The Musher

Jessica Kizmann

By trade, I am an artist, graphic designer, and project manager from central New Jersey. I work remotely for a tech company, which makes what I do with these dogs possible.

I grew up in an animal-loving household and my interest in sled dogs started early on. The movie Balto was most likely my first glimpse into dog mushing. After attaching my childhood Rat Terrier to a doll stroller didn't go so well, my mushing aspirations went dormant for awhile. 

It wasn’t until after college, when I started pursuing my first purebred husky, that I realized New Jersey and Pennsylvania had mushing clubs. Before I even got my first sled dog, I was hooking up Dexter (my rescue mutt) to a rig in the middle of the Pine Barrens.

I ended up buying that rig for dry land training. I also bought all the attachments for another type of dry land mushing known as bikejoring, where dogs pull the driver on a bike. I eventually added a beautiful, hand-crafted Arctic Star dog sled to my mushing equipment collection. As the team grew, our gear changed and expanded.

I’ve been mushing for a few years now and I can safely say this addiction has shaped my life. In October 2018, I bought a house in upstate New York where we’re able to mush longer miles on better, snowier trails. We have 18 acres of land to explore and state forest land right behind us.