weight

I have to say, these puppies look enormous to me.  They feel fat & heavy & very cuddly.  Don't ask me why - I have no idea why I have this perception, because apparently it's not true!  The numbers don't lie, and as you can see from from nerdy charts below, it seems that these puppies are extremely average in size and weight (if extreme average-ness isn't an oxymoron).

In other news, the puppies have been wormed for the first time.  That never goes down well because it's a liquid and they tell me it tastes terrible.  As proof, you can see their uncles from Tuuli's first litter being wormed at the same age here.  

This time I tried Drontal wormer instead of the Panacur I normally use.  I do believe the puppies tolerated the terrible taste more readily than others have coped with Panacur in the past.  I was slightly concerned as the Drontal is obviously a stronger drug, because you only give it once whereas the Panacur you give once a day for 3 days.  However, there have been no apparent ill effects, and it can only be a good thing for them not to have more than one day of it at a time.  

And here are the weights.  The puppies were weighed twice a day for the first week and then daily for the second week.  From now on they will only be weighed weekly.  The first table shows their weekly weight followed by a chart showing the same information in diagram size; and they are all extremely close.  The last chart is my litter average weight comparison chart.  See - I told you it was nerdy.  

If you're having trouble seeing the images, you can click on them for a larger size.

1 week weights

On the puppies' one-week birthday they all had their nails cut, were weighed, handled, stroked, poked, prodded & generally made a fuss of.  Ok, so apart from the nail cutting, the rest of that stuff happens every day.

The puppies are weighed every day for the first two weeks of life and then weekly thereafter.  I keep an eye on them to make sure they are all getting a fair crack at the milk bar and that everyone is growing as they should.  For the first week the puppies are expected to gain approximately 10% of their weight per day and roughly to have doubled their birth weight at one week.  Here's how the daily weigh-in went - with tables and graphs and everything.

Novak is officially the smallest puppy I've ever had.  Sybbie who was "Spot", the first-born of the Devon Nine, was only a few grams heavier at birth, although she did more than double her weight in the first week.  But right from the beginning Novak was strong & healthy and he's developing as he should, so no worries there.  And if you're thinking that baby size somehow implies eventual adult dog size - nope.  It seems to make no difference.  As he was Emmi's first ever puppy to be born, I'm sure she is grateful he was on the small side. 

You might also be thinking that surely Andy must be the biggest puppy I've ever had.  After all, he's head-and-shoulders bigger than the rest of his littermates (so to speak).  But, again, no.  Usko, who was "Dino" (as in the dinosaur) in the Tuisku litter holds the record for the biggest puppy.  As he was a whopping 467 grams at birth, and 840 grams at 1 week, I'm hoping he keeps his record.

Here's what's been going on in the whelping box the last couple of days.  And I'm putting it out there now that it would not surprise me a bit if one or two of the puppies had their eyes open before 10 days old.  They are already hoicking themselves to their feet for an unsteady step or two.  I really need to capture that on video.

Clockwise from bottom: Roger, Andy & Novak

Novak.... or maybe Andy.  With milky chops.

Roger with little tongue

Serena asleep on a brother

Stan cutie pie

weights & other horror stories

Aw, just kiddin'.  Weights are not a horror story for these puppies - although I cannot deny they are very chubby.  In fact, I was concerned that they would be slow to get up on their feet for being too top-heavy.  But I need not have feared, they are indeed up now and walking around.  Well, kinda.

But it's true they are not a petite bunch, although the stats don't lie - they are no bigger than other litters at this age - and not even as heavy as their dad's litter.  Here's the comparison chart.  Click on the image for a bigger version. 

The horror of this story is the tale of puppy worming.  It's a job I don't look forward to and there are many versions of the story at various points in this blog - you can see them here and here, for example.  It's the first time that the puppies realise that something terrible can come from human hands, and it happens when they are only 2 weeks old.  It's a sad day.  It's a sad 3 days, actually, because you have to do it 3 days in a row.  Poor puppies.

First I cover myself carefully and well with a towel because I have learned from bitter experience just how far this stuff can travel when a puppy shakes his head to get the foul stuff OUT of his mouth and ON me.

Then I lull them into a false sense of security with yummy milk in a syringe.  Then without warning, in goes the wormer.

Tux: "Ok, this milk ain't so bad"

Kukka:  "Not sure about this..."

Kukka:  "Nooooo!  Make it stop!

WAH!

Ensi:  "What did you just do to me?!"

weights

Time for the guessing game that is the puppies' weights.  They were all a good size at birth (just ask Tuuli who had to squeeze them out, occasionally bum-first) and they are gaining weight well.  We generally expect them to gain approximately 10% of their weight per day and to double their weight in the first week.  I weigh them daily and any who are lagging behind I make sure get extra time at the milk bar when others are sleeping.  Some puppies will gain more one day and less the next, so it is not always the case that the heaviest puppy at birth will be the heaviest at 1 week old.

I have to say that these puppies are growing fast.  As you can see from the chart below, they are mainly gaining much more than 10% per day.

And, incidentally, just so ya know, the weight and size of puppies at any age bear no resemblance to the size of the eventual adult dog.  Not with my puppies anyway. 

So here is the weight info to date - you can click on the image to see a bigger version.  The question is this:  who will be the heaviest at the 7-day weigh-in?  The poll is at the top right.  Happy voting!

And for those who drop in to see photos of puppies instead of numbers and coloured lines, here is a selection of happy mum & babies from the past 2 days.

Row of Sleeping Puppies

Row of Suckling Puppies

Little Faces  -  Liila getting browner everyday :-)

Little Sticking-Out Tails

And from the out-takes file, Tuuli is looking a bit taken aback - I must have caught a puppy in mid-squawk.

"WTF?!"

5 weeks weights

Well, she did it.  Fooled most people, that is.  Granted, Mini still isn't, well, mini, but Sox has very quickly taken over the job of biggest puppy.  And he's rather a lot bigger when you see them.  In fact, I'm guessing that the people who guessed Sox are those who saw the puppies in person recently.  (Jay, you haven't been cheating, have you?)

Here's the news.

And here are some cute, sadly not-very-sharp photos of the gang scampering around in the frosty grass that I just couldn't resist a couple of days ago.  But first, and in haste because I have much to do before the arrival of puppy visitors today, evidence of just how incorrigible these water babies are.  New owners, consider yourselves warned.

4 weeks weights

You did it.  Well, some of you did, anyway.  A small majority of you guessed that Mini would be the biggest puppy at the 4-week weigh-in and you were right.  I was wrong, I really thought it would be Tito, based on the way he tucks into his meals now that they are getting real food 4 times a day.  Mind you, I failed to take into account how well Mini tucks in.  In fact, she is the first to start and the last to give up, so it really is no wonder she is the biggest by such a margin.   I am going to go out on a limb here and say that one of these days all of the boys will out-weigh their sisters by a kilo or 2.  Or possibly 3.  But not yet.

Here are the stats and the pictures.  You will notice that this litter is no longer the largest thanks, I think, to Tuulen's apparent reticence at mealtimes.  Yet, I'm willing to bet that he, too, will one day out-weigh even Mini.  Let's check back on this in 11 months or so, shall we?

I've said on many occasions that Neka is my pride and joy.  Here is one reason why:  puppies meeting their granny for the first time.

3 weeks weights

I've been trying to get a video of the puppies in group play but this is proving more complicated than I would wish.

People with their first Lapphund puppies are always amazed when they witness the daily mad 5 minutes known as zoomies (yes, that's a technical term).  Zoomies occur when the puppy explodes into a brief period of manic activity, careering around as fast as he can go, often with tail tucked down for maximum speed, and often barking or yipping in excitement.   With Neka this involved a circuit consisting of a figure-8 of the garden followed by a tour of the living room via the sofa (or the back of the sofa, to be precise).  Repeated x 4 or 5.  All at top speed.

Puppies often have an attack of the zoomies in the evenings.  If not zoomies, then a period of restlessness that translates into naughtiness.  Hyperactivity, barking, nipping, that sort of thing.  I always warn people about it because, like everything, it is best managed with patience and the knowledge that puppyhood will not last forever.  And this evening activity is already apparent in these puppies at 3 weeks old.

You see, there was a point to all this, and I'm getting to it now.  The point is that the evenings are the time when the puppies are most active.  It is in the evenings that we get the fabulously entertaining group games.  Unfortunately the lighting in the puppy room is insufficient for good video results in the evening, so I've been grabbing my videos in the daytime where I can.

And so here are a couple of videos for your entertainment.  They are not quite up to the full group play experience of the evening time, but there is some cuteness to be had nonetheless.  The first is a brief game of bitey-face between Tito and Tuulen as they practice using their tiny new teeth.  The second is a little after-lunch game amongst tired puppies.  There is barking, howling, growling, random squawking, wagging and wrestling. 






And so to the weight update.  They are, in a word, all enormous.  Ok, that's two words.  And perhaps not enormous, per se, just super chunky.   They are pulling way ahead in the average litter weight race. 

All of which leads me to the next weight poll as they head for the 2 kg milestone.  Who will be the heaviest at the 4-week weigh-in?  You have until sometime on Tuesday, depending on what Blogger does with the time difference.  Go vote! 

2 weeks weights

Litter average weight at 2 weeks:  1268 grams.

It's official:  this is the biggest litter of puppies to date.  Or I should say, the litter of biggest puppies to date.  Well, not the litter, perhaps, but my litter of biggest puppies thus far.  At the age of 2 weeks, anyway.

The previous largest average weight of 1207 grams at 2 weeks belonged to the Tuisku puppies, courtesy mainly of Usko and Minna.  The Pippuri gang come in at a whopping 1268 grams with the two girls weighing 50+ grams more than any of the boys.  Having said that, Tuisku Usko was still the biggest of all at more than 1400 grams. The smallest of that litter at this age was Kesa at 1060.  The smallest of any litter at this age was Inko from the Monta litter who was only 915 grams. 

I think it is testament to how well Tuuli is taking care of her babies that they are so big, healthy and contented.

Good mum hanging out with the puppies

Sleepy mum

Squished mum

1 week weights

As usual, here is the one-week weight update.  We look for the puppies to have approximately doubled their weight in the first week, and they all have, give or take 10-20 grams.  At the moment, the smallest is Tuulen and the biggest is Tito.  However, as you can see from the charts, he was a late bloomer because up until today, the biggest puppy by a mile at every weigh-in was Fiia. 

Click on the images for a bigger version.

Not that it means anything (because it doesn't), here is an average weight comparison of each litter.  This is just for fun and because I have a nerdy compulsion to observe such things.

I should point out for those who were not around at the time that, in spite of the apparent evidence to the contrary, the Tuisku litter were not actually so much "bigger" than all the others.  They were mostly quite average-sized puppies but the average was skewed by one or two particularly large puppies, namely Usko and Minna.  At birth Usko was almost 100 grams heavier than the heaviest of the Pippuri puppies, and Minna wasn't far behind.   It's interesting to note that neither of those dogs is particularly large as adults, and certainly no larger than their siblings who were so much smaller at birth. 

And as the puppies are getting close to the first growth milestone, a little poll for fun.  Who do you think will reach 1 kg first?  Voting buttons at the top right corner.  Be quick - at the rate these puppies are growing, this poll is unlikely to last more than a day or two!

And here is a little video of dubious quality.  But it does show how strong the puppies are getting and what a sweet, attentive mum Tuuli is.