The Samoyed as a draft dog
There were Samoyed people who had different sized dogs for different uses. It is true that some had the dogs for reindeer herding and others for hunting and pulling work. The reindeer dogs was smaller and more like the Swedish lapdog. While the larger dogs (hunting and draft animals) were usually the ones selected for the expeditions from which surviving dogs founded the registered breed in the West. The fact that travelers mention reindeer dogs, hunting dogs and draft dogs does not necessarily mean that all dogs did everything, but it depended on the means of livelihood the different families had. When we think about whether the breed was originally a reindeer dog or a draft dog, we must remember that the larger dogs that were already draft dogs in Siberia were most likely acquired for the expeditions and the foundation of the breed. We must try to distinguish between the different types of dogs that existed in Siberia and also within the people who were categorized under the collective name Samoyed people. We will always find evidence that both types existed in Siberia around the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. But the question is what type of dog was it that today's registered Samoyed dog was founded through? Most likely the larger hunting and draft dog but perhaps with elements of some specimen of the smaller reindeer herder.
But regardless of which area of use you believe in, the dog must be built for and adapted to hard physical work in an arctic climate. Both a reindeer dog and a sled dog need to be athletically built and able to move with a god speed and endurance. The reindeer dog needed to be able to keep up with a rampaging reindeer, and a draft dog needed to be relatively fast so that the hunter would not have to spend more time than necessary away from his family, while the dogs, tense in front of the sled, would be able to catch up with a fleeing game and then be released untie and set the animal.
Hannie Wink about the Samoyed as a draft dog
On February 17, 2014, Hannie Wink shared the information below in the FB group Samoyed History:
In the Netherlands there have always been discussions about whether the Samoyed originally was a sledge dog or not. It's true that the Samoyedic peoples use reindeer to pull the sledges if they have reindeer. Kai Donner has made during the years 1911-1913 and shortly in 1914 a journey to Siberia to study the Samoyedic language. The Samoyedic peoples he met, belonged mainly to the peoples who are now called Selkup and Enets. Most of them didn't have reindeer or not as much as the Nenets. Sometimes they had lost their reindeer because of epidemic diseases. The Samoyedic peoples had to pay taxes to the Russians. K. Donner writes that at the river Ob the Samoyeds were poor and used the money they earned often to buy Vodka. Kai Donner wrote the book "Bei den Samojeden in Sibirien" (With the Samoyeds in Siberia) He doesn't write much about the dogs, nothing about their exterior, but here are some sentences:About the Forest-Samoyeds who live along the tributaries of the Ob, the Tym, Wasjugan (only at the mouth, further up live Ostyaks), Parabola, Ket, Chaya and Chulym he writes at page 35: "The sledges pulled by dogs or the small, lightweight slides are put in order, new snowshoes are made, traps and snares repacked, which mostly consists of dried fish (so-called pors or pik). Also, most children are embedded in these carriages which are drawn together by dogs and women.
"Samoyed at the Ket (Enets?) P. 85: "The autumn was far advanced, and on the river we met a canoe after another on the way to remote hunting grounds. For a newbie, it is impossible to sit in such a boat without turning over, but we met them with entire families, dogs, sledges, provisions, tents of bark and equipment on board. "" Few of them have reindeer, most have to be content with dogs as draft animals.
"At the Yenisei there are no real post-horses, p. 124: "In a small village there was sometimes only an old horse to get hold of, and then you had to be content with a troika, which consisted of a horse between two dogs. But this unequal draft animals did their job quite well, and the dogs pulled as much as the starved, floated away horse.
"p. 144-145: "The reindeer breeding of the Samoyed differs in some respects from that of other nations, especially perhaps in the fact that they always self herd their reindeer, whereas Yurak (Nenets) and Tungusic people like to use dogs for this purpose.
Khamassin (extinct, belonging to the Selkup) p 187: "In these mountainous areas they couldn't use any sledges, and only on short hunting trips they used small sledges, drawn by dogs, and which were made of hollowed-out tree trunks. These sledges are in terms of shape and type, the very ancient, and are certainly among the most primitive of its kind
"Alexander Trontheim, the dog-handler purchased the dogs for the expeditions from these areas.
Jim Osborn about the Samoyed as a draft dog
Above: Jim Osborns Article. Click on the picture to read it.
Hannie Wink commented on this article in 2014 in the Samoyed History group as follows.
"I just read this article quickly and I do not understand why is not referred to the book of Fridtjof Nansen "Through Siberia, the land of the future", because on page 89 you can see a picture of a Samoyed dog. The Book "Polar gleams" from Helen Peel isn't mentioned either. The size and weight of the first dogs are mentioned on the first pedigrees and some explorers have made notes about the weights of the dogs. I can not find any proof that the standard has been changed in a smaller size of dog. The fact that the Samoyed dog was used as a sleddog on expeditions was used by the Kilburn Scotts to promote the breed as something 'special', though the Kilburn Scotts also told that they were used as reindeer herders, probably because Ernest Kilburn Scott had seen that in Archangelsk. The article states that F. Jackson wanted Bjelkier dogs for his expedition, but he wanted sleddogs from Eastern Siberia, but A. Trontheim had collected Samoyed dogs and Ostiak dogs. The word Bjelkier does not appear in his entire book neither is it used in books written in the same period about the Samoyed peoples. The bitch Jenny chased after a bear which approached the camp and she never returned, probably killed by the bear. That was before he went on the trip where only five dogs survived. The names Kvik and Flo are not in the book. Mrs. Kilburn Scott wrote that Kvik was born on the Windward and Frederick Jackson indeed writes that there were two litters on board when they were going back to England. Kvik has never been part of the expedition, but she was surely a granddaughter of Sally or Jinnie. I think that there is enough evidence that the Samoyed dog was used as a reindeer herder, but also by some tribes, ( Enets, Selkup, Nganasan) used for hunting and as a sleddog. Selection on just one of these, would therefore be wrong."
Gen Deltieure: "Interesting to read what the Russian neighbor I had in the 1970's said was factual. He knew the Samoyed in their native land & told me that the ones used to pull sleds by the tribes nearer water ways & those who lived more inland & were used mainly to guard & move the herds, looked different!"
Eug Hemberg aboute the draft dog
This is a small excerpt from a long article written by the Swede Eug Hemberg who traveled through Siberia in the late 1800s and described the presence of dogs there. Interesting is the fact aboute the function of the samoyed dogs as sleddogs used both by reindeer and non reindeer people."......
Dog plays the same role as for the eminent Scandinavian Nordic nomads. Perhaps an even more significant. For the Samoyed are both generally larger and much stronger than our scandinavian spitzbreed. Why he also considerable efficiency protects herds from predators attack. First, increasing the value through his capacity as a draft dog. In front of light, short sleds strapped four dogs, occasionally more in width, and at the autumns thin snow layer, springs snow crust and in summer over dry tundra plant covers linkes the journey. In soft leather harnesses dogs galloping forward, the sluggish or cal spirit hit by whip braided belt, the direction is determined by light lashes that are applied at the last dog that deviates from its flock. So do reindeer owners traveling to and from their herds, so do also the the people travel that no reindeer have at all between fishing and bird sites, between the Oceancoust and Novaya Zemlyas bird mountain."
This text also tell us that they wher galloping infront of the sleds, whitch tells us that they wher pretty fast sleddogs in Siberia.
High average speed and heavily loaded sled in Siberia
It's an article from Our Dogs, probably around the year 1931. It is going about the "Expedition to the Timanskaja Toondra" where Dr. R. Wasilieff reports about in the Russian journal Sabakovods. This also shows the speed at which the dogs traveled with loaded sleds. Long distances, heavy loads, sleds without modern coverings and untracked terrain. The different Samoyed groups had different dogs of different sizes depending on their livelihood as reindeer herders or hunters.
