The 2026 American Dog Derby purse is bursting at the seams with more money than it’s had in years.

“We have a $12,000 purse,” said dog derby organizer and Ashton City Councilman John Scafe. “It’s more than normal. It’s more than we’ve had in 10 or 15 years. We’ve had some great sponsors come on board. We’re hoping to get more mushers with a bigger purse.”

Organizers will divide the purse up among what’s expected to be at least seven mushing teams from Idaho, Montana, Wyoming and Colorado. More are expected to sign up, but that’s all dependent on the snow.

And so far, the snowfall isn’t what it needs to be, Scafe said.

“We need about a foot and a half to two feet of snow,” he said.

John and his wife Kathy Scafe have overseen the event for 30 years.

“The mushers are waiting to see what the snow does,” Kathy said. “There’s hardly any snow anywhere. They’re having trouble training. All the races start in January. There’s a few in January and early February.”

A lack of snow has caused many of the mushers to train on dirt, John Scafe said.

“They’ve got what they call ‘four wheelers’ that they pull to get (the dogs) into shape,” he said. “There’s not a lot of snow anywhere. If we get snow, we could have a lot of racers here. I’m just hoping we get snow.”

The annual event also brings with it the yearly soup competition at the Ashton Community Center as well as the annual quilt show the library hosts.

The race brings people from throughout the region and helps boost the city’s economy for that February weekend, John Scafe said.

“People come into town to see what we’ve got,” he said. “We’ve got restaurants for eating, clothing, hardware, entertainment, things like that. The auto parts store — people know about it if they ever break down in Ashton.”

In recent years, a lack of snow drove the dog races up to Bear Gulch. Yet, so far this year, there’s not enough snow to race there either, John Scafe said.

“I don’t know if we can go up there,” he said. “They haven’t groomed it. There’s not enough snow yet. They have to have a foot to two feet to groom it good.”

A lack of snow also makes it dangerous for the dogs to race, Scafe said.

“The other reason to cancel is that if it gets too warm, the dog can overheat,” he said. “We’ve got to be really concerned about the weather and heat too.”

Despite December’s lack of snow, there’s still time for Mother Nature to work some of her magic, John Scafe said.

“We’ve got a month and a few weeks or two,” he said. “We’ve still got to plan it and to be ready for it.”

It’s been many, many years since the dog races were shut down due to a lack of snow with the most recent being in 2015. Decades earlier, and, in 1934, a lack of snow caused mushers to get creative. Instead of having the dogs pull sleds, mushers instead used “scooter wagons” and raced their dogs down the highway outside of Ashton, the americandogderby.com webpage reports.

World War II completely cancelled the races until 1946. Three years later, there was too much snow that blocked access to Ashton for all of February.

“The races struggled during the 1950s with the last race held in 1961,” it said.

The lack of snow has John Scafe beseeching the heavens for more. He’s also been doing “snow dances” in hopes Mother Nature will whip up some snow soon.

Just how does he do the dance?

“I just raise my arms and say ‘please snow.’ It’d be nice,’” he said. “I want it by February 1. I’m not demanding or anything.”

Seeding the clouds to make snow is cost prohibitive, Scafe said.

“It would take a lot for that seeding to take place. It’s really expensive,” he said. “We have to rely on Mother Nature and the good Lord.”

For more information on the upcoming dog derby visit https://americandogderby.com.