Well it's been a busy 5 days. The pups are changing by the hour it's amazing. Almost like watching a flower bloom in slow motion, they are one way one minute and entirely different the next. They opened their eyes Monday and Tuesday of this week, then they began being able to hear on Thursday and somehow in between there they learned to walk and today they are barking and vocalizing and attempting to play with each other. They are still quite wobbly on their feet and fall over if they get too excited but it's so fun to see them waddle around the box.
Today we started music appreciation :) ! We started playing their sound tape which has a variety of household, industrial and neighborhood noises for them to get used to. The sounds include the vacuum cleaner, lawn mover, blender, bus, trucks, kids shouting , babies crying, motorcycles, you name it. I play it twice a day to start and then gradually increase the volume and frequency throughout the next few weeks. For music we started with George Winstons Winter into Spring, then the Mills Brothers, a favorite of my late grandmother,then to top it off a little Barry White and Steely Dan. They seemed to like the Mills Bros best as they woke up and began moving around whenever I played it.
So fun to watch them now as they are beginning to interact with eachother and the toys in the whelping box. So cute to see them mouth eachother, attempt to paw at eachother then fall over in their enthusiasm and fall asleep. They look a bit like drunken sailors staggering around looking for the closest milk bar !!
Tess is doing great though she is thin and very hungry all the time. I'm trying to feed her enough but it's hard, we are up to 4 lbs of food today and I'm afraid that much more will make her sick. I broke up the meals into 5 portions so she ate all day but it still doesn't seem like enough. She's a trooper though and will get in there multiple times an hour to feed them. Today I divided the group in half so they ate in two seatings. 11 hungry puppies are intimidating when you have only 8 place settings so this gave some order to the whole thing and Tess and pups both seemed happy with the arrangement. The little guys went on with a few medium sized pups so they could eat their fill without so much competition. I am weighing them everyday and watching to see who is gaining and who is staying the same and altering the way I manage them according to how they gain. Mother nature is crafty and in order to build strong pups mother dogs stop laying down to nurse and start sitting up and letting the pups scramble and stretch to get their meal. The problem with this when there is significant size difference is that the bigger pups can reach easily and the smaller pups can't reach at all. By dividing the group at least once a day it gives the pint size babes a chance to catch up.
The size difference between the pups doesn't worry me. I learned a long time ago that there is no such thing as a runt (or runts). This is Tess' 3rd litter and what that means is that the little pups placement in the uterus was likely next to the scar tissue of a pup from a previous litter. The pup only grows as large as the placenta it is attached to, so lousy placement means a small pup at birth. The good news is that pup will reach it's full genetic potential and be as big as it's genes tell it to be. One of my smallest pups at birth turned into a moose at a year old.
Finished up the Bio Sensor Exercises last night on day 16. These exercises are meant to help wake up the nervous system and get the immune system to kick in early as well. I have always done these exercises with my pups and feel that it gives them an advantage for life. Now that that stage of development is over I can concentrate on developing physical coordination and strength and encourage exploration !!
This is such a great litter, I am really enjoying them !!
