Our Second Samoyed - Thor Ostyaks' Thors Reflection At Polarspirit 19/12/1997 - 17/10/2002

Thor settled in instantly, falling totally in love with his older sister Summer, who kept bringing him all her toys to play with and who never had a cross word for him. Although she did jump rather high a few times when he tried to suckle milk from her, the way he had with his mummy!

He did howl at night for a while as he didn't like sleeping downstairs by himself and Summer decided that she would much rather be upstairs with us at night, than downstairs keeping him company. We always insist on cage training the puppies when they are little as it is much safer for them to be in a controlled space when you are asleep. Puppies love to chew and just because you are asleep it certainly does not mean that they are and so the cage keeps them safe. All the dogs are allowed to sleep where they want when they are older, which so far has always been in the room with us. The puppies soon learn to love their cage as they see it as their den where they can go for a quiet sleep whenever they want.

Thor loved to snuggle up with Summer during the day time.

Summer started to instantly teach Thor one of the most valuable lessons a Samoyed should always learn - How to Dig. As you can see she took great pride in her pupils abilities.

And in much the same way as pilots are awarded their wings, the little ones achieve their first set of muddy paws.

One of the questions you get asked most often when you're owned by a Samoyed is, "how do they cope with the hot weather?" Well, Summer and Thor have found their own unique approach to this problem.

We did try Thor in the show ring but he just soon decided that it was not for him. He did do his share of winning but as he just didn't seem to enjoy it we gave him a try and then stopped. The most important thing for us is that what ever the dogs are doing they must enjoy it.

Thor did enjoy going to weekly obedience classes and he was quite good too. When Thor was younger I would do his class first with him and then do Summers class with her as she was in a more advanced class but Thor soon caught up and then the two of them were in the same class. Rather than take them on alternate weeks, Phil started working with Thor and I worked with Summer.

	A class sit stay
	The dogs demonstrating the different stay positions sit, stand & down

And, of course, there's the dog obedience club's Christmas Party. This was Thors Goal Keeper Fancy Dress outfit for Christmas 1998. He really loved the fun of being dressed up and how impressed everyone was with him. He won first prize too!

When Thor was about a year old we started sled dog training both him and Summer - more for fitness than actual racing. We used a bike with a brush bow fitted on to the front to train as both Summer and Thor were only just learning and we didn't want them pulling too much weight and risking injury. When Thor reached eighteen months old, we again decided it was time to look for another puppy to join our family. Then when the new addition was old enough to join the team, this would give us a sled dog team of three and we could start training the dogs properly with a rig. For the rest of the story on sled/rig running please see the Sled/Rig Running page.

Thor was a total all round nice guy. If you gave him a treat, he would instantly rush off to get the girls so that they could have one too and only then would take his own treat! I have never come across this type of behaviour either before or since. All our other dogs would be more than happy to not only keep it their little secret but also, scoff the other dogs treat too!

Thor with Kira and Summer who he totally adored!

Sadly, we lost our beloved Thor on the 17th October 2002 to Juvenile Leukaemia. We are heartbroken by the loss of such a special boy who truly enriched the lives of all that knew him. He was alway such a happy and positive dog and his spirit will always live on in our hearts and fond memories of him.
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