Puppies at christmas

Pups were 4 weeks old on Christmas day. They have had socialisation in bucket loads these last few days, although now they have got into the idea of solid food, there are times when you wouldn't want to pick up and cuddle a puppy who is wearing more of his dinner than he has eaten! (anyone who thinks breeding pups is easy money, ought to come and see how much effort is required just to keep them clean, let alone everything else that the pups and mum require)
Unfortunatly Bella has almost given up on the pups, I think it is a combination of her wanting to be with us and the fact that she is finding 8 strong pups too much.
Depending on the weather over the next week or so, I intend to start introducing them to the great outdoors soon, which should start to give them an idea of what housetraining is about.

I don't normally update this often, but yesterday I spent ages waiting to get a photo of the pups when they were awake, but they chose to have a very sleepy day. Then lo and behold at 11:30pm they decided it was playtime. Of course by the time I got the camera I had missed most of it , but I got a couple of shots.

Back to the subject of rehoming my poodles :-). I started the bathing and clipping, ready for christmas, yesterday. Safe in the knowledge that everywhere is frozen so the girls should stay fairly clean. Dollar was the first for a spruce up. Guess who found the only defrosted part of "the bog of eternal stench!"

Nearly three weeks old

Just an excuse to put a couple more photos up really. Still not much to say other than the pups are continuing to thrive, for the last couple of days they have started to get up onto unsteady legs and make a very good attempt to get off their bed and onto the paper to have a wee.
Went shopping for puppy toys yesterday so in about a week they can start having some toys in with them.
The messy part starts just in time for Christmas as I am planning to introduce them to their 1st solid meals this weekend.

On a different note, after bogging off twice in two days, (45mins and 1hr 40mins) after deer, does anyone want a pair of very deaf apricot standard poodles? - only joking!

More puppy pictures

Pups have started to open their eyes today, they are all fat as butter and totally gorgeous. They sleep as much as any other pups I've had, but when they are on the go they are very fast and determined, a sign of good working dogs perhaps? they certainly get around the whelping box more than the poodle pups do.

Puppy pictures

Mum and babies doing very well, although Bella is torn between looking after her babies and greeting everyone who comes to visit.

Haircuts and surgical cuts

I am pleased to say that Oliver has left to join a lovely new family today, a couple and their white toy poodle. I think he has well and truely fallen on his feet and get the impression that he is going to be spoilt rotten. He had a wash and brush up before he left, and looked very cute.

Bella, our working cocker has more than made up for one pup leaving by producing 8 gorgeous babies. It unfortunatly wasn't trouble free. She started showing signs on the start of labour, being restless and a bit huffy puffy, on Thursday evening. So I had a restless night, as did she, setting my alarm every couple of hours to go and check that she wasn't in full labour, Friday morning and she appeared ok so I took the rest of the girls for their walk. At 10:30 Graham phoned to say she was leaking, so I cut the walk short and was back in about 45 minutes. She didn't do anything until 12:30 when out popped a beautiful tri coloured bitch, with apparently very little effort. Brilliant I thought, at last a considerate dog who was going to produce pups easily and at a civilised time - wrong. The next pup didn't arrive until 2:20 but was followed fairly quickly by the 3rd, then nothing. At 6pm we took a very relaxed Bella to the vets with her 3 pups. An xray confirmed therre were at least 3 more to come, one of which was already in the birth canal.
She was given a shot of oxytocin to try and get things moving, half an hour later and she was almost asleep in the back of the car. This was then followed by the vet attempting to pull the pup out, but it was just that bit too far back. At this point the only option was a caeserian. She couldn't have had more attention, there were 3 vets, 2 nurses, Graham and myself, she had timed her visit well :-). The pup who had been stuck in the birth canal was the only one that took a bit of real effort to get going, and my thanks have to go to Emma for reviving him, but within a very short period we had a total of 8 noisy pups. We were on our way home within 15 minutes of the last suture going in, and Bella was feeding her new brood as soon as they were in the whelping box, they are so much more resiliant than us humans!
Mum and pups are thriving and once again it will be nice to see a different breed developing (and no clipping, hooray)

Bouncing back

After loosing Cinders it's been hard to get back in the swing, but when you have a naughty pup to keep you occupied, it helps. Oliver has definately got an outgoing personality. He wants to be in on everything, he thinks he is "the man" when playing with the big dogs, barking and growling and they are so gentle with him, even Audrey who is still only a puppy herself. He is very keen to say hello to all our visitors and as can be seen from the photos, he thinks little boys (one of my daughters friends) are great fun!
He is still looking for that special home to call his own, please give me a ring if you would like more details. He will be ready to go in about 2 weeks. He is going to be a small toy, the photos make him look bigger than he is, which at the moment is 3.5" tall.