Often, when guests first arrive, they ask us about the “Alpha Dog/Lead Dog”.
Ultimately, Chris is the Alpha. He’s the one that allocates work, sets up the teams, feeds, and provides the dogs all that they need.
The dogs do have a certain level of heirarchy that is very subtle amongst them. As they have a lot of free running time together, they have ample chance to develop complex social structures. They have family relationships (we all know how complex that can be!), friends and even dogs that they don’t get along with. They often talk/grumble/growl to communicate boundaries. We are always around when they are free running to ensure that the growling doesn’t escalate, similar to children, we can hear when play changes to fight and resolve the conflict.
Leaders! When our dogs are running in the teams, we need dogs up front to lead the charge. We usually have everyone run in pairs, so we need 3 sets of leaders for our 3 teams on the trail, and for each tour time in the day (up to 4). That’s 6 leaders on the trail at a time! Leadership requires that the dogs have confidence, speed to set the pace for the team and a good understanding of our commands, so that they can make the right decisions on the trail. Managing all of the dogs that we have can be like managing an office. We have dogs that work best as a leader, and may misbehave or pout if they’re not in a front position. We have some that will step up if we need, but will not be impressed if they’re asked to do it too much. We also have dogs that are happy to just come to work, get a treat, a pat and then head home without ever being asked to lead a team.
How do we know if a dog will be a leader? Well, we let them try! We will put a younger dog out front with a seasoned leader and see how they do. We don’t want them looking back, and we want them moving into the correct direction when we call out a command. As they work in pairs, as long as confidence to not follow someone else is there, skill will grow with time. Just because they may not work out as a leader when they are young doesn’t mean that they will never be a leader, some may need a couple of seasons in the middle (team) or back (wheel) positions to gain the confidence and skill to be a great front runner.
