I’ve had a few conversations over the past few weeks with people who have been around Seppala Siberian Sleddogs for as long as — or longer than — I have. Some themes keep coming up in those conversations, so I thought it would be worthwhile to facilitate a dialogue.

I’ll admit at the outset that this is a gross oversimplification of complex issues and history, but it will already seem overly tedious to most readers, so I ask your grace.

I should also note that what I express here may not reflect the opinion of the board of the International Seppala Siberian Sleddog Club, but my own thoughts on these important issues.

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I have friends from my days as a supporter of the now-closed Seppala Project and International Seppala Association, which were based out of Canada. In my recent exchanges with them, I hear them echo the refrain of their former leader: that Seppalas should go extinct — that there was not enough genetic variation saved to preserve them as a distinct breed. “The Seppala, as a breed, is dead,” one said to me recently.

I thought, how sad, that these men and women would so easily throw in the towel on half a century of work simply because their retired leader says so. Sadder still to hear such things from the very friend who encouraged me to join the International Seppala Association all those years ago — and to know that all of them were simply repeating the words of a man who had done so much to preserve this breed for decades.

What I have to say in response is important, so I should first make clear the deep admiration I have for the work of the now-closed club’s founder, Jeffrey Bragg. He devoted his life to the Seppala Siberian. I joined his ranks those many years ago because I believed then — and believe now — that his arguments for using Chukchi dogs rather than racing Siberian Huskies to deepen the genetic pool were solidly supported by the breed’s early history. I made two cross-continent trips to meet with him because his passion for preserving this breed was infectious. Please keep all of that in mind as I say what follows.

There must surely have been no such fatalism in his heart when he embarked on his quest to rescue the breed more than half a century ago. That dogged determination must be found in our generation as well, as the torch is passed.

I firmly disagree with the notion that, due to a lack of genetic depth and high coefficients of inbreeding, the project is a failure.

From the very beginning of our breed — nearly 100 years ago — there has always been a need for the occasional and judicious introduction of new genetics. Especially with the second “founder effect” of the Markovo days, that need could not be ignored. The question has never been whether we can keep a pure Markovo line going indefinitely. The question — from Seppala to Wheeler to Bragg to Willet — has always been: from where shall we get genetic variation?

To someone with an early 20th-century notion of breed “purity,” this may seem unappealing. But it has always been so. Consider, for example, Captain George Graham’s resurrection of the Irish Wolfhound. To rescue the breed, he gathered what few remaining wolfhounds existed into a breeding program and then judiciously outcrossed and bred back from Borzois, Deerhounds, Mastiffs, and Great Danes.

Here too, with our Seppalas, genetic depth needed to be regained. The question has always been: with what?

Bragg and his International Seppala Association argued for a historical solution — Siberian imports. But the nature of western relations with the Soviet Union made this nearly impossible. Bragg secured a stud through channels he believed to be from the proper region and began integrating Shakal into his program.

Doug Willet and the USA-based International Seppala Siberian Sleddog Club argued that there was no proof of Shakal’s origin or mushing ability, and opted instead for a more practical approach — using racing Siberian Huskies as the outcross of choice.

And so an already fragile breed was split into two camps.

Many stones were thrown from the ISA at the ISSSC. “They have percentage Seppalas. We have Seppalas.” But it was merely rhetoric. Both were crossing out for the very same reasons — only the ISA was considering their crosses full Seppalas rather than attaching a percentage to them with the intention of breeding back up.

The reason the Seppala Project and the ISA failed was not for lack of genetics, but for lack of healthy leadership. I’ve seen this pattern in religious organizations, and I saw it clearly there as well. As a charismatic leader ages, he often finds the upcoming generation unworthy of his mantle. I’ve watched thriving organizations fail in the second generation because the founder did not properly groom and release the next generation — could not willingly relinquish control over time. Instead, he held on until the end, verbally drove away many of those most devoted to him, and then declared his life’s work a failure, leaving those who remained to go down with the ship.

But it was not a failure. I credit Bragg — and others to a lesser degree — with rescuing the Seppala Siberian. The breed is alive and well today, and Bragg deserves much of the credit for that.

“You smite the shepherd, and the sheep will scatter.” Since Bragg sank his ship rather than passing the mantle and the helm, many of his most devoted followers have simply accepted his pronouncement as gospel. They accept that decades of work were for nothing — that the dogs aging in their backyards are for naught. Others, however, have imported Chukchi dogs from the former Soviet bloc, and I look with great interest at the results.

The beautiful thing about the club that remains — the International Seppala Siberian Sleddog Club — is that because of its percentage-based registry, it can be a home for both factions. If a Seppala kennel feels that Chukchi dogs are not well proven, they need not breed to them. If a Seppala kennel feels that racing Siberians are an unacceptable option for reducing the genetic bottleneck, they can breed to other Chukchi/Seppala crosses. And we can all work together for the future of this beloved breed.

“A percentage Seppala is not a Seppala!” I may hear from a Bragg devotee. To which I will reply that it was Bragg himself who argued to me on multiple occasions — when I was the one pleading for more Markovo-pure dogs to be bred — that the agricultural model of breeding out for genetic health and then breeding back to something like seven-eighths should be adopted.

In the wake of the Disney film Togo, we have seen a flood of Siberians and Alaskans being sold as “Seppalas.” I have grown tired of well-meaning people telling me they purchased a Seppala only to discover it was nothing of the sort when they research the pedigree. Never before has there been a greater need for us to unite and clearly define to the world what a Seppala is.

I am therefore making a public plea to our friends on the other side of the Seppala divide: don’t lose heart. Although your club is gone, the Seppala Siberian Sleddog is not. You are welcome in the International Seppala Siberian Sleddog Club. We stand ready to welcome you and your Seppalas.

“You may say I’m a dreamer. But I’m not the only one.”

I believe we can heal the rift in our breed and present to the world a healthier and more robust Seppala than has been seen in a hundred years — if we do this together.