The Dog Yard

The Mushing Loon Kennels dog yard is behind our house, 100 or so feet to the north. We can see it from our kitchen window above the sink, from the kitchen table, out of the basement sliding door and directly from our deck.



To the north is our windbreak, behind that is a cornfield and across that is the woods that we'll run in the winter. I chose this location to be close to the house and easily viewed from inside. Each dog has a tree to the SW to provide shade, plus they can dig at the base. There is room for four more dogs, one more in this row and then three could be in a row across from them.



I used some old water pipes we had on hand, and bought the rebar swivel from Cold Spot Feeds for their stake outs.

I made the single-sheet plywood dog houses with the plans from Jon Little.

Alice and Nicky can reach each other and have a nice big hole between them. I gave them a nice log to play with and they take turns pulling it across the hole to their individual circles.

Alice loves to run around her entire circle, while Nicky runs along this side of his, then hops around to jog back.

They can see the driveway when cars pull up and they can see to the farm dogs in their run out by the barn. With bird feeders nearby they can watch them, as well as stalk the chickens who come to feed beneath.

I have a fifty-foot zip line behind them between two trees that they can run around on for exercise. Alice does great free-running but Nicky won't return reliably, so he is limited to the zip line for now. I hope to build a larger fenced in area for them to run, time and money allowing.

It sure is heartwarming to look out and see sled dogs in the yard!