Four Thousand Paws: Caring for the Dogs of the Iditarod: A Veterinarian’s Story

Veterinarian Morgan debuts with a riveting and joyous account of his work over the past decade caring for the elite canine athletes who participate in Alaska’s annual 1,049-mile-long Iditarod race. Morgan details how veterinarians ensure that the huskies pulling the sleds are well treated and safe while dealing with frigid winter conditions in remote wilderness. Recounting episodes alternately humorous and harrowing, Morgan tells of catching a mischievous husky raiding another team’s food stores (a not insignificant problem when the only available food must be flown in) and treating dogs seriously injured after a snowmobile driver deliberately rammed a sled for unknown reasons. Morgan backs up his belief “that huskies experience love, fear, happiness, sadness, and maybe even hope” with observations from the trail. For example, he notes that many of the dogs enjoy racing so much mushers have to use an “anchor... set firmly in the ice” to keep the harnessed canines from speeding away before the starting signal, and that injured dogs who have to be left behind at checkpoints for treatment often “howl all night,” distraught at being separated from their team. The novelistic narrative captures the excitement of the race, and Morgan manages to be sensitive to the dogs’ interior lives without anthropomorphizing them. Even those with no prior interest in the Iditarod will be enthralled. Photos. (Feb.)