail. My younger one is steady, more willing to keep going even with nothing in front of him to encourage him, but is much more likely to try and chase small animals and birds. I'm hoping their good qualities will blend together to make a great team.

I used the new gangline today and liked it much better than the homeade one I have been using for the past eight months. I'm hoping the new harness comes on Monday so we can try taking the dogs out together!

 

[Rosalind]

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Will try to get one this year, but generally I am the one holding the lead yelling out, "Left! Right! WHOA WHOA WHOA SLOW DOWN!"

 

[michickenwrangler]

Last winter, my mother and I hitched her golden retriever and my lab/husky to a sled to pull my daughter through the neighborhood. My daughter loved it and the dogs didn't seem to mind.