Hard lessons from the whelping box

I had so hoped to report that Lark’s first litter was a breeze, reminiscent of her great grandmother’s litters and her mother’s first litter, where I became quite spoiled by a common pattern of 6 or 7 puppies arriving healthy and viable within a two hour period. Instead Lark labored over 3 hours on the evening of March 3rd before she delivered her first puppy and no amount of rubbing or attempts to remove fluid from nose and lungs could revive the puppy. We lost two more in a similar fashion, the 3rd and 6th puppies whelped. There was nothing obviously wrong with any of these pups; to the best of our understanding they simply spent too much time “in transit” and their sacks opened before they were out of the birth canal. However, we are fortunate to have three very robust males which we are temporarily calling Crosby, Stills and Nash. Walking Lark in between deliveries and judicious administration of Oral Cal Plus before the first, second, fourth and sixth puppies appeared to help move things along. In addition, I’m extremely grateful my friend Lin (with vet tech experience) was on hand to assist. Without her help we very likely would have been headed to the emergency vet for assistance.

Lark has turned out to be an incredible mother, much like her mother and grandmother. She is extremely attentive to her pups and they are gaining weight rapidly. Their skin is a healthy pink and they always feel warm and full to the touch, which is exactly how a healthy puppy should feel. Lark is very concerned when we take them away for a few moments to weigh them or perform the early neurological stimulation exercises we started on day three, though she is beginning to relax a bit more as she realizes we return them to her after only a few moments of separation.

About 2.5 days after she gave birth, I noticed Lark’s rearmost teats seemed enlarged and somewhat hardened. Even though this is the first time I have had a bitch develop mastitis (http://elizabeth-skoglund.suite101.com/canine-mastitis-a71661), I was pretty certain that’s what Lark was experiencing so I started applying warm compresses right away. Later that day my vet confirmed the diagnosis. Lark was already on antibiotics as a precaution due to our invasive efforts during whelping so I continued to apply warm compresses and drain the affected glands. Things were pretty well back to normal within three days.

"Larkie's boyz" all hit the 2lb mark or above on day 8. They are the most roly poly bunch of pups we have whelped to date. I'm looking forward to watching how they interact with their environment and seeing their personalities emerge.