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PARK CITY — Celebrities often make their way to Deer Valley Resort to ski, but one celebrity there on Thursday got just as much attention as any movie star.
Meet Rooster. No matter where Rooster went at Deer Valley Ski Resort, people had to pet him.
“He’s loving it. He loves the attention. He loves people,” handler Mark Chytka said. “They love him. I mean, he gets mobbed by people constantly as soon as we’re out in public.”
And Rooster, a 4-month-old red heeler lab, can’t get enough.
That’s a positive, Chytka said. “(That’s) what we’re looking for in an avi dog.”
Yes, an avi dog, as in an avalanche rescue dog.
“That basically means he’s going to be trained to find people in the snow and dig them out,” Chytka said.
Though Rooster is having a lot of fun, he’s also in training.
Rooster will be taught to rely on his sense of smell alone to find people who may become buried in snow. While getting caught in an avalanche is a serious emergency, to a rescue dog, it all seems like fun and games.
I think in a small part, they do know they're being rescued. They're getting their second chance.
–Mark Chytka
“He doesn’t know he’s working,” Chytka said. “He’s just playing and we try and build that drive through play, basically, with him.”
Chytka is Rooster’s owner and the ski patrol supervisor at Deer Valley. He said Rooster is already doing a great job with his avalanche training and can find toys and even fellow ski patrollers hidden in the snow. He’s hoping Rooster will be certified in the next one or two winters.
The remarkable thing is that it’s only been two weeks since Chytka adopted Rooster from a rescue shelter.
“I think in a small part, they do know they’re being rescued. They’re getting their second chance,” Chytka said.
And maybe one day, Rooster can return the favor and give someone else his second chance.
