The Krabloonik dog-sledding kennel and restaurant in Snowmass Village was cited in May of this year for 10 violations of state law, stemming from the conditions in which their 260-plus sled dogs live.
The 10 infractions resulted from an unannounced visit by inspectors from the Colorado Department of Agriculture, who enforce the state’s Pet Animal Care Facilities Act (PACFA). Krabloonik, which is the largest dog-sledding operation in the lower 48 states and is licensed as a small-scale dog breeder, failed the inspection.
The inspection report does not allege any outright abuse of Krabloonik’s sled-pulling huskies and cross-breeds. It does cite violations for how the dogs are fed, cared for medically, and leashed.
This failed inspection does not subject Krabloonik to loss or suspension of their license under state law. Their license is good until they fail four consecutive inspections on the same violation. Krabloonik was cited for one repeat “critical” violation: leaving puppies “at large” on the outdoor kennel grounds. The state mandates that dogs younger than four months be kept away from adult dogs, other than their mothers, to protect them from attack.
For the violations, Krabloonik was issued a “stayed fine” of $500, which the state does not require them to pay. The PACFA inspectors have not returned to Krabloonik since the failed May 5 inspection — their first inspection in more than a year — but say they have corresponded with owner/operator Dan MacEachan.
MacEachan did not return calls seeking comment for this article. But the Krabloonik Web site notes he won the 2000 “Humanitarian Award for Best Care of Dogs” at the International Rocky Mountain Stage Stop Sled Dog Race, a prize for top conditioning and medical treatment of racing dogs.
“We work really hard with them while also educating them on PACFA rules and regulations,” said Christi Lightcap, director of communications for the Colorado Department of Agriculture. “For any action to be taken against their license, it has to be one failed inspection followed by three other failed inspections on the same violation. We take it on a case-by-case basis, and take into account whether they are violating animal welfare.”
Lightcap noted that a few dog-sledding kennels in Colorado predate the PACFA rules — which were signed into law in 1994 — by many years. But animal rights activists say that’s not a reason to be lenient.
Zach Ornitz/Aspen Daily NewsKrabloonik kennel workers sweep through grounds to pick up dog feces in the morning before feeding the animals for the day. The sprawling kennel grounds include a restaurant, sledding facilities, puppy pens and more than 250 working dogs that live on tethers attached to dog houses. Krabloonik has come under much public scrutiny for the treatment of its animals.
“We’re lucky in Colorado to have PACFA, but it feels like we’ve been lulled into a false sense of security by it,” said Holly Tarry, Colorado director for the Humane Society of the United States. “I completely understand that these dogs are working animals and they are different from house pets. But that doesn’t excuse Krabloonik from complying with PACFA. And it doesn’t excuse PACFA from enforcing their own laws.”
Krabloonik’s dogs are kept on chains connected to raised doghouses that are spaced in even rows in a field of dirt and patchy grass. The chains are short enough that the dogs cannot move close enough to get tangled or fight with one another.
It is illegal in Colorado to leave dogs chained to their houses in the outdoors as their “primary enclosure,” but dog-sled operations are eligible to receive an exemption from the state. Although they are eligible, Krabloonik has never received — or applied for — that waiver.
The department of agriculture report also claims some of the chains are less than the state’s minimum length of six feet, and that pregnant dogs are illegally tied up. Additionally, a mandatory fence perimeter, to protect the tethered dogs from predators and other outside threats, has not been erected on the site.
Additional current violations include how Krabloonik’s dog food is stored and served. Most of the dogs eat off the wooden planks where their dog houses sit. Their food is kept in buckets and stored outside. State regulations call for food to be served in dishes and stored inside, because otherwise it can mix with vermin, urine and excrement, exacerbating the spread of parasites and disease.
The report states Krabloonik is also in violation of a law mandating that, “Sick, diseased or injured dogs shall be provided with timely veterinary care or disposed of in a humane manner.” It specifically references a dog at the Snowmass kennel with a prolapsed uterus — a condition in which a post-gestational female’s uterus loses muscle tone and falls out of her birth canal — that went untreated. Krabloonik was additionally cited for not reporting medical records for a dog they were medicating for a bite wound.
In 2005, Krabloonik stirred local protest for disposing of unhealthy or weak dogs with a gunshot to the head and burying them in a pit with their feces. Those practices were and remain legal in Colorado for sled dogs, but MacEachen vowed to stop them after the public outcry. He has since pledged to put down dogs by lethal injection, and he has begun releasing old dogs or those unable to pull sleds to the Aspen/Pitkin County Animal Shelter.
“This is a matter of neglect,” said Tarry of the Humane Society, noting Krabloonik’s skeletal off-season staff and the fact that the dogs are not regularly walked or exercised during the May-to-November period when their mushers are working elsewhere. “Its scale has gone beyond what the operators can handle while keeping the animals in good condition.”
andrew@aspendailynews.com
