Tuesday, October 31, 2006

More Q & A



Brie asks:

Their noses gradually darken? Is that what I'm seeing?

Yes, most sammies (and I'm guessing all breeds with dark points?) are born with pink skin all over. As they get older their noses, eye rims and lip rims will darken. Many sammies also get black spots on their tummies and their paw pads turn black as well. Usually noses and eye rims are completely dark by 8-10 weeks, lip rims may take longer, in fact, I have one dog who didn't complety fill in until he was 4 years old!

Occasionally they are born with a little pigment, usually seen as a gray shading. Breeders like to brag how quickly their puppies get pigment, but in the end it really doesn't matter how fast it comes in.

Lisa said:

They are growing so fast!

I'm guessing the first one will hit two pounds tomorrow! And maybe even a couple of them will. The youngest I've ever had a puppy hit two pounds was 6 days (that was Babe) but given how big these guys were when they were born, similar to Raven's litter, 10 days seems to be 2 Pound Day.

Eyes may start to open in the next few days... I've occasionally had a puppy open its eyes as young as 10 or 11 days but more typically it's about 14 or 15 days. I'm betting on Red to be the first!

Now walking is a different story... I've had puppies walk as early as 6 days and as late as 21! I swear I saw either Blue or Purple up on his feet actually walking at one point today. But all my efforsts to catch him at it again have been in vain. But I'm betting tomorrow I'll have a couple entries in the Progress Chart!

Monday, October 30, 2006

Kelly's Kids at One Week

Here they are, one week old already!






What Else Is New?

I added a gallery of pictures to the website, link on the sidebar over there ====>>>

And a progress chart down at the bottom of this page, under the growth chart. Again, there is a link in the sidebar.

Sunday, October 29, 2006

Just a Couple Pictures...

One week portraits tomorrow! Until then...



Saturday, October 28, 2006

Q & A

Several people have written to me or left comments asking about the colored spots on the puppies. What am I using to make them?

Sharpie permanent markers.

Believe it or not, even though they smell *awful*, they are non-toxic.

Claudette asks:

Does everybody have dew claws and do you have all removed?

Yes, all 7 puppies had dewclaws and they were all removed. They only had front dewclaws which has been true of all the litters I've ever had except the first one. A few of those puppies had rear dewclaws as well as front ones. I've since been told that it is typical of the line that litter was from.

The dewclaw removal went as expected yesterday. The vet did a good job, it was over quickly but both the puppies and Kelly were upset afterwards. They did not sleep well last night, so neither did I. Sometimes I think I should skip having the dewclaws removed, but if they remain, and are "loose" on the leg, they can be easily injured in the future, and that can be very painful and can require surgery to fix. So the puppies go thru a relatively minor process now to avoid a potentially major one later.

As far as I know the camera should be up 7 x 24. If it's down for an extended period of time, please leave a comment or email me and let me know!

Friday, October 27, 2006

The Blizzard of 2006.....

.... was not as bad as it could have been. We had plenty of wind and plenty of snow and my husband (who insisted he had to drive in to work yesterday morning) got stuck about a mile from the house and had to walk home last night. But we never lost power, the heat stayed on and the puppies stayed warm.


I did lose my internet connection and while its back today, it is VERY slow (which is why you probably can't get camera connectivity).


The vet was closed yesterday (not that I could have gotten there anyway) so we have another appointment to get dewclaws removed today at 4:00.


Everyone is over a pound now and Kelly continues to be a great mom.

Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Pounders

Four of the seven pups hit one pound today. I'm pleased with the weight gains on all of them, although Blue Boy was making me a bit nervous the first couple days.

Tomorrow is dew claw day. We have a 3:30 appointment. That is unless we get snowed in. Although the weather here is *gorgeous* today, in the mid 60s, bright, sunny and only a few fluffy white clouds, here is the weather report, as of 3:14 MT, for tomorrow:

Blizzard Warning in effect from 3 am to 6 PM MT Thursday...


Yes, I'm serious. Possible total accumuation of 12 inches. High of 32 degrees. And that does not include the drifts which at my house often reach 6 feet. Colorado, love the weather or leave the state :)

Anyway, back to the puppies....dewclaws are usually removed when the pups are 3-5 days old. Because Blue was lagging behind on weight gain, I decided to wait and take them in on Day 4 instead of Day 3. If the weather is as bad as they say, I may be waiting until day 5 or 6.

And if I don't post at least the weight gains tomorrow, or if the camera is down, it's because we have no power.... think warm thoughts for the puppies, we may need it!

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

The Wanderer.

There's one in every litter. In this litter it looks like it might be Orange Boy.

Yesterday afternoon:


Last night:


This morning:


Looks like Blue Boy is a snuggler...



Kelly is doing a GREAT job!

Monday, October 23, 2006

Look How Fast We Grow!

I added a growth chart to the bottom of the page. Weigh in will be every night for the first few weeks, then one or twice a week after that.

1 Day Old

Kelly is being a *fantastic* mom! For the most part she is very careful about where she lies down. With seven in the box it can be kind of hard to miss them all so I do help her out occasionally by rearranging them or pulling one out from under her.


One thing she is doing that I have never had any other Mom do... if she doesn't like where they are SHE PICKS THEM UP AND MOVES THEM!!! Really freaked me out the first time I saw her with a puppy in her mouth! I know that Mom dogs will do that, I've just never had one actually do it.

Each week, give or take a day I'll be posting "birthday portraits" of each pup. They will be the same size and order each week so it's easy to see how each pup is developing relative to the littermates.

For these pictures the border color will be the puppies color. This is true for any pictures I take where I know which puppy it is. As a reminder, Red and Yellow are the girls.





Umm.. why yes... Brown did become Orange. It's a husband thing that I don't totally understand....

So far these pups have been quiet and happy. Hope it stays that way!!

Sunday, October 22, 2006

Seven.

Black Boy

8:00

11 oz

I'm not saying she's done until sometime tomrorow when it's been 12 hours since the last puppy....

Well. That Will Teach Me....

.... to believe the x-rays.

Number 6, Brown Boy, was born at 6:45.

14.4 oz.

We're done!

It's been an hour and a half, Kelly is resting comfortably and the puppies are all sleeping after nursing for the last hour.

5 puppies in 1 hours 40 minutes. Not too shabby.

I want to mention what makes this litter extra special.

3 years ago Kelly ate a pair of pantyhose that caused an intestional blockage.It took 4 vets, three surgeries, a couple plasma transfusions and a lot of prayers to save her. She lost part of her stomach and a foot of her intestines. She was 8 months old.

She made a complete recovery but the One Big Question was whether she could have puppies. I was urged to spay her at the time, the vet was concerned about surgical adhesions getting in the way of a normal pregnancy and delivery. I left her intact so I could show her, never sure that I would breed her.

I only decided to breed her after consulting with multiple other vets who all said it probably wouldn't be a problem until she tried to deliver. Well it wasn't a problem :)

I am so proud of Kelly!! Now I have to tend to a bunch of other dogs who have been **ANGELS** today even though they knew something really interesting was going on. Not a peep out of any of them the entire day.

Pictures tomorrow!!!

Purple Boy Arrives!

4:00

That means she had 4 puppies in 1hour and twenty minutes. That's even faster than Aliy and Raven! I'm not sure it's faster than Kachina had her first four. She was just plopping them out so fast I didn't even have a chance to tell what sex they were.

13.4 oz

Ken is surprised they are this small. they are not TOO small but they are smaller than the puppies Rapper ususally produces.

He is also surprised that she ishaving them so fast.

That being said, she's having more contractions!! Oh Good LORD she just had another puppy!

Okay I'm back.... Hello Blue Boy born at 4:20!

She is in theory, done. We'll see. It would be nice to have another girl to even out the numbers :)

Another Girl! And A Boy!!!

All I have to do is talk to Ken on the phone and another puppy comes :)

Yellow Girl born at 3:25 weighing in at 13.9 oz.

Green Boy born at 3:45 weighing in at 14.3 oz.

Kelly is doing pretty good, I just wish she'd stop sliming them!!

It's a Girl!

Red Girl 13.2 oz.

Born breech, needed some help. Kelly thought the placenta was disgusting and thought maybe the puppy was dinner. She kept trying to put the whole head in her mouth.

Only issue I'm having now is Kelly keeps licking her which gets her wet and it's COLD in my house. So for now, after nursing a bit, I put her in a warming box while Kelly has the next one.

Update 1:22

Her water broke at about 12:10 and she had two small contractions then *nothing* for almost an hour.

A little after 1:00 she had several more contractions then took a 10 minute break then had several more.

And now it looks like she's having a few more. Still can't see anything....

Why am I so worried about all this? Because Kelly had multiple abdominal surgeries at 8 months old and adhesions are potentially an issue. No way to know if they are a problem until they actually become one. According to the vet, I just to have to look for signs she is "in distress"

And also becuase I'm not used to all these drmatics. Kachina, Aliy and Raven just had a set of contractions and popped out a puppy. 20 minutes later more contractions another puppy. None of this multiple hours stuff for them. So this is "different" for me.

On Our Way. Slowly.

6 am temp: 98.5

I think this is going to take awhile.

I'm not sure who got less sleep last night, me or Kelly.

At least I had a place to sleep. The first two litters I had I slept next to the whelpig box on a camping matress. Then I "moved up" to a 48 inch love seat. Given that I am 58 inches it was less then comfortable. Last week I bought a futon so I have a real bed in the puppy room.

Ummm... we'll finish the Futon story later... gotta go... she just had a contraction!!

2 hours later....

Okay well I *thought* she had a contraction. But there has been *nothing* since. And she does not seem in any discomfrot (other than the obvious). So maybe what I thought was a contraction was just Kelly getting comfortable on the futon next to me.

So anyway, back to last night. We spent the first part of the night with Kelly insisting on pushing her cold wet nose into my face every 30 seconds.

Then we spent the second part of the night with Kelly pacing.. pacing.. pacing..pacing.

Then from about 3 AM to 6 AM she sat or laid on the futon next to me, pressed up against me as close as she could get panting....panting...panting...

Since then (and the contraction that was apparently not a contraction) it's been really hectic here. The other dogs had to be fed and let out and all of that is making Kelly very unhappy. Nothing I can do though other than try to get everyone taken care of and settled. We did take a short walk but all she wanted to do was go back to the house.

She isn't happy in the puppy room, she wants to be in the little crate in the bedroom I wrote about a couple weeks ago. I have tried reasoning with her but she won't listen :) So here we sit, me in the whleping box and her jumping in and out and pacing the room.

I wish I could just get her lie down quietly in one place for ten minutes.

Saturday, October 21, 2006

6 PM Temp: 99.2

Hmmmmm......

She didn't eat her dinner tonight.

And she's acting a little restless.

Let's see what the next temperature reading brings.....

Not Today

6 am temp: 100.4

The temperature pretty much says it all.....

Friday, October 20, 2006

See How BIG She Is????

6 am: 100.1
noon: 99.8
6 pm: 100.1


I took this picture this afternoon as she was running (sort of) thru the yard towards me. She was pretty far away so it's not the best picture but you can clearly see her tummy sticking out on both sides! She is usually a sleek 48 - 50 lbs, I'm thinking right now she's at about 65.... and she's really not eating much at all!

Not much else going on here.

I only have two more days of Halloween costumes left for her stunt double....

Thursday, October 19, 2006

Coming To You LIVE.....

noon temp: 100.2

..... from Kelly's whelping box! It's the Kelly Cam!!!!



You do need to have Java enabled to be able to see the cam pictures.

Not much to see, but I figured I better get it up and running before any action started. Now if my ISP can just keep the connection up... yup, I was down again most of today :(

From the Comments....

6 pm: 100.6
10 pm: 100.4
6 am: 99.8

cheerios left the following comment yesterday:

"interested in seeing kelly and the puppies' pedigree, is there something wrong with the link?"

Why yes indeed, there was something wrong with the link. In fact my ISP said they got hacked yesterday so anything I store on their server (pictures, pedigrees, my entire website) was GONE. I also had no access to email for about 36 hours. Luckily they got it all back around 10 PM last night without losing anything! Yay!

This blog (as well as the others) is on Blogger so that's why it still came up although without pictures or working links.

So why am I talking about hacked servers and blog locations instead of about KELLY?? Because there is absolutely, positively *nothing* going on with her :) Which is good for now. I still think The Day will be Sunday, maybe Saturday.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

Milk! Finally.

AM temp: 99.5

Well it's about damn time.

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Kelly Proves Me Wrong

AM temp: 100.3
PM temp: 100.1

Last week I posted that Kelly was not eating well. My assumption was that she just had babies taking up so much room she wasn't hungry.

Apparently I was wrong.

If someone had asked me yesterday which of my dogs would be the least likely to be able to catch and kill their own dinner I'd have said Kelly. In fact I'd have almost been willing to place money on the fact that she had NEVER caught anything in her life.

Apparently I was wrong.

This morning after turning her nose up at her breakfast she went outside and in less than five minutes managed to catch her own breakfast. I don't know what it was but she seemed to be enjoying it and was not about to let me get close enough to either see what it was or take it away from her.

And here I thought maybe I had a Mom-Dog who was not going to bring her kids her idea of what she thinks they should be eating. But it turns out she is probably going to be just like Aliy and Raven after all....

Sunday, October 15, 2006

I Felt a Puppy Move!!!!!!

7 AM: 99.8

Last night, right before settling Kelly down for the night, I put her on the bed next to me, laid my hand on her tummy... and felt the puppies moving!

The is is always one of the most exciting things during the pregnancy. It's one thing to have the vet tell you she is pregant, even to "see" the puppies on the ulstrasound or x-ray. It's another to see her getting bigger and bigger but it's so totally different when you actually feel them move under your hand.

I went back and checked my records the other day. I usually feel puppies move about 12 days of so before they are born. Most of my firends tell me they don't feel them until about 7 days. I think it is a difference in how and where Kachina and her daughters carry their pups because there is no way Kelly is still 12 days from having these guys.

I sure do with she'd get some milk in. That's another thing that's very different this time. I'm used to having milk come in about the time I start feeling the puppies. But Kelly is still dry as a bone, which I'm told is often the case until they are actaully born... just not something I'm used to.

Saturday, October 14, 2006

The Time Has Come.....

7 AM temp: 100.3

.... to start taking Kelly's temperature. For the next few days I'll take it twice a day. The I'll start checking it 4 times a day.

Why?

It's the most reliable way I know of to tell when the puppies are coming.

A normal temperature for a dog is around 101-102 degrees. But every dog is different and so I need to establish what is "normal" for Kelly. I'll do that over the next few days by taking her temperature several times during the day.

At somepoint in the next few weeks there will be a dramatic temperature drop. It may go as low as 96 degrees. Most dogs experience this temperature drop and it usually means pups are due within 24 hours. In some cases it may mean just a few hours! When Kachina's temperature dropped I had puppies in less than 10 hours.

Aside from using the temperature drop as an indicator that pups are due soon, it's important to monitor so that you know if there is a potential problem. If the temperature drops and stays down for a long period of time and there are no signs of labor, it may be an indication that there is a problem and that a Cesarian Section may be needed, or at the very least, a trip to the vet for check up.

I'll be positng Kelly's temperature in the chart on the sidebar over to the right regularly.

Thursday, October 12, 2006

Four. Probably Five.

I was just kidding when I said 42 :)

Kelly and I just got back from the vet where they confirmed absolutely positively there are four puppies and most likely five.

I had hoped to post pictures of the x-rays where it would be easy to see the puppies, they gave me a CD with the films on them but when I bring them up on my PC I can't see anything other than one little spine. When we looked at them full size, you could very clearly see many more. Anywhere here's is a little bit of the one where you can see the spine....just barely, but it's there.

Wednesday, October 11, 2006

X-Ray Scheduled!

Tomorrow shortly after 2 PM I'll be able to report back how many puppies we are expecting.

Stay tuned for the big news!

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

Puppy Pedigree

I finally got around to putting Kelly and Rapper's pedigrees together into one combined one. You can view it here. Link in the sidebar too!

Sunday, October 08, 2006

Kelly Can't Eat

Okay, that's not quite true. She can eat. And she is eating. But she can't eat an entire meal at one sitting.

Other than when she was so sick as a puppy (Maybe I'll tell that story at some point in the future) the only time Kelly does not eat is when we are traveling. She HATES to travel and will dump her bowl and scatter the food all over to show her displeasure.

Her usual "at home" behavior when presented with a bowl of food is to scarf it down almost before the bottom of the bowl hits the floor. In fact she eats so fast that as a young dog I use to scatter the food across the floor of her crate instead of giving it to her in a bowl in order to slow her down as I was constantly worried about her choking!

For the last 3-4 days she greets each bowl with her usual frenzied hunger, eats about half.. and then quits. At first I was a bit worried, but then I realized the 42 puppies inside her tummy ate taking up so much room she can't fit an entire meal in their all at once. So she is now getting fed about 5 times a day with little meals each time.

She's happy, I'm happy.

Monday, October 02, 2006

Big Dog

Kelly is huge. H. U. G. E. HUGE!!!!

I have never had a girl this big so early in her prgnancy. Shoot, Aliy never showed at all with her second litter!

Does this mean Ken really did fatten her up a lot while she was with him? (I don't think so since when I took her in for the pregnancy test she had only gained one pound since the day she left to go to Oregon...)

Does it mean she has BIG puppies in there?

Or does it mean she has a LOT of puppies?

Or just a lot of fluid?

She is already having trouble jumping on and off the bed. Boom'r and Kachina were still jumping on and off the bed the day they had their puppies!!

Kelly is also visibly uncomfortable when she stuffs herself into her crate of choice in the bedroom. I keep trying to convince her to go in the big crate but she prefers the little (30" by 20") one. Silly dog.

I think maybe I need to set up the whelping box soon and put an ex pen around it and let her spend her "rest time" in there instead of in a crate. As I mentioned before, Kelly is the ultimate creature of habit and I think she needs to get adjusted to her new surroundings well in advance of the puppies coming.

I'll get a picture of the fat girl later this week and post it here so everyone can see my gigantic dog....