Big deal in chained sled dogs

The colder, the more exciting. A sled dog tour in the snow is an adventure. One might even think that the dogs like it even better than the vacationers. Only from about minus ten degrees do the animals feel visibly comfortable on the move. Their tails wag happily, the dogs nudge each other as they run and "jiff", which is a high-pitched howling cheer in dog-speak.

From minus 20 degrees, when only the balaclavas of the passengers in the sled can be seen, wrapped up in blankets, the fun in the snow flurry really begins for the cold-resistant dogs: They want to walk, run, pant, preferably in a pack, covering kilometers Kilometre.

Hyperactive sled dogs are not like carriage horses that trot on command; the huskies, Greenland dogs or Alaskan Malamutes and their mixed breeds from the north just run off with boundless joy and the desire to move as soon as you finally let them. The fact that there are six or eight of them pulling a sled behind them is a minor matter for the animals, a necessary evil - and their right to exist.

Because dog sled tours are one of the most popular attractions in the far north. Few vacationers miss out on this adventure in the polar regions, whether in Scandinavia, Canada or Alaska.

Even if it's not cheap: A classic four-hour tour with pick-up from the nearest hotel, meals and a guided tour of the dog farm costs from 190 euros per person. The pure travel time on the dog sled is usually about a good hour, in which you cover about six to ten kilometers. Multi-day self-drive safaris are also offered from 1500 euros. Everything booked up quickly.

For owners, sled dogs are big business in winter. There are usually two variants: The passive tour, where holidaymakers sit in a snow taxi and let the musher, i.e. a professional dog sled driver, guide them through the snowy landscape. That's comfortable, you can enjoy the landscape when you look to the left and right, but in the low seated position you can actually only see wobbly dog ​​bottoms.

More sporty is the active tour, where you steer and brake a sled yourself as an amateur musher. It's definitely more fun. The first and most important lesson should be heeded: Never, never let go of the sled. Otherwise you realize that dogs don't stop, whether with or without a musher, and then you can only watch how the animals and their sleds disappear behind the horizon. At least then you get warm again at minus 20 degrees when you have to catch up with them.

In Finnish Lapland alone, for example, there are officially 43 dog farms with 4,000 dogs, and in northern Scandinavia there are more than 10,000 animals. According to the Finnish supplier Hetta Huskies, a single sled dog generates an estimated turnover of 3,000 euros per season.

But hardly anyone wonders how animal-friendly this business really is. With a few exceptions, chain keeping is common in Norway, Finland, Lapland, Alaska and Canada, all year round. It is considered to be traditional and more economical than a fenced outdoor enclosure divided into groups of dogs.

One argument is that otherwise you would have to build too many fences so that the animals cannot climb over them in heavy snow; Another is the excessive effort involved in managing an exercise area with individual areas in which several dogs live together in packs of different sexes.

Like on one of Norway's largest dog farms near Tromsø: There, about 200 to 300 dogs are chained up in the middle of the snowy landscape, waiting in pairs on a wooden platform with a double hut to crawl. Many tourists mistakenly believe that these animals are only temporarily chained there for sledding. No, according to the mushers, the dogs are kept like this.

As soon as people approach, the dogs freak out with joy, tugging at the short chains, a wolf howl from many throats. Howling, yapping, barking. It's not a pretty sight. Each dog hopes to be one of the chosen few to be pulled in front of the sled. The animals left behind prance on the taut chains. Sled dogs want to work, only then are they really happy.

According to a Norwegian committee, dogs should be allowed at least ten hours of free exercise per week. That means: frolic. In fact, many workhorses only come off their chains during the season to be tied in front of the sled. Maybe that's why they look forward to sleigh rides even more than holidaymakers.

Now it has to be said that dog farms like Tromsø Wilderness Center are well aware of the exercise problem. In summer, when the dogs have little to do, it offers a buddy program: holidaymakers can borrow a sled dog there for a few days to accompany them on tours through Norway's nature.

Then sometimes chain dogs have vacation.