Miley meets the puppies

Miley watching the puppies in the box
while Maddie supervises

My daughter Lisa and her puppy Miley (who is Maddie's daughter from her last litter) are in from Pittsburgh for a bit to help while we whelp puppies. Miley adjusts well to living in a different house and has enjoyed playing in our big yard and in the woods behind the house.

Miley has been increasingly curious about what is going on in the garage. Up until yesterday she was allowed to play with Maddie and come and go as she pleased between the house and garage, but then the door was shut. We tried to keep her out so that she wouldn't distract Maddie or cause her any alarm that there was another dog around her babies.

Miley did however peek in the door a few times and was convinced that there was something wrong out there when she began to hear the cries of the babies. She barked at the door as if to alert us that something has happened.

Today we let her into the garage to see the puppies. Maddie watched her carefully at first but quickly relaxed and doesn't seem to mind having her in the gargae. Miley on the other hand just can't figure out what these new little puppies are. She ran around the garage and smelling everything. She would just look at the puppies, it almost looked like she was startled when they made noise and moved around. We let her smell one but that just made her more confused when it moved its head to nuzzle up to her. She is starting to get used to their noise but can't quite figure out what they are doing here if she can't play with them. I think she will enjoy the puppies much more in four or five weeks when they are a bit more playful and can chase her around the yard.


Miley turned seven months old yesterday.

1 Day Old - Weigh-ins Begin

The girls with Maddie, you can see the pink nail polish that
helps us identify each puppy

Today we start the daily weigh-ins for the puppies. To help ensure that all my puppies are getting adequate nutrition and that they are healthy and gaining weight I have made a habit of weighing them every day.

When the puppies were born I weighed each one and recorded this information. I also used a little bit of nail polish to mark each puppy so that I can know who is who. For example, the boys are marked with green polish, the first boy has a mark on his head, the second on his shoulder and the third on his back. The girls are marked with pink polish in a similar fashion. I will continue to reapply the polish when it wears off until they go to their new homes. It has proven to be an easy and safe way for me to identify each puppy.


The boys, marked with green polish

Twice a day I will put each puppy on the scale, not only to check their weight but this is also a time for me to look at each one well to make sure they are developing correctly. If I notice that a puppy hasn't gained weight between weigh-ins I will give him some alone time with Maddie to make sure he has a chance to fill his tummy.

I had weighed each puppy last night and as expected they each had lost about an ounce since birth. This morning it is great to see that they are all almost back to their birth weight and two of the males are now heavier than they were at birth!

We are now nursing in two groups. Each group gets about two hours with Maddie and then two hours under another heat lamp. This makes it easier for the puppies to find a place to nurse and the smaller piles makes it less likely that Maddie will lay on a puppy when she moves around.

The girls again, I like that you can see the cute little face of the last puppy.

And then there were nine!

Tuesday, October 30, 2012, 6pm

We have decided that Maddie must have heard the weather report and decided that it would be safer for her little ones to stay warm and snuggly inside her until Hurricane Sandy passed us by! She waited until she saw that we still have electricity and that the garage still had it's roof and was nice and toasty before she would let the little ones come out!

We had watched Maddie closely over the weekend but she really seemed quite comfortable to just hang out in the garage and play with Miley. She still tried to chase after her balls and would try to run around outside.

Maddie and Miley in the garage
waiting for Sandy to be over

After watching the weather reports over the weekend, we made preparations in case Sandy caused the damage that was forecasted. We brought extra flashlights, candles and had a generator on stand-by in case we lost our power for a long period of time and needed to whelp and care for puppies without it. Fortunatly for us we didn't lose our power but we are prepared in case we get another bad storm some time this winter.

We stayed up for most of the night on Monday, as it became evident that Maddie was much more uncomfortable and wouldn't sit for more than five minutes. The rain and wind outside made it difficult to take her out for the bathroom or to get some exercise, so we put newspaper on the floor and walked laps around the car instead.

It was around 6:30am on Tuesday morning that Maddie started going into labor and by 7:30am we had our first little girl. It took almost ten hours but as of 4:30pm last night we have nine little puppies! Six girls and three boys.

They are big puppies, most of them weighed between 18 and 21 ounces! They are very strong healthy puppies so far. We do have one little girl, she about 3 ounces smaller than the rest, that we are keeping an eye on her and so far she is nursing really well. And the last puppy born is still having a bit of trouble nursing on her own so she is getting lots of attention and extra milk from a dropper but we are hopeful that she will gain strength today.

Maddie is also doing great! She is eating and drinking really well and has rested peacefully for most of the night. We have gone out a few times to stretch and get some fresh air but she is always excited to get back in the room with her babies.

Maddie would probably say her nose looks big in the picture,
but can you see all 9 little puppy bottoms?

And we wait...

We still don't have any puppies yet. We were expecting Maddie to have her puppies on Monday or Tuesday based on when she whelped her first litter, however we are still waiting, her official due date was yesterday so she isn't that late yet but just later than last time. We moved her into our garage last Sunday and have been checking on her every few hours for the past several days. Yesterday afternoon it started to appear that she is getting more restless and is having a harder time getting comfortable so we are hoping have some puppies yet today. The pictures don't really show how big and round Maddie has become, it is most obvious when she walks or tries to run, but I think she should be glad to have the babies out soon.



We are expecting!!!

Maddie is expecting her second litter the last week of October, which is next week already! She is healthy and appears to be feeling well.  Although she is starting to run a bit slower she still loves to have her ball thrown across the yard and if the afternoon is warm enough she still likes to lounge in her pool. We plan to set up her room in the garage this weekend so we will be prepared whenever she decides its time.