Bear Walking

 This morning we have puppies walking like baby bears. The legs get under them and they move forward two steps before returning to swimming around on their bellies. The Internations Candies move very quickly at this stage of the game, compare to the first few days when they don't move well at all. But with their eyes and ears closed they tend to bump into things. Walking at one week is more about getting to Mom quicker than the next guy than it is getting somewhere in particular.

Lilly spends less and less time in the Whelping pool as days go by. They are good eaters and she empties out pretty quickly now, but as they begin moving faster the competition can get stiff and the babies insistent. 

In a few days their eyes and ears will open fully and they can begin to learn how to use them. Yesterday we could see a few of them trying to force the eye lids open, but so far we don't see the dull reflection of new eyes. Once the eyes are open we'll remove the kiddie pool and things will get a whole bunch more interesting.

They've grown so much!

They most certainly know how to eat! 

The International Candies are all proficient eaters. It might sound weird but this isn't always how things go. We've had litters where there are one or two who don't know how to get enough food from Mom to put on the desired amount of weight. The danger in not eating is called a "failure to thrive". It happens every once in a while so we have strategies and tools to put the weight on when we see this and get everyone healthy if needed. Right now it's not needed.This bunch is a whole lot of milk sacks.

There are other concerns about eating too much that we watch for as well. Heavy puppies can have "Swimmer Syndrome" and need remedial training when learning to walk. This lot likely won't have any of that to worry about.  They will all be runners by four weeks and we are already seeing a lot of pushing each other around as they learn to use their legs.

We will weigh everyone on Saturday, at one week old. We expect them all to have doubled their birth weights and continue doubling every week. until weening at four weeks. We expect to see eyes and ears opening at the end of the second week, give or take a few days. This is when pictures start being taken.  This is about the time when we take the whelping pool out of the puppy pen and they will start running around. Four weeks is when Mom can't possibly keep up, so we start putting mushy puppy chow into the mix. From that point on it is a smelly pandemonium around here and people visitors begin to handle them.

Summer is the best time for puppies. they get a lot of outdoor time and start interacting wth our pack of hounds. This is going to be fun.

Dewclaw Day

Not a Basset Foot

 Very early in every litter we remove the "Dewclaw" to make everyone's life easier. Ann does most the work. Though I am a tough, I simply have a hard time watching. My job is to hold each puppy with my eyes closed and that's enough involvment for me.

The dewclaw is a thumb on the foreleg and it can be something of a problem. It performs no function for pets and can get caught on things and injured.And it makes makes trimming the nail more difficult, so the nail is often neglected since the other nails wear down through use and this one doesn't. Bassets are huggers and wrap their fore-legs around you in different ways, the dewclaws can make this less fun. So taking them off is a good idea and best done when the babies are only a few days old.  Ann does the deed and before you can carry them back to the Whelping Pen the momentary bleeding is stopped and the puppy feels just a second or two of pain the entire time. 

Today, while I went for supplies (mostly the junk food we eat during the long hours when the babies are very young) Ann called my brother in to hold babies and I came home to a peaceful, and Dewclaw free, house. Hurray for me!