Mine Eyes Have Been Opened

The puppies eyes are slowly opening.  About half of our litter has their eyes completly open and the others are half way open.  Each day their eyelids separate a little bit more revealing their blue tinted brown eyes.  Puppies eyes will eventually be all brown.

First Steps

Some of our puppies have started to walk.  They have evolved from "crawling" on their tummies or maybe a better description would be swimming on land, stomach on the ground with all four limbs paddling for mom.  A few of the puppies are now stumbling around on all fours.  It reminds me a bit of Bambi.  Although this is pretty amusing because their eyes are still closed.  The puppies use their nose to smell mom and work their way to her.  They are so sweet.

Week Old Standard Poodle Litter

One week old.

The puppies have had an eventful week, they have almost doubled in size.  They have had their tails docked and dew claws removed.  Their eyes are still closed and their ears too.  

I can't wait to see their eyes open this week!

Whleping Day - Clover's Birth Story

24 hours old.

I have a very hippie view of birth.  Basically I believe that birth is a natural process that works it self out most of the time.  So I settled down with my camera to watch Clover whelp her puppies. 5 minutes later I put it down.  Clover wasn't severing the umbilical cord, eating the placenta, or showing any interest in her puppy.   Her birth was anything but textbook. She wanted to get out of the whelping box, so I let her. Then all of a sudden she popped out another puppy semi-tore open the sac and walked away. 

Puppy number two was covered in meconium, still attached to her placenta and Clover again walked away not at all interested in her second born.  As I was cleaning off puppy number two, her lips started to turn blue and I resorted to CPR.  Bubbles of amniotic fluid came out of her nose and she started to whine and behave like her older brother.  As I was trying to tie off the umbilical cord, I saw puppy number three had been born and abandoned.  He too was laying on the floor still in his sac.

I rushed in and performed the third rescue of the morning.  Clover was rejecting her puppies!  I fought back the tears and called the vet for the third time that morning.  Earlier, I left 2 panicked voicemails during the birth, but I have no idea when I found time to call because those three puppies were born in a fifteen minute period.

When my vet, Dr Kristi, called me back she said that Clover was likely still in active labour probably too occupied with that to clean off her puppies or allow them to nurse.  We talked of formula feeding and some of the responsibilities I would now have as a surrogate mother to the puppies.  I was secretly glad for the respectively small litter of 5 expected puppies.   Then Dr Kristi encouraged us to get Clover to nurse.

My husband helped Clover lay down and I latched each puppy on a nipple.  Clover began to gingerly lick a puppy and then she thoroughly licked all the puppies.  She calmed down and allowed them to nurse.  She became protective of her puppies and relaxed into her new role as mom.

About an hour later, her labour started back up and I am happy to say she whelped the rest of the puppies perfectly.  She was severing the cords, eating placentas and cleaning puppies off, and finally nursing each one. We were very surprised to meet puppy number six.  Clover's scan had showed only five puppies.  Clover had EIGHT puppies!  Three boys and five girls ranging in colour from apricot to cream.  

Clover with her first liter.  Puppies are only hours old.

Assisting Clover in the birth process was a life goal met for me, but also somehow a sacred experience.  I cried and laughed.  It was incredibly scary but I loved it.

BIG news!

Finn cuddling Clover's pregnant belly.

For weeks Clover's nipples have been growing larger and her stomach too.  She looks more like a wiener dog instead of a barrel chested poodle. Last week her stomach grew a full two inches.  I have been impatiently waiting for the 45 day gestational X-ray to confirm the now obvious pregnancy.  Today was the day. I am so excited to announce that YES. She is expecting!  She is due on October 27.  Congratulations to Clover and Finn.

A Summer Vacation Souvenir

After a vacation in Victoria BC with some long walks on the beach, my dogs came home with a souvenir -FLEAS!!!  I thought they seemed a bit more itchy, but didn't think much of it because my vet said that fleas don't live in our climate.  But I just found a live flea on one of my dogs! EEW!

After a quick google of flea treatments I discovered this webpage. http://www.richsoil.com/flea-control.jsp  It coveres pretty much everything that I already knew and got it right. I like the idea of using food grade Diatomaceous Earth, because it is natural and a safe product for humans and pets.  

PLAN TO ERADICATE FLEAS

1.  Bathe dogs in soapy water

2.  Groom them with flea comb and remove and kill any live fleas

3.  Launder anything the dogs have touched

4.  Vacuum the entire house

5.  Dust the carpet with Diatomaceous Earth

Wishing for Puppies

When I was 11, my best friend's cat had kittens.  I loved it.  But I didn't like that they were going to grow up to be cats.  (I am a dog person.)  I wanted the same experience with dogs.  After we adopted Clover I hoped we would be able to breed her, once she was old enough.  Standard poodles aren't fully mature till they are 2 years old.

After a ton of reading and research, I had her vet, Dr. Kristi, check her hips for defects and her eyes as well as anything else that would preclude her from being a mom.  My vet not only endorsed Clover's health but her excellent disposition.  Clover is smart and sweet.  I swear she understands English.

At least I was able to snap this picture while we tried to breed her.

So when Clover was 22 months old, I tried to breed her with a stud in rural community 2 hours from home.  We drove her to see her new boyfriend on Day 7 through Day 12, but she would not stand for him.  She would flag and flirt but off she would run if he tried to mount.  I was so frustrated.  On day 14 we tried a different stud and took the two dogs to the vet for artificial insemination.  The vet then gave me the bad news that Clover was no longer in estrous. I was devastated.  I had spent hundreds of dollars on gas and vet bills and we were still no closer to our goal of parenting puppies.  So we went home and hoped for better luck on her next heat cycle 7 months away...

Finn AKA Phoenix, Phinneas, Ferb

Briefly this passed winter, and I mean perhaps for a mere 24 hours, I thought that I wanted to adopt a male chocolate lab. The fleeting infatuation with chocolate labs was just long enough for me to post an ad on kijiji, and forget about it. My inbox got a single response regarding adopting another standard poodle.  How serendipitous, I was just thinking I would rather have another poodle rather than a hyper, shedding lab.  The poodle was white.  Yuck. I mean what about if he peed on himself, would his fur stain?  He was also bigger than Clover.  Could I really handle a dog who was bigger than Clover?  I had my doubts but it just felt right. I became really excited about possibly about adopting Finn. My husband was not.  For 2 and half months we talked about adopting Finn and finally we brought him home in the end of April 2012.  

We all love Finn, now.  He is very gentle with people, in fact my four year old rides him like a pony. He does pretty well with other dogs but Finn has to do a little maucho posturing to let every dog know he is alpha.  He came to us untrained so I am working with him.  He is eager to please but he is still a work in progress. I am so glad that he ended up with our family for his forever home.

 Finn after we got him home and groomed.  

I just love his pom pom tail.

Clover AKA Cloveroo, Clovis, and Cloves

The deal was: When we buy a house, we get a dog.  

In three weeks we were moving 1000km away and into OUR brand new house. It was time to make good on the deal we made as newly weds.  Time to get a dog.  I wanted a red standard poodle, not black, not white, not champagne, not silver and definitely not parti, but RED.  Slight problem, I could not find a breeder with red poodles anywhere in Alberta.  And of course there was this perfect red, well maybe apricot coloured, standard poodle puppy, who had had even rolled on to her back for my kids, -"a sure sign of a non-aggressive dog".  This perfect puppy's breeder was located just an hour away. But this perfect puppy needed to be adopted pronto.  Before we moved to Alberta.  No, they would not hold her for us 'till moving day.  Ugh.  What to do?  What to do? 

Well there wouldn't be much of a blog if we hadn't adopted her. Clover is my beloved apricot* standard poodle.  Today, she is two years old.

Clover age 10 weeks, strawberry picking with my husband.