Animal Life - Sled Dogs

 


Photographer Paul Nicklen shared this photograph, commenting on the differences between the Arctic Canadian community he grew up in, where they used snowmobiles, and Qaanaaq, Greenland, where they use sled dogs.

For hunting, it is the quieter, therefore preferred method.  Without engine noise, the animals they hunt, such as polar bears and arctic foxes, even come close to the Inuit towns.

There are about 650 people in this society, and more than 1,000 dogs.


Archaeological evidence has shown that these Inuit dogs began pulling sleds around 800 AD, but they were hunting partners before that as well as camp guards.  They are not a breed, but are aboriginal landrace dogs, "a class of domestic dogs that emerged as an ecotype within a specific ecological niche."  The fact that adaptation was influenced by human interaction also plays a role in their classification.


Paul Nicklen

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