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.

The Results Are In!

My friend Linda assisted me in assessing the temperaments/ personalities of Marli’s puppies and they are closer in most respects than I thought. All three have socialized nicely. It helps to have them exposed to lots of dogs at various ages as well as lots of different people and children.

Dillon went first. Over the past several weeks she has gone from being the “leader of the pack” to one that kind of held back and now to a wonderfully adjusted, yet lower keyed, than the other two.

She scored three 2’s, three 3’s and a 4 on the sound sensitivity. In other words, she is a confident and outgoing puppy that will respond well to human companionship but might require a more consistent hand in training.

Delilah was next. She scored four 3’s and three 4’s, making her slightly more social but not enough to make much of a difference. She also has displayed a more outgoing character than Dillon, but again, not anything close to what I would call wild.

Daffodil was kind of all over the map, scoring two 3’s, two 4’s, a 2 for Following, a 6 for Dominance, and a 1 for Sight Sensitivity. Of the three she is definitely the most energetic and outgoing. So, while she will make a fine pet she might not be the snuggle bug some are looking for.

So, none of the pups display overly excited behaviors. They play well and seem to take turns being “boss.”

If you’d like to read more about the Volhard Test, go to the February 19, 2014 posts.

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Havanese Puppies Eyes are Opening!

One of Marli’s puppies has her eyes open now and a second is almost there. Here are three photos I took this morning.

Girl #1 has her eyes open! She, like her siblings, is moving around quite well in the whelping box. She is black and tan with white markings on her paws, her chin and her chest. The tan is showing up on her rump and her legs. She also appears to have some lightening on her eyebrows. At 13 days old she weighs 13.4 ounces. This puts her right on a par with Maxi’s pups at the same age.

Girl #2 still has her eyes completely closed. But she is a bit smaller than her sisters so this is no surprise. She, too, is moving around nicely. She is black with white markings…no tan in her coloring at this point. She weighs 11.4 ounces.

And, you can’t see it from this photo but girl #3 has slight openings in her eyes. She weighs 12.5 ounces, is moving around well and is black and tan with white markings.