The Puppies Are Here

WARNING:  some photos in today's blog may be graphic.



Puppy #1 Litter 3

The first puppy was born at 9AM.  Dale and I were both at work.  I ran over on a mid-morning break and Duchess was cleaning the sack off a puppy. At this point, there are 11 puppies: 2 red/rust and 9 black/rust, 6 females and 5 males. 



Birthing Process

Sometimes, after several hours, more puppies will be born.  So I am not willing to say at this point that this is all the puppies. 



Mama & Puppies

We weighed all the puppies this time.  Not that we will be able to tell which one was which.  They weighed from 14 ounces to 19 ounces.  One that weighed 18 ounces was born dry, the sack was pulled off some time during the birthing process. Duchess took care of the sack and umbilical cord and the puppy wasn't breathing yet. I picked it up and stimulated it while giving it mouth to mouth. (I got very close to it's mouth and blew little puffs until it was breathing.)  I kept a close eye on it until it was breathing smoothly and crawling.

These first 24 hours take a lot of due diligence. Duchess is so tired that she could easily stand up, move around and accidentally lay down on a puppy.  So we do a puppy count to make sure they are all present.



What's that?