April 16, 2014
Wednesday AM

I love dogs by choice. I think you would be hard pressed to find more than a hand full of people that spend more time training and working with their dog than I do. I am commanded by God to love their owners ☺. This is more difficult.

For me owning a new dog is a 10-hour a week part time job for the first 18 months of the Labradors life. After that it is 6-7 hours a week. During hunting season from September 16 until December 31st working and training approaches 12-15 hours a week. My dog is a substantial part of my family budget traveling to competition and in training supplies.
With no local Ketchikan testing grounds we have been able to pass 4 AKC junior events and secure a junior title, 4 senior events and secure a senior hunter title, and pass two master events with only three events left to secure a master title.

My mentor in town, who lives down the street from me, has been able to secure all titles and pass the Master National. He has also just titled a Master Hunter and qualified for Nationals with another dog. He also went to the Canadian National Amature field trial championship last year with this dog. She is a qualified field trial titled dog and has an Amature win. He is pretty much the man.

Do to the limited available open land in Ketchikan, especially in the winter, we have benefited (especially when the dogs are puppies) from the baseball fields on the North end. It is so hard to find an open vegetated field. Think about how rare these are where we live.

The Ketchikan Gateway Borough allowing dogs on the baseball field is greatly appreciated and we do not take this privilege lightly; however many dog owners apparently do.

Even though my dog is not a puppy anymore with limited time after work, skills and drills are primarily worked on in the field. Before I can do almost any drill now I must grab about 8 plastic green bags before going on the field. This is necessary to pick up other dogs defecation just so I can have a spot big enough to place a bird or bumpers. To throw marks on the field I have spent as much as 30 minutes picking up 21 piles of defecation.

I think people must believe the rain takes care of it. Well it does not. I do. If you want an example look at the edges. I do not use the warning track (parameter) for training. We had a record almost 5 inches of rain on Monday. There are piles that have been there for 30 days. I can no longer believe that people just do not walk out there and see it, as there were 12 piles within 10 yards of home plate tonight on the lower field.

Domesticated animals feed well-balanced protein, carbohydrate; fat mix foods do not break down as fast a goose waste that is primarily grass and bugs. Your dog s fecal mater is littering with the potential of disease that stays for a long time.

As you stand in the sand and hurl your tennis ball out into that field without walking out there you may have no idea what that ball is rolling through or what your dog is carrying back to the house. I have witnessed cars pulling up with a woman getting out and walking 6 dogs at once, one a Great Dane, all being aired out allowed to defecate and none of it picked up. I have come to the field to train and put my dog in a remote sit while a followed a man with 3 Labradors picking up after his dogs while he watched me never saying a word. Just put them back in his car and drove off. I could keep going on but you get the idea.

Little League baseball is starting up, kids, and parents are up there whenever the weather is even the slightest bit decent getting their kids some practice time. As I walk up to train I am ashamed that I am a dog owner knowing they are disgusted by the field and worry that they think I am the issue. This though is a good reminder of what that field is, a baseball field, not a dog park, not a retriever club, not a sewer leach field, a baseball field.

Dogs are allowed on their by privilege, at this point grace. I believe in limited government, in limited services, that is one of the reasons I live in the Borough out North. That being said these limited services combined with public use means it is incumbent on us to be personally responsible. If we lack personal responsibility there are 3 outcomes:

1) The borough will ignore the issue and by some miracle soft ball, baseball players (who are by right priority users) and families will ignore the increasing mess (yes it is worse than the past so not likely)
2) The borough will have to increase expense thus expenses on the citizenry for maintenance of public space (also not likely)
3) The minority user for which the space was not created for (dog owners) will be banned (most logical)

Lets maintain the road of self-determination while we still can in this and realize that as dog owners use of that space is valuable and a privilege. Lets respect not only the priority users of the field but their health as well. Lets also not think so little of our own dog s health (worms etc.) not to mention ours.

The borough has provided for free bags and receptacles at the entrance of the field. It cannot get any freer or any more convenient. Moreover there is an access in the fence to the woods directly behind the concision stand where dogs can go in the woods. After about 14 days in a row of saying potty and making your dog defecate in the woods before he is allowed the reward of running on the field he will be trained to go back there and defecate on command.

Whether you are training for ribbons, for hunting, or just a great dog owner being a great buddy to your dog, allowing them to run in an open area, lets keep the area clean and not ruin the gift we are currently allowed to receive.

I was up there this past Saturday at 8am with a shovel and a bucket clearing the lower field. If you would like to join me in cleaning at any time, you are welcome to do so.

Joseph Lanham
Ketchikan, Alaska

Received April 10, 2014 - Published April 16, 2014

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