Our Staff

Meet the team

Samantha (Sam)

Samantha (Sam) lived a long and happy life and is the name behind the site. She was born in Montana and lived several places with us before we finally settled in Minnesota. She passed away in December 2004. She leaves us with a lot of memories and probably still some leftover fur.

Elsa

Elsa wasn’t with us very long as she had some pretty severe health issues caused earlier in her life. She was a sweet girl (and large) but experienced severe separation anxiety and a pancreatic disease that eventually overtook her.

Ella

Ella arrived in October 2005. She was found as a stray and was near impossible to capture in Southern Minnesota. As a rescue we didn’t have much background on her and weren’t even sure she liked us at first. She was really independent and eventually warmed up to us. She lived a good long life and had many adventures in the area plus Northern Minnesota. Her beautiful howl is missed as well as her quirky personality. She passed away in August 2017.

Kota

There is Kota – OMG this one is a real gem and nothing like the ones that came before him. He arrived in December 2017 as a rescue from Adopt a Husky. He has been a handful at times but is slowly mellowing out as we get to know him better. As a purebred he comes with genetic issues that we are working on treating. He is one of the odd Huskies that likes to play ball/fetch and for whatever reason doesn’t seem to want to howl. He is the first dog we had that seems to stick at his ideal weight which prevents the vet from yelling at us.

Unfortunately it seems Kota has more issues going on as he is getting older. He was recently diagnosed with Immune-Mediated Thrombocytopenia (IMTP) and so far treatment has not proved effective. He was treated with chemotherapy and began high doses of Prednisone. He continued to get worse after the initial chemotherapy and needed to have a blood transfusion which his body rejected. After a brief hospitalization he began to slowly get better as the chemotherapy began working. However, a few weeks later his platelets began dropping significantly and he next began taking immunosuppressants of which the first one didn't prove to work and recently began taking another. As of recent blood work his platelets have continued to drop.

Kota Health

December 2024 update: Good (or better) news. Kota's platelets began to increase after starting the last immunosuppressant in late October 2024 and he was able to decrease his prednisone dose by 10mg.

January 2025 update: Continued good news! Kota's platelets are continuing to stay within the normal range, while slightly lower than last month, and other lab values are looking great as well. He is now able to decrease his prednisone dose by another 10mg. He'll return to the vet for another follow up in February 2025.