Tommy and Tuesday's puppies: our V-litter

It's about time to introduce our V litter out of our FC Tuesday von Moosbach-Zuzelek, Sfk, V, and sired by FC Tom vom Linteler-Forst, SchwhK (Prize I/100), Deer Search cert., V. We bred Tommy and Tuesday twice, on February 6 and 8, and Tuesday's pregnancy was uneventful. She had a good appetite and was active. 

She started to whelp on Friday night (April 11) and finished six hours later. Puppies arrived in this order:

9:05 PM Volt (lime collar), 7.8 oz (221 gr)
11:50 PM Viola (pink) 7.4 oz (210 gr)
12:04 AM Vonnie (yellow) 7.6 oz (215 gr)
2:45 AM Vincent (blue) 8.2 oz (232 gr)
3:10 AM Vivica (red) 8.8 oz (250 gr)

Tuesday has been taking a great care of the pups, but in the beginning she suffered from excessive milk production, a painful condition called galactostasis. According to the Merck Manual: "The affected glands are warm, swollen, and painful to the touch, but the animal is alert and healthy. Warm compresses should be applied to the affected glands 4–6 times daily, and the young should be encouraged to nurse from these glands." 

She was put on Clavamox and quickly recovered. Puppies have been gaining weight quickly and at ten days they were:

Volt (lime) was 221 gr at birth, now 650 gr

Vincent (blue) was 232, now 625

Viola (pink) was 210, now 600

Vonnie (yellow)was 215, now 615

Vivica (red) was 232, now 715 gr

They also opened their eyes and started to crawl around whelping box much more.

 

Tuesday has been staying with the pups in the whelping box all the time. They are spotless clean. What I like about her that she not too possessive of her pups. She completely trusts us, and even if dogs bark outside my den, she does not get too upset about it.

April 20

April 22

Mielikki and Sky's puppies: the first two weeks for the U-litter

We wrote about the whelping and first couple of days of Mielikki's puppies on our main blog. To read about  it click here and here. We are happy to report that Mielikki has been a terrific mother and her puppies have been doing really. Today they are two weeks old and their eyes are open. I took them for a short while outside as the sky has been overcast so the bright sun is not going to harm their sensitive eyes. Nobody was crying and pups were not stressed out. At this age they seem to be very easy going and laid back. They like to be handled and stroked, and they give little kisses. They don't struggle almost at all when turned on their backs. We will be learning much more about them in the next few weeks.

These are the pups
Boys:
Urho - blue at birth 280 gr, now 895
Uncas - red at birth 285, now 925
Girls:
Ursula - green at birth 285, now 780
Utah - yellow 261/835
Uma - white 244/760
Uschi - pink 215/790
Uta - no ribbon 215/670

Day #11

Day #2

Puppies are growing!

Paika and puppies continue to do really well. This morning (Wednesday) pups were:

• Pink female born at 310 gram, now 540
• Blue male born at 360, now 605
• Red male born at 385, now 610
• Yellow female born at 230, now 410

Not much else to report. Pups' eyes and ears are still closed but they certainly respond to touch and smell.

Day #3 for Paika's puppies

Things could not be going better. Paika is healing well. She has a good appetite, and spends all her time with the pups. The pups seem to be very content and well nourished :). They have put quite a bit of weight and this morning they were (we are switching here to grams as lbs and oz are just too complicated)

• Pink female born at 310 gram, now 405
• Blue male born at 360, now 470
• Red male born at 385, now 480
• Yellow female born at 230, now 305

Pups are one day old

Things are going much better today. Paika is healing well, and I think her uterus is going to recover. She is taking exceptional care of the pups, is eating and drinking well. Pups put on some weight, and the little girl is vigorous and nurses well.

Today pups got their color ribbons to identify them. They are according to the sequence of their birth
Pink female born at 10.4 oz, now 10.8
Blue male born at 11.8 oz, now 12.6
Red male born at 12.8 oz, now 13.8
Yellow female born at 7.8 oz, now 8.2

Pups are one week old

Are all these dachshund puppies going to be wirehairs?

You might wonder why these puppies look so different from Paika whose coat is longer. Well, puppies coats are very short for the first few weeks of their lives. With time differences between individuals will become more apparent. We are quite sure that all these puppies are going to be wirehairs as Paika was DNA tested for the gene that controls the absence/presence of furnishings. If you would like to learn more about it click here and here. BTW, the color of Paika and her puppies' coats is called "wild boar".

Day number 6 for the little pups

You probably noticed that their bellies are getting rounder... thanks to the good milk supply courtesy of Paika.

Puppies like to stay all cuddled together and close to their mom Paika. However, a mild stress is good for them, so a couple of times a day, when I change their bedding, I spread puppies in the whelping box. This way they have to do some "work" to reunite (they must follow their noses) and they get some exercise too.

Family ties - all these puppies are related

This picture was sent to us yesterday by Rosi and Anne Bauersachs from Germany whose "L" litter is related to our puppies and is the same age as Gilda's litter. We wrote about this coincidence few days ago. From Anne's letter it looks like everything is going well with Ilena's puppies. Anne said : "Today you wrote about supermoms. We know what you mean because we also have one - she loves her puppies over all."

There are few more pics taken yesterday of our puppies.

Close-ups of R-puppies (Joeri x Gilda)

Q-puppies (Joeri x Keena)

Supermoms rule!

I consider Gilda and her daughter Keena Supermoms; Elli, Keena's grandmother was another Supermom. What do I mean by this term? You start with moms that whelp with ease and have excellent mothering instincts. They clean their babies, take care of them really well and they have plenty of milk. They love their puppies, and spend extra time with them. Sabina, Gilda's mother, was not like that. She did minimum that she could get away with. Below is the picture of Gilda's whelping box this morning. It was spotless, there was nothing to clean.

Keena's puppies turned one week old yesterday. I took their weights and they are:

Male Green at birth 230 gr, now 375 gr (he is growing more slowly than the rest so we are keeping eye on him; otherwise he seems to be fine)

Male Red at birth 230 gr, now 405

Male Navy at birth 250, now 510

Male Blue at birth 300, now 560

Female Pink at birth 340, now 590

Female Yellow at birth 295, now 510

Female White at birth 330, now 650

Female Lime at birth 250, now 510

Female Orange at birth 230, now 515
 

Puppies will opening their eyes when when they are around 10 days old. Right now their eyelids are sealed. They can't hear any sounds either, but they can certainly smell. They know how to find their mother pretty quickly.

All is well in the whelping boxes

Things are going really well with Gilda and Keena's pups, but yesterday we had to do some adjustments. As you know Keena was caring for 9 puppies and Gilda for 5. I caught Keena several times carrying Green boy around in her mouth. At one time she put him in her own bed (see picture), the other time she placed him on the blanket. I see this behavior occasionally in our females and I really don't know the meaning of it. Sometimes a mom may choose a special puppy to give him attention one-on-one. I remember many years ago when Vamba had a "D" litter. She would persist in picking up Drake, her favorite puppy, and jumping on John's bed, where she would stay with Drake and give him extra attention. It is widely known that some bitches would try to get rid of a defective puppy and try to remove such a pup from their whelping box. In Keena's case, I read her actions in neutral terms. She was putting Green boy in her bed or on the blanket outside the box, but she was not staying with him. She did not act like she was trying to hide him either.  Even though Keena was very careful, I needed her to stop this behavior. Finally I decided to "give" the pup to Gilda. Since Gilda is larger than Keena, and she always produces excessive amount of milk (last year she raised 8 pups and managed to put on weight while doing it), we transferred two pups from Keena to Gilda. The pups are double marked by a different shape of collar and nail polish on their nails so we can always tell them apart from other pups, but this is going to help Keena cope with a huge litter. Also Green boy is safer with Gilda, who never carries pups in her mouth. Gilda had no problem with extra puppies, cleaned them right away and let them nurse.

Gilda stays in her box 100% of the time.

I took a short video of Keena's Red boy, it is not of the best quality but is is quite amusing and shows the pup's acrobatics.

To see the video in different resolution click here.

Keena's puppies are four days old

Keena's puppies continue to do very well. For the first two days Keena tried to carry them in her mouth to rearrange them in the whelping box. I did not like it and pups did not like it either. I think that she stopped doing it now that the pups have grown. She stays with the pups in the box most of the time, but this morning she was really happy to get out. When John let her out, she went on a short hunting expedition.

These are pups weights as of the May 26 evening. Sorry that they are in grams, for me it is much easier to compare weights this way than when they are expressed in pounds and ounces:

Male Green at birth 230 gr, now 300 gr

Male Red at birth 230 gr, now 315

Male Navy at birth 250, now 355

Male Blue at birth 300, now 440

Female Pink at birth 340, now 425

Female Yellow at birth 295, now 375

Female White at birth 330, now 460

Female Lime at birth 250, now 350

Female Orange at birth 230, now 345

Q-puppies are one day old but it is Keena who is being pampered

Keena's puppies are one day old. So far so good. Keena is an exceptional mother, and I am sure that the first few days must be very difficult for her. She has to come up with logistics of dealing with so many pups. Elli, who used to have very large litters, usually would divide pups into smaller groups that would be nursing separately. Also the potential problem is that Keena has only 6 fully functional teats.

My approach to puppies is that you you have to have a healthy, well fed, energetic mother, then most likely pups will be OK. If she has good instincts, she will take care of her pups. So today is all about pampering Keena. I make sure that she eats frequent high protein, high calcium meals, and that she drinks quite a bit.Her appetite is very good.  I check her temperature for any signs of infection. With large litters bitches are more prone to metritis, inflammation of uterus. I remember many years ago when Sabina had 10 puppies and developed metritis. We ended up hand feeding all 10 puppies. This is something I want to avoid at all costs, and if there are any signs that her temperature gets elevated significantly, she will be put on antibiotic Clavamox.

Anyway, puppies are doing well, they have not gained much weight since they were born, but this is very typical for newborns. I would be concerned if they started to lose weight but so far that has not happened. I weigh them often, and check if they are hydrated. If they are not, I make sure that I put them on a teat and they nurse.

Keena's whelping box is in my den so I am with her almost all the time. We are expecting another litter within next few days, and I know that by the time Gilda has her puppies, Keena will require less of my attention.

Gilda with her pups

All is well in Gilda's nest!

Pups look good and Gilda is up to the challenge of raising 8 puppies. This is the most pups she has ever whelped, which is unusal as she is seven years old. But Gilda loves to eat and she is the only female we have that can have a litter of pups and gain weight while nursing. She is also a no-nonsense kind of mom, who disciplines her pups (when they get older). Some females are very permissive, like Elli, and they let puppies get away with murder, but not Gilda. It will be interesting to see how she is going to deal with the large litter!