Tick had her pups early this morning. Tha picture on the left was taken a few minutes after the last birth and the picture on the right was taken early afternoon. The pups are doing well and mom is doing a great job. There are 3 girls and 2 boys weighing between 6-7oz. The girls have the most colour. Two girls have full face masks and the other girl has left and a bit of right ear colour. They are all tri coloured. The 2 boys have one coloured ear each, just like dad. Will get distinguishing pictures at about 1 week. For now mom needs rest and the kids need to pig out.
June 15 2006
The pups are progressing well and getting fat as you can see. Mom is experienced this time so is a little more laid back but still extremely attentive to her brood. Two of the girls have the head colour and the other girl is the one in the upper right pointing east-west. Not much happening yet, just eating and sleeping and doing the growth twitch. Puppies twitch as they sleep which is an indication of healthy muscle and nerve growth. In a litter this size someone will twitch every few seconds.
June 23 2006
Ticks pups are 10 days old now. They are growing steadily and doubled their weight in the first week. The next event will be eyes opening at about 14 days. Then they will get more mobile in their whelping pen. Now they just eat and sleep and twitch.
The 3 girls are in the top picture and 2 boys below. Their eyelids are clearly defined now but not a hint of opening yet. They are all tri coloured and although the colour looks pretty dark now with black predominating it will probably fade to tan as you can see happening to the left girl. They will likely end up about the colour of mom. Their noses are turning from puppy pink to black now and will probobably be all black by their next pictures.
More pictures after their eyes open.
June 29, 2006
The pups are just over 2 weeks now and all their eyes are open. Still not a lot of activity yet but I expect action in the next couple of days. They are rising up a little more but not a lot of walking around much yet. Mom is doing a great job looking after them and I think they are too full to move. As promised, their noses are almost all black now. They will be hearing in the next day or so. Their ears have almost fully dropped down to the side of their heads.
Girls on the right, boys on the left. They wouldn't wake up for their pictures. They must be tired after their pigout at mom's diner.
July 9, 2006
Ticks pups are growing up fast. They are playing hard in their whelping pen. These pictures are of their first trip to the living room. As with most litters they usually don't move around much the first few times out. They just take in all the new surroundings. In the next few days they will spend some time in the x-pen in the dining room. They will get solid/mushy food today and we will start limiting mom's access to them in a few days. They should be weaned by the end of the week and spending their entire day in the x-pen. When they get used to being on their own we will start taking them for walks and training them to do their p&p outside.
Here is a picture taken a couple of hours later when they had their first solid food. They did very well and got right down to business. Mom only had a bit of their food to clean up.
July 17, 2006
We had a big banger here a couple of days ago and lost our internet connection as well as other electronic stuff. Back to dialup for a couple of days.
The kids are doing well as you can see from these pictures. They are spending most of their day in an outside x-pen weather permitting. They are doing well at their potty training and don't even want to p&p in their x-pen. They wait until they are taken for a walk and some will let us know when they have to go by crying to be let out. They are on solid food twice a day now and will be weaned totally from mom soon. We began crate training by bringing them in for their afternoon nap. We start by doubling them up in crates and will have them in separate crates in a few days. By next week they will be sleeping in their crates at night.
The last few days they have really progressed in their stamina and coordination. They are going for longer walks now and soon will be walking most of the farm lane.
July 25, 2006
The pups love going for long walks down the driveway or into the hay fields. They go 3 or 4 times a day or as much as we have time for. Weather permitting they spend the rest of the time outside in their x-pen. They are getting very well trained and tell us when they need out of their x-pen for p&p. They get fed twice a day in their communal bowl. The last 2 nights they have slept in their crates. One crate had 2 pups and the other had 3 and we didn't hear a peep out of them all night. Tonight they will be put to bed in separate crates so we might hear some whining. We will also begin feeding them separately in their crates. By the time they go to their new homes they should be used to being alone and this should make the transition easier. They should also be pretty well crate trained.
Aug 2, 2006
It started raining about an hour ago so the pups came inside. You will count 6 in total because the bigger one is from the Emmylou litter and she is about 2 weeks older. They played hard for quite awhile and then crashed in the last picture.
This may be the last update since the pups will be going to their new homes this weekend.
The pups are sleeping through the night in their own crates now. They are put out for their last p&p around 10pm and then put to bed. They don't wake up until about 5:30am when they are rushed out for their first potty break of the day. The first few nights alone a couple whined but the last 2 nights not a peep. We also take them for several very long walks and play with mom out in the hay fields so by the end of the day they are very tired. A well exercised Jack is a good Jack. If they don't get enough exercise they will find something to do and most often its not something you would prefer.
Once again Tick has raised a litter of very nice pups. They have their mom's hunting instinct so they should not be let off a leash unless it is a very controlled environment where they can come to no harm. We keep a close watch on Tick when she is outside because she will take off in a flash after prey and is not easily interupted from her hunt.
