Video of eight-week-old puppies having fun in the pond

How we raise puppies to be successful blood tracking dogs

We have been so busy working with puppies that we have not had much time for posting reports about all the activities. Puppies turned seven weeks old on Friday, and they are a lot of fun. We usually manage to post individual pictures and videos on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/borntotrack

Puppies have been exploring a lot. They are showing interest in holes created by other dogs and they do some digging on their own.

The dachshund breed was first developed to hunt foxes and badgers in their dens under ground. This meant that they had to be psychologically comfortable in tight, dark  places. The video suggests that our little tracking dogs still think that it's fun to run though a dark tunnel.

We take pups on walks to the pond, but we have had a lot of rain and the water is deep. It is fine for Mielikki but pups have second thoughts about swimming.

We have been working pups on deer liver drags and we will post about it on our main blog at http://borntotracknews.blogspot.com/. Make sure you check it out.

The picture shows Ursula at the end of the track. We use large pieces of liver that cannot be swallowed. Liver contains a lot of vitamin A, which in excess is toxic, so while we use deer liver for training purposes we actually do not let pups ingest too much of it.

Puppies continue to be socialized with people. Our friend Dan dropped by on Sunday to play with them. This week pups are going to meet new people as our friends are coming over for the July 4 celebrations and are going to stay for a couple of days..

Today pups went to the woods for the first time, and they were learning how to navigate obstacles and difficult cover. We want them to be accustomed to the outdoors and be comfortable in the woods. After all they are going to be tracking dogs!

Puppies' first taste of deer liver

Video of Mielikki's five-week-old puppies

Apparently we have gotten ten inches of rain in the last couple of weeks. Well, it was raining today again. As you can see in the video puppies had a lot of fun in our kitchen/dining area. The background music was entertaining and included some rain forest birds.

We started to supplement pups with some extra food, but Mielikki still insists on cleaning them. I have never seen such a clean freak canine mom! Also, she loves to play with her pups, and she started to let them know that some toys such as her ball are off-limits. But she does it gently and never growls or snaps at the pups.

A busy whelping box: dachshund puppies at 19 days

A video clip of Mielikki with her puppies shows what a patient Mom she is! Puppies are quite mobile, they crawl fast, but now they can also take few steps at a time. They have started to interact with one another, and you can see it in the video. It is time to give them toys to play with.

Summer working a liver drag

It has been a while since we had time for puppy training. So today while John was tracking, I had Summer on a liver drag, which was probably 150 yard long and aged an hour and a half. Summer is a high-spirited, fast working puppy, and we still don't know whether we are going to keep her in a long run. But today she has showed her best work yet. Actually it looks like she is ready for an older line. Also it is time to start working her on a leash!

A good lesson for puppies about toys' ownership

Monday did not start well. Paika got sick overnight, and when I came down to my den in the morning, the floor was covered with diarrhea and vomit. I found it strange that she never let us know that she needed to go out. Other dogs would scream or jump on the door, but she always tries not to complain and tough it out. Whatever caused the trouble got eliminated from her system becausein the morning she was feeling good and had a good appetite. I called our vet just to reassure myself that things are not too serious and he recommended to give her a light diet today and several doses of Pepto-Bismol.
Puppies have been doing very well, and they have not been affected by her overnight issues. Today they are 18 days old, and I took them outside for the second time. They stayed in the outside pen, together with Paika, for several hours. Nobody complained too much.

The below video shows how they played with a furry raccoon, which they liked very much. Then two pups tried to approach the rubber toy Paika had claimed. They learned a quick and valuable lesson from their mom on what she considered inappropriate behavior. Paika is a sweetheart and I was a little surprised at her reaction, but she knows her kids the best. It is her show and unless she is ready to harm her pups (which she is not), I am not going to interfere. Some females are very permissive and they let pups do just about anything. Elli or Gela would never do what Paika did, but I actually think that Paika is a better teacher. You have to watch the video to the end to see her reaction
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Pups are one week old

A video showing the whelping of the second puppy

This is a seven minute video showing the whelping of Paika's second puppy. The placenta was not expelled along with the puppy so I had to cut the cord to free the pup, which was already outside. I think that the real star of the video, besides Paika of course, was the first puppy. The original video is 11 minutes but it seemed a little long so I shortened it to seven minutes.

It is touching to see how Paika handles the delivery. She is able to focus on the first puppy, which is pretty demanding,  and the puppy that is being born. She is highly cooperative and has a complete trust in me (not all bitches are like that).

Remy on a fresh deer liver scent line

It really got hot when Remy started to work this deer liver drag - around 85F. It was a long line with three checks and he did very well.

A deer liver drag for two ten-week-old puppies

I have included below two video clips of Rilla and Questa working a 50-yard deer liver drag. The track was fresh, and it included three turns. We were in a hurry this morning when we did the drag and did not put any flags or markers along the way. The commentary is at the end of each clip. Rilla worked the drag first.

To see a video of Rilla in a high resolution click here.

To see a video of Questa in a high resolution click here.

Puppies meet Nolan

Today we had a very nice visit from a future owner of our puppy. Gunn Gardner from Springwater, NY, a member of Deer Search, came all the way to visit puppies, and he was accompanied by his grandson Nolan. A nine-year-old Nolan was natural with puppies, and even though he got scratched by sharp nails and teeth, he played with pups for a long time, and then went for more. It was a great fun for puppies too! Nolan lives in Texas so probably we are not going to see him too often, and that's too bad. After we had played with the pups, we went to the pond to watch Bernie performing his tricks in the water. And then Nolan fished and caught a big catfish. Altogether a great day!

By the way, yesterday Keena's pups turned 7 weeks old and their weights were:

Boys:

1. Quantum Green      1440 gr

2. Quick Red              2470 gr

3. Quentin Light Blue  2740 gr

4. Quint Navy             2360 gr

Girls:
5. Queenie Yellow       2040 gr  
6. Quanta Pink            2470 gr
7. Quella Orange         2560 gr
8. Questa Lime            2130 gr
9. Quipster White        2600 gr

Keena's pups at four weeks

Today Keena's pups turned four weeks old. I went over them in some detail, and these are my observations:
Queenie Yellow (below) 1260 gr, her teeth are just starting to come out, coat should excellent, not too short or long, on a scale of 1 to 5 with 1 very short, smooth and 5 long and soft, I'd give her 2.

Quanta Pink (below)  1500 gr, her incissors and canines are all out, looks like a short coat that I'd score 1

Quella Orange (below) 1475 gr, again incissors and canines are out, short coat with ascore of 1

Questa Lime  1275 gr, no teeth yet, coat quite short on the body, but longer on her face, 3

Quipster White 1680 gr (huge puppy), teeth are just starting to come out, coat score 4
 

 
Quantum Green don't know, we'll pick him up on Monday
 
Quick Red 1215 gr, no teeth, coat score 4

Quentin Light Blue 1470 gr, teeth are just starting to come out, coat score 2.5

Quint Navy 1260 gr, teeth are just starting to come out, coat score 3

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Also today, for the first time pups from both litters spend some time together in a pen. This is a video clip taken during this session:

To see it at a different resolution, click here.

Green puppy - first attempts of walking

Keena's puppies have opened their eyes but since they are asleep most of the time this is not easy to show. Also their eyes are very sensitive to bright light so we'll wait with close-ups few more days.

I tend to take more pics of Keena's pups as the lighting in my office is better than in the room where Gilda is with her pups. These are current weights for R-pups:

Females:
White at birth 260 gr, now 580
Pink at birth 300 gr, now 615

Males:
Red at birth 365 gr, now 730
Yellow at birth 280 gr, now 630
Black at birth 335 gr, now 670

Puppies are supposed to double their weight at birth within first ten days so everybody is on target.

Keena's Green male puppy who is mothered by Gilda was today 450 gr and almost doubled his birth weight on day 13. When he gets older we'll take him to a vet to check him out. As far as walking goes, he is the most advance because he is the lightest (everybody else is still crawling). eThe video below shows his first attempts at walking.


To see the clip in other resolutions click here.

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.