Kicking up melting snow, two huskies galloped along the Down East Sunrise Trail in Ellsworth, pulling their owner Henry Owen on a fat-tire bike behind them. The dogs were full of energy and ready to run for miles. Or so it seemed.
Suddenly one of the dogs, a Siberian husky named Muddy, veered off trail and dove, nose first, into a snowbank.
“I guess we’re taking a break,” Owen said, as the wide tires of his bike rolled to a stop. He laughed while Muddy thrashed in the snow, joined by the second husky, Mia.
Biking while being pulled by dogs, or bikejoring, can be a serious racing sport, or it can just be fun way for dogs — and people — to “get their wiggles out,” Owen’s fiancee, Renee McManus, puts it.
Together at their home in Surry, Owen and McManus, both 26 years old, established the small sled dog kennel A-B Huskies two years ago. Ever since, their focus has been educational programs, especially with children, and spreading enthusiasm and knowledge about mushing sports with the community.
The name A-B Huskies stems from their goal: to get from point A to point B as happy and healthy as possible. Recently, one of their favorite ways to travel between those two points is by bikejoring.
“Usually when you start out, the dogs are so strong that for the first mile or 2 miles, you’re kind of just a brake,” McManus said. “You’re a human brake, which is the same thing when you’re sledding. But then, eventually, the dogs start to get into a rhythm and a pace, and that’s when you can start pedaling.”
Owen and McManus each have biked an estimated 400 miles with their dogs so far this mushing season, which for them starts in the early fall, when the temperature starts to drop below 50 degrees Fahrenheit in the early morning, allowing the dogs to run without overheating.
“It’s definitely a workout,” McManus said. “It’s great because when you’re going uphill, you can help out the dogs [by pedaling].”
The dog yurt
Located near the shore of Toddy Pond, AB Huskies is an unusual dog kennel. Typically, sled dog kennels are constructed some distance from the home of the kennel’s owner, but not in this case. Owen and McManus live in a secondhand yurt they erected right inside the kennel’s main dog yard.
“I don’t know of any other kennel like ours,” McManus said as she exited their warm yurt and crossed the snowy dog yard to the garage, where the huskies are often housed during the winter. Moving through the garage, she opened the wire crates, releasing the dogs into the yard.
Out came Brody, Ewok, Isaac, Kavik, Kebo, Kearsarge, Korua, Mars, Meeka, Mia, Montana, Muddy, Pluto, Torus and Vinca.
There were 15 sled dogs in all, Siberian and huskies, each with distinct looks and personalities. Of the group, eight are what they consider “running dogs,” capable of hauling a sled, while the rest are retired sled dogs.
“We like having a number of retired dogs around here,” Owen said. “We’re crazy dog people.”
The couple enjoys living in close proximity with their dogs, but it also serves to socialize their dogs more than most sled dogs, and socializing their dogs is extremely important for their educational programs with children. In their first two years of operation, they’ve run programs about dogsledding at Reeds Brook Middle School in Hampden, Brooksville Elementary and Peninsula Metamorphic Arts and Learning in Blue Hill. Most recently, they’ve led Friday after school programs for teens at Camp Beech Cliff on Mount Desert Island.
“It’s funny doing the kids programs because the dogs all have very different personalities and background stories, and certain kids always gravitate to certain dogs,” McManus said.
The fluffy, brown Siberian husky named Brody is particularly friendly with children and usually a program favorite. Little Mia steals the crowd with her icy blue eyes and gentle ways. And young Kearsarge jumps around with energy that’s infectious.
“The kids have been great,” McManus said. “It’s kind of like they’ll do anything for the dogs. You’ll be like, ‘Can you go fill this bowl of water?’ And a kid that would normally be like, ‘I don’t do anything for anyone,” will be like, “Yeah, sure!”
“Something about dogs and kids go really well together,” Owen said.
Hitting the trails
Owen and McManus grew up in Maine and attended College of the Atlantic on Mount Desert Island, but they didn’t connect until they went to work for Pulling Together Youth Dog Sledding, a nonprofit outdoor experiential education program on the island. There they worked there for two seasons, and during that time developed a love for dog sledding and for each other.
When the couple established AB Kennels in Surry, they started bikejoring more often as a way to keep their growing sled dog team in shape and help them learn mushing commands, such as “hike” to get moving, “gee” for turn right, “haw” for turn left and “on by” to pass another team or distraction.
“Once the dogs are trained in a harness and are used to pulling something … I think bikejoring is really simple for them,” McManus said. “So our dogs took to it really really quickly.”
With a sled, the couple runs their dogs in teams ranging in size from four to a dozen dogs. But when it comes to bikejoring, they only harness one to three dogs at a time. A bike is much easier to pull than a sled, so harnessing more than three dogs would simply be overkill, they explained. The dogs would be too fast and difficult to control. In general while bikejoring, they like to maintain a pace of 10 to 12 mph.
“[When bikejoring,] there’s a real sense of closeness with the dogs, a real sense of teamwork,” McManus said. “It’s like going from talking to a large group of people to a one-on-one conversation.”
Unlike dog sledding, bikejoring does not require snow, which means the bikjoring season is much longer in Maine than the dog sledding season. And when there is snow, a bikejorer can ride a fat-tire bike, which has wide tires designed to travel over soft surfaces, such as snow and sand.
Another thing that makes bikejoring different from dog sledding is the harness system. In sledding, the dogs are attached to the sled in a line by harnesses and kept in order with necklines. In bikejoring, the dog is typically attached to the biker, who wears a harness on his chest or waist, and there are no neck lines to keep the dogs facing forward.
“They have the opportunity to go way off the trail, or wrap around a tree or chase a squirrel,” Owen explained. “So at a certain point, those are the things that you’re training for. And that’s what makes bikjoring scary for people or fun … because the dogs have the ability to pull you in the ditch if they want to.”
“I’ve definitely gone over the handlebars a few times with bikejoring,” McManus said.
Of course, it helps if you’re on a good, wide trail. Multi-use trails and snowmobiling trails are great places to go bikejoring, Owen said, granted it’s permitted. One of his favorite trails for the sport is the Down East Sunrise Trail, an 87-mile multi-use trail that runs from Ellsworth east to Ayers Junction.
Using this trail and other multi-use trails and snowmobile trails, Owen is planning a bikejoring trip from Ellsworth to Fort Kent that will be between 300 and 500 miles in length, scheduled for next winter. He’s calling the ambitious journey “Mush Maine.”
“People have done it on bike, and people have done it with dogs, but nobody has done it all together,” Owen said.
In the meantime, Owen will be training and planning, and he and McManus will continue to share their love for mushing sports — especially bikejoring — with others. Because bikejoring only requires one dog, it’s a much more accessible sport to the general public — and many different breeds of dogs can succeed at it, they said.
“Most dogs need a job to stay healthy, like chasing a ball or chasing a stick,” Owen said. “I’d like to get more people into the sport just because there are so many dogs out there that aren’t exercised, and people don’t know what to do with their dogs.”
In addition to 15 sled dogs, the couple has a house dog, a black Lab named Posey that they’ve successfully trained in bikejoring, though she’d rather lounge around the yurt.
“We tell people, ‘You can do it with your dogs,’” McManus said. “Just go super slow, be safe, wear a helmet and just go for it.”