Photos of Pepsi’s first litter

Here are the pups only 4 days old. Pepsi likes to sleep on her back so it’s no great surprise that she’s adopted this as her preferred feeding position! At this age, their back legs are still to weak to walk on so they crawl around by pulling themselves forward with their front legs and drag their back legs behind them.

2 weeks old, the pups have grown from 0.5kg birth weight to 2.2kg! At this age, they have their eyes and ears open and are starting to get up on their feet. The fun is about to begin….

The pups are wormed at 2 weeks old and then we give them 2 days to let their stomachs settle again. At 2 and a half weeks old, they start their first solid food. This is a challenge as they are used to sucking milk and don’t know how to eat solid food. It involves a lot of patience and I get more food over me than the pups get inside them in the first two days!

This is Beacon being fed his first meal:

At 3 weeks old, from L-R: Amy, Arthur and Ashleigh discover that there is a whole new world outside of the whelping box. Who will be the first to escape?

Amy was the winner… 5 mins after this photo was taken, Amy was running round the kitchen squealing. She was the first born and has always been the feisty one so it was no surprise that she found her way out first.

Once the pups found their way out of the box, they spent the night escaping and then squealing because they were frightened of the kitchen floor. I spent last night getting up and putting them back. After being up 3 times during the night, I decided that they are big enough to leave their box now.

So at 3 weeks old, this is a key turning point as the pups go from being babies in a box to miniature puppies in a pen. They look so cute fast asleep. Ah… silence. Enjoy this whilst it lasts!

From the top: Amy, 2nd row: Beacon, 3rd row L-R in yellow: Ashleigh, Marden, Blade, Bottom row L-R (black): Arthur and Angus

Funny how the camera comes out when they are asleep. When they are awake, I am usually found picking up soiled newspaper, mopping the floor, preparing food, washing bowls or feeding pups one at a time! Not much time for a camera at those moments!

At 3 weeks old, the pups are now really vocal. After a quiet first 2 weeks where I thought they were the most chilled out, laid back pups I’ve ever had, they have proved me wrong and shown that they have excellent voices. the last couple of days have been really exhausting as they have hardly slept. Pepsi is getting fed up now and doesn’t want to feed them any more. However, she has plenty of milk so she needs to as they still need her milk in addition to the small amount of solid food.

The pups are slowly taking to their solid food, although slower than previous litters we’ve had. Today, after 4 days of solid food, I managed to feed 3 of them at a time although it was a mad scramble as they all walked in their bowls and pushed each other around. Still, this is a lot of fun!

Meanwhile, Gracie (our retired 8 year old brood) has gone to stay with my parents as she was starting to get bored in the house all the time. I think Pepsi would have liked to have gone too!!!

 

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