Busy Week

Well, the babies have had a productive week so far, as Daddy Brighton looks on. OK, it was really the bunny that ran by at the most opportune moment when we took him outside to take his picture. But really he has been very interested in his kids.

Wednesday the babies had their dewclaws removed. And for those of you cringing thinking we whacked off their thumbs - not so. The dewclaw is a vestigal digit that serves absolutely no purpose other than running the risk of getting caught on something like a fence and tearing. And if that happens, then you have problems. When puppies are just a couple of days old the bone in that toe hasn't ossified so removing it is very similar to merely clipping a fingernail. They do squeak but almost immediately fall asleep again, no worse for the wear.

We also started their Super Puppy exercises. For those of you unfamiliar with the program, no they won't be leaping tall baby gates in a single bound or gait faster than a speeding bullet in the show ring. Developed by the US military for their dogs, it, in essence, is a series of 5 exercises performed daily from Days 3 - 16, that take less than a minute to do for each puppy. The theory is that this exposes them to neurological stimulation to which they would not normally be exposed. This "unnatural" stimulation seems to jump start their metabolic systems and has shown benefits that may include improved cardio-vascular performance, stronger heart beats, stronger adrenal glands, more tolerance to stress and greater resistance to disease. You know, I'm handling everyone every day so I figure it doesn't take but a minute to do and it may be of some benefit. And it sure won't hurt them.

With the help of our lovely assistant, Aaron, we will go through the exercises for you. Alan very kindly took photos of the process.

The first exercise is a tactile stimulation exercise performed by tickling the puppy between the toes for between 3 - 5 seconds. The next three exercises are a series of positions the puppy is held in, again for no longer than 3 - 5 seconds. They are held head up, supine (on their backs) and then head down. Something they would definitely not experience naturally. The final exercise is to place them on a damp cloth that has been chilled for 5 minutes in the refrigerator. They're permitted to crawl off. Although puppies cannot maintain their internal body temperatures until they're about 2 weeks of age and it's very important to keep them warm, this very brief exposure does no harm (and supposedly a lot of good) at all and they're back in the puppy pile warming before they even know what "hit them."

If you'd like to read more about the Bio Sensor or Super Puppy method and the theory behind it, you can check out this link: http://www.taylordcanines.com/biosensor.html

They're still pretty uneventful - just eating, sleeping and growing. Everyone has put on weight and seems to be thriving. The other dogs are enthralled with the squeaky noises they're hearing. English Setter baby, Kyndle, is quite intrigued by them. I can only imagine what she'll think when they turn into "real" puppies and start to play.

Clemente

And say hello to Clemente - another of our lovely liver lasses

Look for her in the Big Leagues!

Mays

Meet Mays - one of our (obviously) black girls

We think she has the potential to hit it out of the park.

Maris

And this is the lovely Maris ...

She'll run the bases of your heart

Ruth

Say hello to our Baby, Ruth (sorry, couldn't resist)

She's our Grand Slam Girl

Rose

And this is our first born girl ... our lovely Rose

We think she's World Series class

DiMaggio

Say hello to "Joltin' Joe" DiMaggio as we like to call him

We think he could be a real All-Star

Rizzuto

This is Rizzuto - one of our liver boys.

You better look out.

He may steal your heart while he's stealing home.

Gehrig

This little guy is Gehrig - another of our Black boys and our third born

Keep your eye out for Gehrig. He's here to play the game.

Meet Koufax

And this little guy is Koufax. He was our self-starter. Alan had run to the store for some birthing supplies and when he came home he was welcomed by the distinctive sound of puppy cries - little Koufax, our first born.

We think he has the Look of Eagles.

Meet Aaron

Please meet Aaron - Puppy #11 mentioned in our first post.

He's one of our Black boys. We think he's quite a handsome fellow - just like his Dad.

The Final Count

Whew, it was a long night but we made it. We have a total of 10 puppies - 5 boys and 5 girls and I THINK 3 blacks and 2 livers in each sex - and most importantly a healthy mom with 10 thriving babies. She actually whelped 12 but two of them were, unfortunately, stillborn - a liver boy and girl. We thought she was done at ten but she had an ace (Alan said a Joker) up her proverbial sleeve. I looked down and saw a little nose making its way into the world. He was a bit of a slow starter but perked right up with some brisk toweling. I just love to make them mad and squealing like that - their version of slapping butts I guess. Anyway, again I thought she was done and had walked away. When I got back a few minutes later - there was #12. Unfortunately, she was one of the stillborn and, try as I might, there was no reviving her. I was hoping and praying Jenga was finally finished but she was still trembling and quivering. After some thought and discussion, Alan and I loaded her up for a trip to the emergency vet about 2:00 AM. He took an x-ray and, thankfully, showed no more babies. So we brought her home so she (and we) could get some much needed rest.

This afternoon, we introduced Daddy Brighton to one of his new sons and recorded it for posterity. He seemed quite fascinated by this squirming, squealing little bit of dog but seemed to sense he needed to be gentle with it and was a total and complete loving father ... no deadbeat dads here.

We have decided on a baseball theme for this litter because we think they're going to be an All-Star team. So please welcome the boys: Aaron, Koufax, Gehrig, Rizzuto and DiMaggio and our girls: Rose, Ruth, Maris, Mays and Clemente.

It seems I can only include 5 pictures per post so I will add individual posts for the babies and include their Day 1 Photo Op on their respective posts.

We'll try and keep things current and plan weekly photos of the kids. Stay tuned for more puppy posts and future updates.

BABIES!!!

I got a phone call at the show today from Alan, informing Jenga was acting "strange." Seems she was panting and trembling ... hmmm. Needless to say, I headed home. About half way home I got another call from Alan "We have a puppy" and so it begins. As I post this, we have 5 babies - 3 girls and 2 boys - all black so far (although Alan thinks one of them may be a brownie). Trim is finished on most of them (they have color around their eyes and on their noses). We took a quick picture to include with this blog. I'll post a complete report tomorrow when she's finished.

Let The Blogs Begin

Well, I was going to wait until the first of next week to start this blog but as big as Jenga is I think we may be busy whelping puppies about that time. Her "official" due date is Thursday, April 29. She is GIANORMOUS!!! At least as big as she was last year when she whelped FOURTEEN puppies. These pictures were taken just last evening with technically 11 more days to go. She ain't goin' make it that long.

She has slowed wwwwaaaayyyy down too - which is to be expected when she's hauling around the load she's hauling. If you think about it, last year she whelped 14 puppies with an average puppy weight of 12 oz. OK let's round that up to a pound what with placentas and all the other "stuff" associated with birthing and she was carrying around at least 15 extra pounds. Now do the math - when she only weighs about 50 pounds not pregnant and you add 15 pounds that's about 30% of your body weight being added. That's a LOT!! And I would hazard a guess she was closer to having added 20 pounds of body weight.

Poor dear, she's not eating much either right now but that's to be expected. Her stomach is all squashed with puppies so the best she can manage is to graze from the bowl of food we leave in her crate during the day. Of course, once the babies arrive and she's feeding them all, she'll eat us out of house and home.

And Alan said he felt puppies moving around for the first time yesterday too. In my experience, you can usually start to see and feel babies moving around during the last week of pregnancy. So I think we're within that last week window.

I won't be able to post too much this weekend. I'll be in Terre Haute helping to work our all-breed kennel club show. Thanfully, I'll only be an hour away in case anything starts to happen. She can go into labor anytime after Day 58, which is Saturday ... so folks, we'll all be on Puppy Watch starting Sunday. We'll keep you posted.