This last week I added the crates to their pen and they immediately investigated them and have used them as their place to sleep and get away from their littermates. They have been amazingly disciplined about doing their business on the wood chips. Week before last they did all their bowel movements in the wood chips but would urinate whenever and where ever the thought popped into their brain. In this last week, they have started walking to the farthest areas of the wood chips to tend to both functions. Yeah! When I am home with them I have them out of their pen and I also feed them outside of their pen. Today after eating some food one of the puppies ran back into the room with their pen and went to the back side by the wood chips and was crying to get inside. I picked her and put her inside the puppy pen and she ran to the wood chips to do her business. That was really amazing.
The puppies have been eating canned dog food and mush – ground-up dog food and goats milk. To give them variety I alternate between adding cottage cheese, yogurt, or scrambled eggs. The puppies smell like goat’s milk, horrible smell IMHO. My food plan for this next week is to wean them off of that wretched stuff.
I have been taking the mothers away during the day and putting them back in with their babies at night. Today they have been apart except for a few visits and tonight is going to be the first night without their moms. Whenever the moms are separated from the pups J-boy is put in with the I-pups. Right now their special CD of noises is playing a cheering at a football game. One of the recorded noises is a human baby crying and the puppies always get worried and upset when they hear it. Every litter and no matter the age. I wonder if I should take it off or leave it in? The only over noise they react to consistently is a cooing, gurgling baby.
Well, off to get ready for schutzhund training. Allie and Funny will stay with their puppies until training is over and then they get a break. I will play with the pups and feed them a nice mushy-stinky meal and then they will go to sleep without their moms, both human and dog varieties. You know the moms are going to be more upset then the pups.
Busy weekend planned for the little guys.
You are an excellent dog mom, Julie.
As for the baby crying—see if you can find a recording of a baby crying and then it switches to laughing. I can see where the crying would stress the pups (not necessarily a bad thing), but I would be interested to see their reaction if the baby sounds went from crying to happy.
I bet you will miss J-boy not being in bed.
It is so cool to see how much thought and planning goes into puppy-raising!
What’s the reason for goat’s milk over some other kind of milk? When I was growing up my dad occasionally raised goats for milk. I remember thinking it was the most horrid tasting thing ever. It tasted like chewing the way goat fur *smells* to me. Kinda like how gin tastes like chewing on pine needles to me.
Hi Stacy, the puppies can digest goat’s milk. I am glad to hear there is another person out there that thinks goats milk stink. I refer to goat’s milk as “essence of barnyard.” Raising pups takes a lot of time and there is much work involved. I could spend much less time and be more hands off then I am, but then I would not be doing it properly. This is very much a labor of love. Raising puppies is not only about feeding them and keeping them clean. They need to be stimulated, mentally, physically, they need attention and love.
Carole I slept great last night without J-boy waking me up 3 times a night! All the pups did super without Mom last night, with the exception of J-boy he was a little whiny this morning.
Julie says, “This is very much a labor of love. Raising puppies is not only about feeding them and keeping them clean. They need to be stimulated, mentally, physically, they need attention and love.”
Carole says: Yes, and that is why Alta-Tollhaus pups are Super-Pups right from the get-go.
Thank you, Julie!
Glad to hear the pups did well without thier Moms last night. I’m sure they had a good day with whatever plans you had to keep them busy! It is super all the things you do with the pups before they go to their new homes. Hope you had a nice day.
Lynda