We Have Been Very Busy!

It has been a very busy household. Maxi’s puppies are growing by leaps and bounds. But, Maxi is holding her weight….eating like a horse….and producing gallons of milk. The puppies’ eyes are still closed but their noses are beginning to turn. The two chocolates will have dark brown noses and the others will have dark black ones.

Here are some photos to enjoy.

Nursing puppies can have the craziest positions!

Maxi, the lunch counter.

This little girl is really going at it. Love her tail.

A puppy huddle after lunch.

And now for some individual shots….

This is Puppy #2….a black parti girl. Note her nose hasn’t changed completely.
This is Puppy #3….a sable parti girl. Nose is almost all black.

Puppy #4… the black parti boy.

Puppy #1…chocolate parti boy. You can’t see his nose but it is almost all brown now.

Puppy #5….our other chocolate parti boy.

Puppy #6….our black parti girl.

Roll Out the Red Carpet!

Here are Maxi’s pups front and center! Aren’t they gorgeous?

Maxi is such a good mom. Puppies are all gaining nicely.

When I weigh them, I take a few minutes to stroke their tummies and nuzzle their little faces so they can get accustomed to people smells and touches.

At this stage they are both blind and deaf. But their senses of smell and touch are extremely keen. That is how they find their way to the milk station!

 Enjoy this morning’s video on YouTube. If you double click on the video it will enlarge to your entire computer screen. The background whining is from my puppy boy Potter who is so done with all the attention being diverted from him!

Already Gaining Weight

It is more common than not for puppies to lose weight their first day with their moms. But apparently Maxi has more than adequate milk (nice when there are only 6 puppies!) because everyone of them gained weight. Some more than others and I am encouraging the big weight gainers to use the less used nipples to get them into more production. As with humans, the more a nipple is stimulated the more it produces.

Ooops how did this get here? My grandson Ben who came to see the new puppies. He’s being protected by Lily and Willow

Maxi giving one of her pups a bath. Since puppies cannot control their “plumbing” yet, the mama will lick their bottoms to stimulate them to urinate and defecate.

Most of the puppies taking a nap. All except for the little black and white boy. The other boys are chocolate and white. And we have two black and white girls and one sable and white girl.

We Have Puppies!!!

Our super mom Havanese, Maxi, delivered 6 healthy, beautiful puppies early this morning! We have three girls and three boys…3 black and white, 2 chocolate and white and 1 sable and white. One girl is 5.5 ounces and the others are all 6.0 and 6.1 ounces! I’ll post more photos tomorrow but here is one to enjoy for now.

A proud mama and her puppies are resting nicely!

Time to Start Taking Temperatures

Taking Maxi’s temperature will help me know within 24 hours when she is actually going to whelp her little Havanese puppies.  She is due Saturday so I began Monday. I take her temps in the morning and the evening when she has rested a while…which is pretty much all the time right now!

If she gets any bigger she’ll be dragging on the floor!

Her temps are hovering between 100.0 and 100.8 degrees Fahrenheit. A dog’s normal temp is 101.5 but the hormones prevalent in a pregnant bitch will lower her temp to closer to 100.0 during her last trimester.

Maxi chilling this morning while the others play around her!
You can’t really tell from this photo but Maxi is as big as a doghouse!

With a little luck we will catch the dramatic surge to over 101.0 F which happens 12 hours before the drop to the 98.0 F area. When her temp drops I will know the puppies should arrive in the next 24 hours!!

So, we actually have about a 36 hour heads up on when the pups are likely to be born, which is very helpful.

This is Maxi’s private apartment! I think she likes it. The box on the left is where she’ll whelp her pups.