The puppies have had a terrific first week. Edie has settled into her new role beautifully. She is calm and relaxed with her puppies and attentive to their needs, lovingly feeding and cleaning them throughout the day.
The miracle of birth and transition into motherhood is awe inspiring and I am filled with appreciation and wonder with every litter. The puppies are so vulnerable at this age. They cannot see, nor hear and are not yet able to regulate their own body temperature. A supportive and safe environment is essential.
It’s a fairly quiet week in the whelping room. Our focus is to provide supportive care to Edie. I bring cool, fresh water for her to drink and multiple meals throughout the day to her in the box. During the first few days she doesn’t want to leave her puppies but will happily eat and drink if I provide room service.
I clean the whelping box and wash the bedding daily and towards the end of the first week I begin to add some larger stuffed animals for the pups to navigate around.
I have started trimming puppy nails every three days and on day three I start doing Early Neurological Stimulation exercises which will continue until the puppies are sixteen days old. I've also begun implementing Early Scent Introduction in which novel scents are introduced to the neonate puppies. So far the scents they have reacted to most were lavender and a smelly sock!
The puppies all have french names as the theme for this litter!
These puppies have all been spoken for. If you would like to follow the litter's progress please join us on Facebook and like our Northrock Barbets page to see frequent updates and photos.
