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He has the privilege of being the first puppy to nurse. Buttercup still isn't quite sure about this, but she allows him to be held up to her to nurse for now.
Nursing baby puppies on their mother increases her maternal instincts. Hopefully this will mean she is more involved in the next puppy.
We have just over an hour before the next puppy. Though she doesn't seem interested in taking care of this puppy either, it soon becomes evident why. As fast as we can get a dark ribbon around his neck, and name him "Christmas puppy", the next puppy is out. 2 ½ very short hours later and there are ten puppies in our box.
Here, at the end of delivery our next set of questions would be answered. What kind of mother would Buttercup be? We believe in natural pet care. Having to supplement as part of newborn puppy care is not the ideal environment.
Thankfully, mom settled right in and began to show us what an amazing mother she would turn out to be.
When puppies are born, there are a few distinct characteristics:
- Their eyes do not open.
- Their ears are not open.
- They cannot urinate or defecate without assistance.
This makes mom extremely important to their care. Throughout the day, mom must lick their bottoms to stimulate bowel functions. It was an exciting relief to see her licking them all within the first couple of hours.
She was also very attentive to where they were around her, and gently herded them around where they needed to go.
Because the puppies arrived so quickly, we had not had a lot of time to inspect them. The basic inspection consisted of looking for all legs and paws, ensuring each of them had an anus and reproductive parts, as well as checking for cleft palate. A puppy with a cleft palate has a very low rate of survival.
It was very exciting to observe each puppy in turn have all necessary bits.
One other important part of puppy development is learning about each puppy's sucking ability as well as their ability to defend their place of eating. Stronger, more dominant puppies can easily push off the weaker, submissive ones. It doesn't take more than a few hours at this age for a puppy to begin to fade without eating.
Sitting in with Buttercup, we made sure that each puppy had its turn drinking colostrum which is the mother's first milk. It is loaded with antibodies. With ten puppies and only 8 teats, we felt it was best to become involved at this point to make sure each puppy got a good head start.
We wrapped up the day with a full, healthy litter. We continued to monitor Buttercup throughout the night to ensure no problems arose when the lights went out. Thankfully, the night was uneventful, and we wrapped up Day one successfully.
The cast of characters from Buttercup's litter are as follows:
1. Male, Black Ribbon, nickname: Black Tie
2. Male, Dark Green Ribbon, nickname: Christmas Puppy
3. Female, Red Ribbon, nickname: Little Red
4. Female, Dark Pink Ribbon, nickname: Pinky
5. Male, Light Blue Ribbon, nickname: TBA
6. Male, White Ribbon, nickname: TBA
7. Male, Light Green Ribbon, nickname: TBA
8. Female, Lavender Ribbon, nickname: TBA
9. Female, Glittery Ribbon, nickname: Snow Puppy
10. Female, Fancy Pink Ribbon, nickname: Double Pink
Everyone was excited after Buttercup was finished whelping her newborn puppies. The spotlight now turned to Coconut.
Continue to Part Two of Newborn Puppies
The newborn puppies have begun to arrive. As a surprise to everyone, Buttercup's English Goldendoodle puppies are the first to arrive. At 62 days, she is full term.
The first puppy out is a male. Buttercup has never seen a puppy before. Her response is to jump right out of the whelping box. That took all of us for surprise as we had never seen a dog do that before.
Her mothering instincts aren't quite all there yet, and after a couple of licks, she leaves the puppy and cord care to us. We remove the sac from the puppy, and begin rubbing it to get it to breathe. Normally, the mother would lick off the sac quite vigorously, so we try to match that with our rubbing.
After being dried and weighed, the first male gets donned with a black ribbon, and earns the temporary nickname of "black tie".
Newborn Puppies: The Beginning
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