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I recently had a female whelp a litter of 5 puppies. For those of you with larger breeds you might consider this a small or your usual sized litter, but for a toy breed, Pomeranian in this case, this is A LOT of puppies. Mom has been doing a pretty good job of taking care of them and fortunately she was in milk when the litter came. Of the 5 puppies I did intervene early-on and just topped-up the smallest puppy to ensure he would not get behind his slightly larger litter mates (0.5 to 1 oz larger).  That got...

Here you are one day, with a healthy happy litter of puppies, when all of a sudden your worst nightmare begins; DIARRHEA!  Why, what caused it, how to fix it, will they be ok, how can I help them, can they still go to their new homes on time; these are all questions that come to mind.  First we need to evaluate the severity of the diarrhea; is it semi formed like a cow patty or is it straight shooting like a firehose, is there blood or mucus in it, are there worms in it, is the odour more foul...

So now that we are on route to determine if our female is ovulating and we have chosen what type of semen we are using, what happens next? This all depends on HOW we plan to breed her. We have many options on how a breeding can take place and what type of semen will be used. For the semen options we have fresh, chilled, and frozen (for more information on these read my prior blog, HERE). Beyond that the mating options are live mating, vaginal insemination, transcervical insemination, and surgical insemination. Making the choice of what type of semen...

How to Use Calcium During Whelping & Lactation Let's Discuss Calcium during Whelping In mammals such as dogs, calcium allows the uterine muscle to slide past and shorten, resulting in effective uterine contraction. Low blood calcium leads to ineffective contractions and nervousness, often resulting in puppy loss. Extremely low levels of calcium in the the bloodstream can cause eclampsia which can be fatal and is a medical emergency.                                                                 ...

A problem you may experience with your mother dog is a low milk supply. This can happen with large litters, or litters with small puppies that aren’t nursing enough to bring in milk, and especially after a C-section. During the first week post-whelp your mother dog’s milk will transition from colostrum, to milk. Colostrum is high in energy, nutrients and antibodies, so despite appearing thinner it provides vital nutrition to the pups. Even though it may not appear as though she has a lot of milk, breeders can use the pups’ weight to determine if she is producing enough. Pups...