The Physiology of Sledge Dogs

Abstract

Xn 1954 and 1955 the author was stationed at Hope Bay in Graham Land, as one of the twelve men at Base D of the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey. During this time an investigation was carried out into the physiology of sledge dogs. This investigation was divided into two main parts: the first was a study of the sledging diet, and the second of the factors affecting the work output of sledge dogs.As well as summarizing the results, this article attempts to make two particular points. The first is to demonstrate the unusual opportunity for detailed scientific work that now exists in the Falkland Islands Dependencies, and the second that such work need not be of a specialized and remote nature, but can be regarded as part of the general fabric and structure of pure science.On average there were seventy-five dogs at Hope Bay, most of which had originally been brought from Labrador in 1944 and 1945, but are now in their third Antarctic generation. 1 Other dogs came from Canada and Greenland in 1954, and these were smaller and faster than the " native " stock. 2