Puppies!!!

We have puppies!!!


Four beautiful little darlings, to be precise. They arrived in the wee hours of the morning yesterday, September 1st – right on schedule.

Mo had been acting a bit antsy during the afternoon, according to Nanny & the kids, but when I got home from work she seemed a bit more settled. We even took her out to the field after supper with Pigster and played out there for an hour. But as soon as we got settled for bed, it became apparent that she was in serious labour – and that I wasn’t going to get much sleep at all.

The kids were asleep by 9:30 and I had almost fallen asleep by 10:00 when MoMo woke me with barking and scuffling. I got up and let her out to pee, after which she jumped onto the kids’ bed and settled there. That lasted for all of about 3 minutes, then she was up and pacing back and forth from kitchen to bedroom, pawing in her crate, pawing in the whelping box, jumping on my bed and off, and about a half hour later barking again. That was the pattern for the next 2½ hours. Button slept through it all, but Mustang awoke around 10:30 and couldn’t settle again what with MoMo being so unsettled. So she kept me company with MoMo until half past midnight, at which point MoMo headed straight for the whelping box and settled down to push. We saw a puppy sac begin to emerge, so Mustang rushed over to wake Button and tell him the puppies were coming. That puppy went back in, though, and it actually took another hour before the puppy finally popped out. The others followed in short order and within an hour we had four little darlings.



However, an ultrasound in late July had shown 5, maybe 6 puppies developing or so the vet said, so we were expecting another two or at least one to arrive. But MoMo didn’t seem to know that. She settled in to nurse her pups and didn’t act at all like there was anything more happening. After an hour of waiting with nothing happening I sent the kids back to bed, promising to wake them should another puppy arrive, and sat down to keep watch By 5 am nothing had happened so I headed to bed myself. Nanny arrived at 7:15 and tried to sneak into the house (I’d posted a notice at the front door to alert her we were sleeping) but MoMo barked a bit which woke me. I went back to bed for another hour, but the kids got up to show Nanny the puppies.



After breakfast I called the vet and said I wasn’t sure whether to be concerned about the lack of puppy/ies #5 and possibly #6 or not, as MoMo didn’t seem to be labouring any more. They recommended coming in for another ultrasound to be sure, so just before noon – after having taken Mustang to the dentist and slept a bit more – we bundled the pupsters into a little basket and took them with MoMo to the vet’s office. The ultrasound revealed that no, there were no more puppies in there – so four it is!!

Introducing:

Sapphire Sea Star
born at 1:48 a.m. – a lovely dark chocolate girl (the only girl of the litter) who came in weighing 175g.

Zircon Ocean Spume
born at 2:01 a.m. – a lighter chocolate boy, weighing 230g.

Carnelian High Tide
born at 2:34 a.m. – a cream-coloured fellow, who was a hefty 290g (Mo really had to push to get him out; I helped along a bit).

Jasper Jellyfish
born at 2:44 a.m. – a darker apricot-coloured guy who already seems to have the calmest personality of the lot, weighing in at a mere 174g.

Stay tuned for more pix as they grow and develop!!