Archive for the ‘nutrition’ Category
Signs of things to come
As I was cleaning up the puppy room before bed half of the group was wrestling and the other half was exploring. Walking around my feet, chasing the mop, and peeing and pooping on the nicely cleaned floor. I must have mopped that floor three times before I gave up, turned off the light and let the pups do what they will. They are paper trained, but they also pee and poo on the floor too…so maybe not so paper trained after all. Sigh. This is the beginning of the busy time. If I can keep myself in the moment, it isn’t too bad. But if I try to project outward a few weeks I get overwhelmed. This is going to be a challenge, trying to keep everything sanitary.
I cut the pups toenails again, boy they had gotten long! Everyone was very good about it and stayed relatively still. (more…)
Pups getting the hang of it
Today Annie got to show off her stuff to an interested family. She did great and I was very impressed by her easy going nature. Now if we can just figure out this Kong obsession! Really, though, she was friendly, open and happy to let them interact with her. I couldn’t have asked for more.
The puppies have really gotten the hang of eating, as the photos show. They just put their heads down and lap it up. It’s funny, but they lap for a bit and then get distracted and wander off. But if you put them back to the bowl they react like, “Say! Where’d this come from? Food! Yahoo!” and start lapping again, only to get distracted and wander off again. They have mastered the ins and outs of climbing the board that separates their bedding area and now when I enter the room it isn’t unusual to see one or two pups out wandering around, exploring the space. However, the room (more…)
Annie and Pups Update
Annie may have a new family! It’s still early in the process, but the thought makes me both happy for her (and happy and sad for me). If it’s a good match, it would be wonderful for her, but I will miss her.
Puppies continue to eat well, better every day. Now when I walk in the room most of them wake up, lick their chops, and look at me expectantly. THis morning, a couple actual climbed out of their sleeping area to get first dibs on the meal. Everyone has pretty big, tight bellies, which tells me they are probably still battling roundworm. Since I read recently that it’s best to worm them 10 days apart rather than 14, I decided to worm them today with Strongid. At two weeks they weighed about 2.5 lbs on average. Today at less than 4 weeks, they weighed bewtween 5.5-7.5 lbs – more than doubled! Isn’t that crazy? Clearly, mama is feeding them well. Sweeties’ puppies weighed this much at 6 weeks so these guys are shaping up to be larger dogs. Their personalities are starting to show and even though I don’t like to admit it, I’ve already got my favorite. Any guess on who it is?
Puppy Chow Time
Here is the video I referred to a couple days ago. Here the pups are eating (and wearing) solid food for the first time…
Make sure your sound is up for puppy noises!
Puppies First Solid Food
So, this morning I’m hanging out with the puppies and they seem to want to walk around so I take them all out of the bed area and put them into the puppy play room. They wander around, crying less than usual, and Annie is eating and they all walk over to her food bowl. Instead of nursing, they all crowd around her bowl and start trying to eat her dry kibble!! She was tense and growling at them but stopped when I (more…)
New teeth and play area
After wondering for a day why Annie’s teats seemed excessively full (yes, you are supposed to check them daily for obvious reasons) I realized the pup’s teeth must have come in and sure enough, all their little razor sharp teeth have erupted! No wonder she is less eager to nurse them. So last night for the first time in their lives I supplemented their diet with formula. They cried and cried. No one likes to grow up I guess. But a few caught on perfectly and lapped up the formula like they had been doing it for ages. I will introduce it again tonight and once a day for a bit. They are still unsteady on their feet so they can’t really manage eating (more…)
