weight update

The first week in a puppy's life is the most critical.  Every little thing can affect them and so many things can go wrong.  They can so easily pick up an infection, they can have feeding problems, they're not yet able to regulate their own temperature so even a draft can kill them.  It's a stressful time for us under normal circumstances (whatever 'normal' is).

With the first litter, Neka had no complications and was an excellent mum and 6 of the 7 puppies were fine and thrived with little or no input from me.  That was a lucky break, though, because the 7th puppy had a tough start in life.  He was difficult to resuscitate, couldn't suck, and I had to hand-feed him every 2 hours for the first week and every 3-4 hours for the second week.  Round the clock.  That was hard, hard work, but I was able to do it because Neka and the other puppies needed so little from me.

With the second litter, again Neka did a great job, although it was a constant low-level concern for us that she keep enough milk flowing.  And we were also very fortunate that none of the puppies had any problems at all.  They were all strong, healthy and vigorous.  All nine of them.  So, that was the difficulty with that litter - the sheer volume of the workload made everything tough.  Much, much more cleaning and double everything else. 

With these puppies, this week has been a rollercoaster ride.  Some had some problems, some didn't.  When it comes to tiny puppies, every little thing affects their progress, and so they didn't necessarily follow the pattern of weight gain that we might have expected.  At their weigh-in this morning, Dino was the heaviest, of course.  And the poll winner was ... 2 Toes!  So, not a shock result, but she's had more than her fair share of problems this week and there was a day when Butterfly overtook her, but she caught up again when she started to feel better.

Here are their current weights compared to their birth weights. Because I like pictures, I was going to insert a chart illustrating their relative weight gains, but for some reason I can't get it to work like I used to in the old days.  I'll figure it out for later.

                  Birth   1Week

2 Toes        418      778

2-Tone        327      682

Grey Wolf   327      645

Dino           467      840

Butterfly     361      740

I've got a trickier poll for next week for you clever things who played it safe with your votes.  Watch this space.

Tomorrow I'll have the first week updates and new photos.  In the meantime, here are some puppies doing their baby Lapphund thing.

Grey Wolf










2-Tone









2-Tone Again (spends a lot of time on his back, this boy)

Someone found a nice spot for a snooze.  It's just typical of a Lappy to claim the highest place available, even if it is only a 1-inch book.







Just to prove how advanced he is, Dino is learning to read.

poll hint

Oh, not a hint really, as such.  I can see why you're all picking 2-Toes, really I can.  After all, she was the biggest of the girls at birth - by a long way.  And, yes, it's true that puppies will normally gain about 10% of their weight each day and that at the end of the first week they will have approximately doubled their body weight.  Approximately.

And it makes sense, too, to pick 2-Tone because boys are usually bigger than girls and will often gain more weight more quickly if they are small to begin with.

It just goes to show that these things are not set in stone and so many factors will affect the growth rate.  For example, you haven't even had the poo story yet (for which, perhaps you're grateful?)  Does it help if I tell you that at their daily weigh-in this morning, but for 1 gram, 2-Toes was the same weight as Butterfly?  No, that's not much help, I guess.  See, isn't this fun?

One more day to vote!  In the meantime, this is what was going on at breakfast this morning.  Halfway through you can hear Lenny the cat yowling outside the door for his food too.  And you also get a glimpse of how a puppy can come unstuck, get lost and need a little help finding their way back to the milk bar.

A note on the sound:  all the grunts, squeaks, squawks, yelps, squeals & screeches are made by the puppies.  The creaking sound that is similar to wood pigeons cooing or a woodpecker in the forest is something the video recorder does, for some reason.  

And the books in the corners of the box?  That's a story for another day.

presents & other bribes

Heh, just kidding!

Before you get too excited, these puppies have been spoken for for quite a long time - in fact, they have been spoken for several times over.  So I'm afraid that no amount of bribery will work.  On this litter, anyway.  There is always, of course, the next litter.  I'm just saying.

Today I was thrilled to get one of these from Kate & Jerome as a present for wetting the babies' heads.  Now, I'm not much of a drinker, really. (If you discount the odd medicinal g&t, that is.  Ok, I've been known to consume the occasional bottle or 2 of pear cider as well.)  But I'm not one for Bailey's or beer and I've even gone off wine a bit.  So, what's so great about this stuff?  Well, it's Lakka - Lapponia Cloudberry Liqueur, made in Finland.  Lapponia - get it?  As in Lapphund, Lapland, etc.

Even that's not what's so great about this stuff, though, and the best thing is that Kate & Jerome will have had no idea when they picked it out.  Have you ever had a cloudberry?  Thought not.  They grow in the wilderness of the northern hemisphere, but I've never seen one or heard of one in the UK (maybe Scotland?)  Where I come from we call those berries 'bakeapples'.  Don't ask me why, I have no idea whatsoever.  They have nothing at all in common with apples, but believe me when I tell you they are the single yummiest little fruit that ever grew wild.  We eat them right off the bush, make them into jam, put them in scones, on ice cream.  Some people even make wine or sherry with them.  They're gorgeous in everyway, even their colour.

For many years I really thought that they didn't even exist outside of Newfoundland & Labrador, since they didn't have the profile of, say, a raspberry or blueberry (both of which also grow wild there).  So, imagine my surprise when I went to Finland a few years ago and on a visit to the Lumiturpa kennel was served bakeapple jam with our afternoon tea.  I was thrilled & delighted.  Perhaps rather more than was strictly necessary for a fruit.

I'm off to the shops for ice cream.  What do you mean it's breakfast time?  Your point?

Puppies... oh, yeah.  Pics later and maybe even a little video if you're very, very lucky.

super granny

Mum and babies are looking great today, don't you think?  The early stresses are behind us, I think, and now I just need to concentrate on making sure all the puppies get equal time at the milk bar and that I get some sleep.

The first night home after the birth, when Taika wasn't feeling quite so perky as in this photo, she lay down, conked completely out, and allowed her puppies to nurse.

Later that night she had some food, some chicken soup and a trip to the grass then happily returned to her brood.  She sat up in the corner and allowed them to nurse again and then she proceeded to fall asleep.  She didn't lie down, but her head kept getting heavier and heavier, dropping lower and lower.  She resisted all my attempts to coax her down until sometime after I had started to doze myself.

She finally decided to lie down, since she was obviously going to be stuck with these puppies, and so she just plunked straight down where she sat - right on top of the nursing brood.  This is not unusual - bitches often lie down on their puppies and they just squirt right out from underneath.  However, Neka was always a little more careful and at least tried not to trap anyone as she lay down.  Poor Taika, of course, wasn't completely committed to the well being of her family just yet, and the combination of exhaustion, full belly and recovery from the anaesthetic were just too much to resist any longer, so down she went.

The puppy screams brought me rocketing to my feet from my spot on the inflatable matress on the floor, even though I know that the volume and urgency of a Finnish Lapphund puppy's scream bears little resemblance to the gravity of the actual pending danger/injury/suspected slight.  And then who should appear in the doorway (of the door I thought securely closed) but granny Neka, ready for action, ready to take over, ready to rescue anyone who needed rescuing.  All that was missing was the superhero cape.  I guess she didn't pause long enough to don the cape in her haste to scale the barricades at the bottom of the stairs.

This is how that looks now (with Keskiyo checking out the squeaks he can hear coming from the puppy room).

Somehow, Neka scaled this to get to the puppies.  She has told me on a number of occasions that she's the one who does puppies around here.  She just cannot believe that she's not allowed to go to them.  Even before Taika moved into the room, Neka was trying to get in there - I guess it was the irresistible combined smells of cardboard and newspaper that did it.  As soon as the puppies arrived and started squeaking, she has been positively frantic to get in there.  Poor Neka!  She goes to work with Jay each day to lessen her distress.

So over time we have been adding things to the barricade at the bottom of the stairs until we thought that surely she couldn't get past.  Well, turns out she can get past anything if she wants to badly enough.  Mercifully, most of the time she leaves it alone.

Two days ago when Taika wasn't doing all she should have for her litter, I admit I was tempted to hand them over to granny to get on with it, but sometime in the very small hours of Tuesday morning, the maternal instinct finally kicked in and now Taika is doing a great job.  With the nursing, with the cleaning, with the wees & poos - the whole shooting match.  What a relief!

I know I promised the poo story, but that will just have to wait for another day.  Will these do intead?

Here you can see 2 Toes's namesake on her back right paw.  She also has a vertical stripe of white on her chest.

This is 2-Tone and his bright tan legs.  With his flashy white face markings and tan legs, I guess you can see why I originally thought he was black & tan.  But then I caught a glimpse of his head - you can even see it in this photo - wolf sable through and through. 

Here you can see almost all of Butterfly's butterfly chest markings.  I'll have to try to get a better one at some point.  Shouldn't be too tough as time goes on since baby Lappies seem to spend most of their time sleeping on their backs.

Grey Wolf top, random wolf sable puppy bottom.  Finally managed to get a shot where you can see the difference in the coat colours.  She also has white toes on all paws and a big white arrow on her chest, so when her colour changes I've got a backup identification plan.

weight poll

Instead of telling you the puppies' relative weights, I decided to run the first poll.  Saves having to type so much as well, so there's my ulterior motive.

So, I'm leaving the baby dinosaur out of the equation, because that would just be too easy.  On Sunday the puppies will be a week old and I'll be doing their weekly update.  The question is this: on Sunday's weigh-in who will be heaviest?

As always, the poll sits on the top right of the blog & it will close around midnight Saturday.  Happy voting.

mmmffnnngggh

In case you're wondering, that's about as much sense as I can muster verbally at the moment.  I did, however, get a good hour of sleep, thanks to Jay.  Thanks, Jay!

Today's mum-and-babies portrait.  If you're thinking Taika is looking tired, don't fret, she gets very heavy-lidded and dozy when the puppies are nursing.  She's actually quite bright-eyed now and you'd almost never know she had just had surgery.  Also, by necessity for the well-being of the newborns, the puppy room is hot, hot, hot and Finnish Lapphunds don't really do hot.



And so today the gang went off in their hot water bottle warmed box to have their hind dew claws removed.  In our first litter, only about half of the puppies had hind dew claws, of which one was Taika.  In the second litter, all nine had them.  In this litter, not only do all the puppies have them, one poor little mite - Grey Wolf - had double rear dewclaws!  What's in store for the next litter, all with doubles?

Double dewclaws are actually required by the breed standard in some breeds and they're not completely unheard of in Lapphunds - Neka's dad Pacsha had them, for example.  Grey Wolf says, "thanks a bunch, great-grandpa."  I did manage to get a quick photo of them but the paws are pretty small and the photo is pretty poor.  You can just about see the tiny white dot of the second one pointing towards the back of the leg.

Oh, I hate the dewclaw removal event.  It's horrible to take those gorgeous, fat little wigglers and inflict pain on them.  I'm a complete and utter coward and I hide in the waiting room with my fingers in my ears lest I hear a squawk while the vet and nurse assistant get on with it.

However, having seen what can happen to these claws on adult dogs if they're not removed as puppies, I do still think it's worth it.  I even wrote a little article about it for the SFLS newsletter.  Since then I have had another conversation with my vet about it and he had some interesting observations.  He has noticed that since tail docking was banned, many breeders who would in the past have had tails and dewclaws removed now no longer bother with the claws.  And he has seen a quite noticeable rise in the number of dew claw injuries. 

So, off they came and now I'll add bathing the wounds in warm, salty water to my list of daily chores.

Today's photos:  a selection illustrating some of the reasons puppies suddenly start to scream blue murder and you have to run to extricate them from some dire situation or other.

Dino leading Butterfly into the temptation that is the corner-under-the-guard-rail tiny spot to get wedged in.  You can see I've stuffed the very corner with newspaper in the hope of keeping them from getting too badly stuck.  The rails are designed to give the puppies an escape route when their dam accidentally squashes them against the sides, but with each litter I'm thinking more and more that they do more harm than good.  The puppies just can't seem to resist wrapping themselves around the rails.

 Usually at this age the puppies are too small to get wedged in, they just crawl underneath and are fine.  But that was before the Brown-tosaurus arrived.

I'm guessing this is Butterfly again getting herself the aforementioned well and truly stuck by using Dino for a leg up.  He fills up that space completely and in a couple of days I'll either have to get rid of the rails or grease the brown pup so we can get him out.

In every litter there seems to be one puppy who can't leave the water bowl alone.  I guess they like the cool metal, but there is always a puppy who likes to sleep with head in bowl.  Here is Dino practicing already.  Frankly, he's so big and strong I'm afraid he'll fall in and drown.  I never dreamed any of them would be able to reach the rim of the bowl at this age. 






Tomorrow a weight update, the Neka Superhero story and everything you ever wanted to know about puppy poo.  I bet you can't wait, can you?

day 1 portraits

Two Toes
Puppy 1
Sex: Female
Colour: Wolf Sable
Time of Birth: 16:15
Weight at birth: 418g

Named because the absolute only distinguishing feature she has from her littermates is 2 white toes on one of her back paws.  She's got eyebrows, she's got a little white chin, she's got tan arms, she's got rear dew claws on both paws.  Same as everyone!  But she has only 2 white toes and they're both on one paw.

Two-Tone

Puppy 2
Sex: Male
Colour: Wolf Sable
Time of Birth: 16:20
Weight at birth: 327g

The name is awkwardly similar to the 1st puppy's, it's true.  But this one had his name first - the second to be named, in fact.  Chosen for the colourful stripes of colour on his front legs.  This is a dangerous identification, however, because the one thing we know about the wolf sable colour is how much it changes as the puppy grows and develops.  So this little guy could end up losing his most clearly identifying feature in a matter of days.  In my defense, when he was named I thought he was black & tan.  (Is that a defense?)

Grey Wolf

Puppy 3
Sex: Female
Colour: Wolf Sable
Time of Birth: 16:25
Weight at birth: 327g

Again, I find myself with a puppy named for the very thing that is likely to change dramatically and often.  Oh well.  She was named because when the puppies are all lined up side by side, she looks grey instead of black.  Difficult to tell in these photos, of course.  Interestingly, she was exactly the same weight at birth as 2Tone and they have both increased by exactly 20g since yesterday, so still the same weight.

Dino

Puppy 4
Sex: Male
Colour: Brown & Tan
Time of Birth: 16:28
Weight at birth: 467g

No, contrary to what you might expect, he wasn't the great hulking monster who was blocking up Taika's birth canal.  He is, however, the largest puppy in any of our litters, and he was next-to-last in the birth canal.  When he came out he was enormous and looked twice as big as everyone else.  He was the quietest and slowest to come around and needed to be swung to clear his lungs.  The way you do this is to hold the puppy securely between your hands and swing it down fast from over your head.  The centrifugal force clears the airways.  However, he was so big he wouldn't fit in my hands.  Luckily Jay was there with his extremely long pianist's fingers and so he resusitated this boy.  In addition to being dinosaur-sized, he also had a very long neck at birth.  Luckily all the bones are settling where they should now, so his weird long neck is no longer in evidence.  However, when I pointed out these features, Jay promptly named him the brown-tosaurus, but as that's a bit of a mouthful, we'll call him Dino in honour of the dinosaur in the Flintstones.

Butterfly

Puppy 5
Sex: Female
Colour: Wolf sable

Time of Birth: 16:30
Weight at birth: 361g

This girl was the prettiest puppy at birth of any we have produced.  If I may speak candidly, newborn anythings are not traditionally lovely in any aesthetic sense.  However, Butterfly had the sweetest little heart-shaped head, which makes a nice change from the wedge-shaped heads that usually appear after being squeezed down the birth canal.  Again, the shape of the head changes dramatically, so I'm not expecting this to be identifiable.  Instead, she was named for the lovely and distinctive pattern of white on her chest (which, unfortunately, is not visible from the photo.  Sorry.)  She was the other puppy I originally thought was black & tan until I got a good look at her today, dry and in daylight.

So, there you have it: 2 dogs, 3 bitches; 1 brown, 4 wolf sable.  Not the rainbow litter I was expecting after all.  But they'll do just fine.

we have puppies

Yesterday was a tough day.  The book says that "the most skilled part of whelping is deciding how long it is safe ... before asking veterinary assistance and assessing whether the bitch is in trouble or if she is just having a rest."  Well, the sum total of my experience of whelping puppies was gleaned during 2 litters of puppies prior to this one.  Kittens don't count.  So my experience was severely restricted to what I've read, what other, more experienced people have told me, and what I have witnessed with Neka.  Cue much wondering, weighing up alternatives, phoning for backup verbal support, etc.

Taika & I had 2 sleepness nights together on Fri & Sat, and all day Saturday I was completely convinced she would have her puppies that night.  She kept moving in and out of Stage 1.  By 'Stage 1' I mean heavy panting, restlessness, digging and shredding paper.  This is the stage during which the puppies are getting ready for action.  When the bitch is lying on her side, you can even see the puppies moving.  So there was plenty of all this starting Friday night and continuing through Saturday and then Saturday night.  Here she is happy as a clam in her box doing her digging and panting.

I wasn't too worried at this point, because this stage can come and go for a few days, really.  And then at about 4 am on Sunday, Taika stopped panting and settled down.  I braced myself for the contractions to begin signalling the beginning of labour & arrival of the first puppy.  Instead, Taika went to sleep.  Huh.  So I did too.

Sunday morning she was acting as if she had no intentions of giving birth for another week or so.  She had her breakfast then asked to go out so we had a little stroll down the park.  She did all her business, including 2 unusually large poos then dragged me back into the house and straight upstairs.  Within an hour the first tentative contractions started.

At noon, following a few strong contractions, her 'waters broke' (for want of a better term) and she threw up her breakfast.  5 minutes after that there was another rush of fluid and the strong contractions continued regularly.  Based on my experience with Neka, and what the books say, I was expecting a puppy before 1pm.  Nothing.  Then I was expecting the first puppy by 2 pm.  At 1:30 Taika threw up again.  I got my surgical gloves and Vaseline out and had a little root around but couldn't feel anything.  And, frankly, I was nervous of sticking my fingers too far inside since I didn't really know what I was doing!  The thing is, if you can gently grasp a puppy and very slightly shift its position during a contraction, that might be all that is required to get things moving.  But I couldn't feel anything.  I called Toni who has a wealth of experience and has always been on hand with great advice during each of my whelping experiences.

At 1:50 I called the vet and while waiting for him to return my call, what appeared to be a puppy head presented itself at Taika' vulva.  Spoke to the vet, we agreed if the head was there everything would probably go normally from now on.  When there was still no progress after a couple more contractions, I got busy with my Vaseline again but there was actually no puppy in reach - just the bag, unbroken and sticking out like a balloon.  At 2:45, almost 3 hours after the start of labour, I called the vet and told him we were on our way in.  We arrived there at 3:10 pm with Taika no further along and with our hot water bottle box to collect born puppies.

I won't even go into the stress of getting Taika out of the box, down the stairs, into and out of the car.  She's heavy.

After an hour of observation, the vet decided the puppy wasn't moving further down the birth canal in spite of Taika's strong contractions and the fact that it didn't feel like a particularly big puppy, so at 4pm Taika went off for a Caesarian section.  Jay & I stood by in the recovery room and resusitated the puppies as the nurse passed them through.

So, we made it.  Taika & puppies were back home by 6 pm and while the babies settled down for a feed, Taika caught up on some much-needed sleep.















C-section births are notorious because the bitch can reject her puppies, since she has no idea where on earth they came from and does not have the experience of ripping the sacs, stimulating them to breathe & cry, etc.  So, while Taika is not exactly being the absolute best mum ever just yet, she's doing a great job.  At first she did glare at the puppies as if to say "What the %&£!  Last thing I remember I was trying to have a big old poo, the next thing I know my box is full of these strange wiggling, squeaking things that smell funny."  I still can't quite convince her she has to clean them and to lick them to stimulate expulsion of waste, but all in all it's going well.  She's happy to let them nurse, she rushes back to them when she's been out for a wee, and she hasn't tried to kill them - well, not on purpose anyway.  Phew!

And even Neka, amazingly good mum that she turned out to be, chucked her first 2 puppies out of the box when they were born, one of which was Taika herself.

Here is Taika today, much brighter, with the babies gathered around.


















Tomorrow individual pics, birth weights and stuff.  Oh, and how Neka came to the rescue when Taika lay on the puppies and squished them.

crufts 2010

Yesterday I missed going to Crufts because I was otherwise occupied supervising the ever-growing Taika.  So, it was all for a good cause and everything, but I did spend all day searching for news and feeling left out nonetheless.  We were thrilled x 3 (or more!) when the Postgraduate Dog class was stuffed with Taika's Infindigo brothers.  Taito was 2nd and Karhu was Reserve and half-brother, the young Tarkka, who is only 19 months old, came 3rd.  Then, to top it all off, sister Keksi was Reserve in Postgraduate Bitch.  Wow, what a great day.

Yet another place in the Postgraduate Dog class was awarded to Keskiyo's son Arianrhod Kirrinkurri who was VHC.  Click here for full results for Finnish Lapphunds.

Inko and Rauhan were both there too, although I hear they left their coats at home.  Carrying on the family tradition - their mum Neka, apart from Crufts 2009 when she placed 3rd in Open Bitch, never ever managed to get the timing right and was always either in season or out of coat or both when March rolled around.

Dogs shows are certainly not the be-all and end-all.  In my book, they're just for fun.  The be-all and end-all are happy, healthy dogs who live with families who adore them.  But we do (in the main) have a great, fun bunch of people on the Finnish Lapphund show scene and so we have a terrific social time when we go.  Crufts is always a special show, with more dogs turning out looking their absolute best than at any other time the whole year.  We always have a top breed specialist judging too, and that's what makes it especially exciting to do well.

So yesterday was a great day.  If you'd like to watch the agility, obedience, flyball and other fun stuff, there is a live stream showing all day, in case you didn't catch any of my many, many Twitter updates yesterday.  And today I'll still be keeping half an eye on things as Neka & Keskiyo's breeder Toni will be competing in the Crufts breeder competition.  Go Team Elbereth!

In the meantime, we're gearing up a notch now that Crufts is out of the way for another year.  Last night Taika did a little bit of digging around and started investigating good dens, so she's getting ready too.  The cardboard & newspaper floorcovering is now down.  Lactol is in the cupboard.  Scales are ready & waiting.  So are we.

puppy shopping 4

Brushes

For a puppy, any soft brush is best until they get used to it and their coat grows enough to warrant proper brushing.

As adults, they will need 2 or 3 different grooming tools. (Although it goes without saying that some of us have 12 or 13 different ones. Ahem. No, not me. Of course not.)

Stiff bristle brush like a Mason & Pearson. Being the best, these are expensive! About £50-£60 for a medium size one. However, you can get them a bit cheaper than that at the bigger dog shows. These days mine is a cheaper brand of bristle & nylon mix after having good ones stolen from my bench at a show.

Another necessity for the fine hair around ears and under the legs is a comb. I prefer those with varying length teeth, sort of like these. I can't actually find a link to a comb that is like my favorite one, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's no longer available. You need to personalise it, of course - mine has authentic puppy teeth marks all over the handle, making plastic points that are uncomfortable to hold. Ideal.

Finally, for when they moult a rake is the tool of choice. A brush also works, but the rake does it faster & easier. This is not a product like the Furminator! That doesn't only remove dead hair, it cuts the fur. What we use for Lappies is designed to remove undercoat that is already loose without damaging the outer coat. The type with a double row of rotating teeth is best.

Collar & Lead

As advised to me back in the day, I now advise that a Lappy puppy's first collar & lead should be the soft nylon cat collar type. It will take a surprisingly long time for a Finnish Lapphund puppy to outgrow this little collar. It can take a day or two for puppies to get used to a collar & lead, and one of these is much lighter & more pleasant for them to get acclimatised to the idea of being restrained and no longer being free to run amok.

Other Stuff

Bowls, obviously. I use stainless steel - easy to clean & can't be chewed. Keskiyo, however, makes quite a racket with his when he flings it around on the patio or in his crate to get attention.

Nail clippers (yes, it must be done). The guillotine sort are easiest to use & are widely available.

mama has arrived

I collected Taika yesterday and brought her to Devon and she settled right in. Unfortunately Keskiyo thinks she's just about ready to be mated and Maija thinks she is muscling in and trying to take over the position of top dog. However, Keskiyo will calm down when the puppies arrive and Taika moves completely upstairs. At the moment she is only going up to her whelping room to sleep. As for Maija, a couple of walks together will sort out her nose joint.

As you can see, the whelping room has improved enormously. All that's missing now is a bit more cardboard and newspaper for the floor.






And here is Taika showing off her belly. It looks remarkably small here, although if you double click to get a closeup view, you can see her teats which appear fit for function & ready to go. In the second photo you get a better sense of just how chunky she is.

piano

Oh yes, how could I forget Maija the piano-eating wonder! Ok, to be fair she didn't eat the entire piano, but she did take a chunk out of it. Those of you to whom I have preached not leaving your young Lapphund unsupervised and keeping them crated when alone could not be blamed for having a little snigger. After all, if she had been safely tucked up in her crate then she never could have eaten a portion of the piano, could she? Could she?

Apparently, she could. That's right. Believe it or not, Maija got her little muzzle out through the bars of the crate (past the bone, past the kong) to grind her new grown-up teeth against the piano an inch away from her crate.

There are now 2 inches between piano & crate. And a sheet of wood.

puppy shopping 3

Toys & Chews

If there's one thing I know about Finnish Lapphunds it's this: they sure do love to chew. Having said that, chewing is a necessity for all dogs, especially young ones and, to be honest, some Lappies are more interested in chewing than others.

Little did I know how lightly we were getting off with Neka in this respect. As a puppy she destroyed very few things. And those that she did get were irresistible and we take full responsibility for leaving them within reach - plastic lens cover from camera, remote control, the occasional shoe here and there.

Then Keskiyo moved in and, boy, did we get a shock to the system. He destroyed everything in sight and then some. Nothing was safe, including the exposed corners of any wood. Woe betide us if we left anything within a paw's reach of the bars of the crate in the car. Four years later I'm still wearing my very expensive waterproof jacket but since it was less than 2 weeks old it has had a few unnecessary holes and a half-missing zip (so, not so waterproof any longer, actually). You guessed it - left in the back of the car and dragged through the bars of the crate.

Then Maija came along. And, sheesh, we thought Keskiyo was bad! She was the worst of all. Socks galore, pens & pencils, several leads, the edge of the vet bed, her blanket, anything at all left on the coffee table within reach. Many, many things destroyed.

However, one interesting thing about all this was that if the chew toys were yummy enough and interesting enough, then the dogs would always prefer them over the pencils and remote control, etc. Socks, maybe not so much. They will always be appealing, I guess.

So, the moral of the story is this: when you get your puppy you'll need lots of different chew toys and bones. Our adult dogs' absolute favorite thing that they will forego all other treats for is a fresh bone from the butcher.

For puppies and their growing teeth and jaws, Nylabone puppy bones are terrific. At the rate they grow, though, FL puppies very soon graduate out of those little soft ones. By 10 or 12 weeks Neka was going through the softest of these in 1 minute flat. She still loves these little puppy bones, though, and when Maija had them we had to make sure Neka didn't steal them from her. For the bigger and older dogs, this type is also good with the fake marrow inside.

There's literally hundreds, possibly thousands, of different types of dog chews on the market. Most of the very best ones also have food value, so if your puppy is a destroyer and swallows everything instead of just chewing & savouring, then you need to keep that in mind and balance it with their meals. Ours all love pigs' ears (I draw the line at buying trotters and, worst of all, pig noses!) paddywhack, tripe sticks (of course they love that - the most disgusting smelly thing ever produced). Call me squeamish if you like, but in addition to pig noses, I also cannot bring myself to give our dogs pizzle. I'm sure Jay agrees.

In addition to these things, and others like them, there's all the less-natural things like Dentastix, Jumbones, etc. Ours also love all these. Regardless of what it says on the packaging, though, these are not treats to be given everyday! Our dogs only ever get half a Dentastix at a time and only once in a while. Jumbones are great because you can also buy them in slices, which is a much more sensible size of treat for a dog.

For lengthy chewing, I stick with bones (fresh, nylon, smoked, stuffed) and occasionally the other items.

Rawhide is another very popular dog chew product. We only ever give the shredded, re-formed variety because of the dangers associated with other types. Rawhide pieces get soft when chewed and it's surprisingly easy for dogs to choke on it, so we avoid it.
As for toys, no one needs advice on this, really, as pet shops are stuffed to the rafters with toys of every imaginable type and you'll soon discover which are your puppy's favorites. Be prepared for them to be destroyed as well - that's all part of the fun for puppies. There are a few must-haves, though:

• Tennis balls
• Stuffed animal for snuggling at bedtime (at least as big as the puppy - so pretty big)
• Activity ball (just put their meal kibble inside)
• Kong
• Tug ropes

For some fabulous advice on how to survive your puppy's chewing phases, go have a look at Gwen Bailey's excellent article.

puppy shopping 2

Bedding

I have found that the best bedding for puppies (& dogs, in fact) is vetbed which you can buy in most pet shops. The cheapest I've ever seen has been at shows, but you can also get it online. Vetbed is polyester fur with a woven backing. It comes in a range of colours & it's usually sold from a roll so you can get it cut to size & buy it by the metre. It looks like this or apparently like this, but I've never seen any of that stuff. You can also get it with patterns like stripes or paw prints.

Vetbed is particularly great for puppies. When liquid is spilled (or otherwise deposited) on it, it runs straight through so the top stays relatively dry. It's very easy to clean - just throw it in washing machine and tumble dryer - and it lasts for absolutely ever. I still have a piece that I bought when Neka was a puppy more than 5 years ago.

You can also get vetbed with a rubber backing that doesn't ruck up so easily or slide around when jumped on. Of course it doesn't last as long when washed & dried often.

I definitely don't recommend spending a lot of money on beds & blankets and that sort of thing. I've never yet met a Lapphund (even a baby) who didn't push all the lovely snuggly bedding out of the way so they could lie on the bare plastic/tiles/concrete/stone, etc. They do, however, like to push the vetbed into a pile to use as a pillow.

For cute pic of the day, check out Keskiyo's great find on his walk this afternoon.

puppy shopping 1

Or should I say, shopping for puppies? No, that's not it either. Shopping for puppy things. That's it!

Last night I wrote a loooong email about the first few essentials one needs when thinking about bringing one's puppy home. This is the same info blog-style.

Crates If you're planning to show your Lappy, then the size crate you need for shows is approx 31ins x 21ins x 24in because that is the size that will fit on the benches. At many shows that won't matter because you can set up your crate in lots of different places, but it's best to stick to that size for 2 main reasons:

1. You have no choice but to set up on the bench at Crufts, and there's no spare room so it's gotta fit.
2. Metal crates are heavy to carry around & who wants to carry more than necessary.

When your dog has grown out of the chewing-through-everything stage (somewhere around 2 years, I find), then it's safe to graduate to a cloth crate which is MUCH easier to carry around. Here's a selection for example. There are a lot of different types with various features & at one time or another I've tried all the ones illustrated. My favorite is the Croft Classic. Like most of them, it has a carrying bag with handy outside pockets. It also comes with metal pegs for pinning the crate to the ground in case of high wind. It has a lightweight metal frame inside which means it's strong enough to put stuff on top, and it has "blinds" over the windows. An excellent product all round.

The 31-inch metal crate can also double as a car crate if you don't want to go down the route of those designed especially for cars or the very desirable and very expensive made-to-measure dog guard.

At home, however, you will need something bigger than the 31-inch size. That one will be ok for a few weeks, but by the time a puppy is 5 or 6 months old they will need more space if spending nights in there and time when you're out. For a home crate, the bigger the better, once puppy is fully grown. I would say certainly no smaller than 94 x 63 x 69cm (37 x 25 x 27in), especially for a male. This Croft one is the sort of minimum size.

Croft are good quality but quite expensive. In my experience you don't really need a great quality metal crate. They all last & last and they don't usually fall apart - although you might need to be careful with cheaper ones if you have a bouncy puppy who jumps at the sides when excited. The more sturdy they are, the heavier and the more expensive, but I would always go for mid-price rather than the most expensive. I would also say that whichever crate, be sure it has a plastic tray in the bottom. Some come with metal trays (very heavy & likely to rust) and some come with no tray at all.

Here's another good site for crates, and they also do a good fabric crate.


* * * *

This weekend Taika moves in. I'm still working on Jay & the whelping room.

magic number

Oh, you clever things, how did you know? Despite all the evidence suggesting otherwise, most of the people who voted on the poll chose 5 puppies. And I'm thinking that after my experience of 7 and then 9 of the little beasts, then 5 will be positively easy. Uh huh.

This is how much mess 7 make when they're learning to eat porridge:














Top, L-R: Keksi, Tuuri, Seppo, Koda
Bottom, L-R: Karhu, Taito
Missing from photo: mum-to-be Taika

Kate zoomed down to visit Kath and her brand new ultrasound machine. Lo and behold, she did indeed spot 5 puppies - maybe 6, she said. So, it's quite a relief to know it's more than 2 or 3, although 5 or even 6 will not completely fulfil the demand for them. Unfortunately, some people will just have to wait until next time.

It's so lovely to give people the good news - yes, there are puppies on the way and if nothing goes horribly wrong, then you shall have your long-awaited Finnish Lapphund! Equally, it's terrible to give people the bad news - sorry, not this time. On a mating attempt long ago, we were unsuccessful and I had to tell a bunch of people that there would be no puppies at all on that occasion. Including Kate who ended up with Taika 8 or 10 months later. And this time, the news will also be sad for some who were hoping for a bigger litter. We've all been there with the wait for a Lappy puppy - a very lucky few just happen to turn up at the right place at the right time and ask the right question and not have to wait at all. Most have to wait a bit, especially if they prefer a specific colour or sex.

And so on to the list of prep chores: I am now in possession of plenty of liquid puppy wormer & Kate is employed administering a squirt to Taika everyday. I also have a stack of puppy insurance packs and a whelping box which is currently flat-packed until such time as the junk room is cleared - see previous post. I'm awaiting puppy sales wallets which have been ordered. None of these do much to help whittle down my list, it's true.

Things to add to the list:

• Update the puppy information pack
• Update the sales contract & send to everyone so we have a chance to talk it through

So what's the holdup? If you've had half an eye on Twitter this week you will know that I've been busy setting up a new work-related website. Yawn. Part of the job entailed photographing tiny electronic parts and somehow getting them more or less in focus (yeesh, my eyes!) For this purpose, I needed a smooth, bright white background and so I was using the glossy back of a spiral-bound report we had for something or other and placed it in the feeble natural light coming in through patio doors.

Keskiyo thought it looked like fun, and he decided to help out. He's much more photogenic than these other things, don't you think:

shopping

No, not for clothes and makeup, alas.

Where the 30-ish days post-mating always grind by in an infuriatingly leisurely manner while everyone plays the is-she-isn't-she game, the 30-ish days pre-whelping zip by quite smartly. In the meantime, I've been procrastinating over clearing out and preparing the whelping room - otherwise known as the back bedroom, or more frequently, the junk room. But I've decided it's best to delegate that job to Jay.

Before you judge me too harshly, consider the fact that I don't even know the names of some of the things in there, let alone what they're for or where a likely alternative good home would be for them. (Um, bin?)

Witness:


Now what am I going to do with all that xmas wrapping paper? And I don't foresee much call for an electric fan anytime soon. Does that fan even work?

No, that pile of abandoned shoes is not mine, as it happens.

And those little electronic thingies? No idea.



Apart from that job, there's all the stuff that needs money thrown at it, and now, with just over 3 weeks left to go, there's no time to waste. So, today I've ordered the whelping box. I never know which size to get. The first year I ordered the one recommended for Border Collie size dogs. It was exceedingly spacious and is fitted with 2 large washable mats (with 2 extra for washing & swapping) and side rails to provide a little escape channel for the puppies to stop them getting squashed under their mum against the walls.

The second year I ordered what I thought was the same size but got a slightly smaller version. Still plenty of space for Neka & her brood of 9 but the rails and mats didn't fit - 1 mat was too small but 2 were too large. So I ordered new mats and Jay made the rails fit. Well, they still didn't fit, as such, but they accomplished their purpose nonetheless.

This year I didn't know whether to buy the larger or smaller size. In the end I opted for the smaller so that I'd have only one mat to wash at a time instead of 2. I guess I should also have ordered new rails, but I'm sure Jay will want to participate in some small way in the setting up again this time around. I'm hoping the rails will miraculously appear when some of the stuff starts moving out of the room. Perhaps they're hiding under the wrapping paper.

Other jobs to do / things to buy:

Puppy food for Taika, starting next week
Wormer for Taika & puppies, ditto
Puppy-holding contraption for the postage scales
Holding box (bigger than last year's!)
Lactol milk
Find hot water bottle
Clean & disinfect all the just-in-case tools - thermometer, scissors, tiny nursing bottles, syringes
New batteries for clock/room thermometer combo
Chicken soup for new mum

And if you're one of the people who is planning to be visiting the puppies when they're 4 weeks old, then start saving your newspapers now. It is no exaggeration to say that I will not be able to get my hands on enough newspaper when the puppies arrive. So, save your own and if you can also get all the papers from your friends and neighbours, then so much the better. No one will be given entrance without a newspaper offering.

It's not much to ask for the chance of cuddles with 1-month-old pups, really.

no poll result

If you've been checking out my Twitter feed (which shows on the right-hand side of the blog window under the photo slideshow as well as on the news page of the website), then you will know that Taika is indeed in whelp. Sadly I cannot announce the result of the poll though because, whaddeya know, things didn't go quite as planned.

On Friday I had a call to say that the ultrasound machine had broken and could not be fixed. Oh, the timing! A new one has been ordered, but it won't arrive probably until Taika's puppies do. So that left us all at the mercy of Kate's vet who very helpfully rearranged their afternoon appointments on Saturday to squeeze Taika in to have her scan there. The only problem with that, of course, is that vets are notoriously squeamish about naming numbers. I don't know if they are afraid of unreasonable comeback from people after the birth - "But you said she was having sixteen!" - or whether it is simply because they are not radiologists and so do not have the expertise to make any kind of accurate estimate.

That's what's great about using the people who are experts. They're not afraid to name the numbers, and we all know that 4 can actually mean 2 or 7 and that 9 can mean 5 or 10. We just accept that it's not exact - but in my experience, the helpful woman I've used in the past has always known.

So for a fat fee, the vet was able to confirm that yes, Taika is carrying puppies - plural. Strong heartbeats & plenty of space. All seems well with however many are in there. But she wouldn't even say she heard/saw 2 or 4. All she said was she didn't think there were "lots" in there. My question would be how many she considered "lots" to be. "Lots" for, say, a Labrador would be 12 or 14 whereas for a Lappy, "lots" could be 6 or 7, although a vet would be very unlikely to know this.

So, after all this, you would think that in 4 weeks' time we are guaranteed to have puppies, wouldn't you? There are several people who are certainly hoping that's the case. But it's not entirely that straightforward. (Did you really think it would be?) It's true we will probably have puppies. But as with seasons & mating, there are certainly no guarantees, and this is another likely reason vets don't want to name numbers. For example, she could be in whelp with 4 puppies now but re-absorb, say, 2 of them before the birth and so we only end up with 2. Also, stillborn puppies are certainly not rare so they might not all make it. The scariest scenario is that something goes wrong and the mum needs to have a Caesarian. This can also result in one or more dead puppies.

So, in case you have uncrossed your fingers, toes & legs, thinking we were out of the woods now, please just give your limbs all a good stretch and then re-assume the position until all the puppies arrive safe and sound.

tomorrow

So there is one more day left to vote on the poll and that means that tomorrow is the day. If I told you that today was going to be the day, I apologise. I apologise whole-heartedly for giving you a full 24 hours more anticipation than you thought you were going to have. Today could have been the day, as it is the magic day 33 after mating. However, I couldn't quite manage to get all the necessary people in the same place together until tomorrow. Kath the scanner and Kate with Taika, that is.

So as soon as we get back, you'll be the first to know the result. Well, right after the very few who have been waiting a year now for this event (!) and who have been faithfully promised a puppy should we be lucky. They'll be the first-first to know. And if you're waiting with bated breath for a text tomorrow night, don't think that no text means bad news - I remember from past experience that the village we're going to has notoriously poor mobile phone reception. And, to add insult on top of that injury, what the village lacks in phone masts it more than makes up for with its terrific pub so we're off there for dinner after the scan to either celebrate or commiserate and plan our next move.

But don't worry - as soon as I can let you know, I will let you know. Promise.

On other other hand, if the news is bad I'm not sure I will have phone reception or access to a computer from Venezuela or Outer Mongolia or wherever it is I will have to flee to if Taika does not prove to be in whelp. Do you suppose they have good beaches in Outer Mongolia?

more old wives' tales...

... or not.

I'm charmed that so many people have voted on the poll and I find it interesting to see that the majority vote currently stands at 39% for 5 puppies. A super-competitive someone who always likes to win (and who shall remain nameless) has even voted twice - once with his own guess and once because I said I thought Taika would have more than 7. That's not what I voted, though - I voted for 7.

Don't ask me who just at the moment because I can't quite put my finger on the right book, but it has been said (by someone who ought to know) that the sex of the puppies is determined by the sire's genes while the genes for litter size come down the dam line.

As I'm a bit short on photos at the moment, here are a couple of cute old shot of Neka's first litter of 5 dogs, 2 bitches (including mum-t0-be Taika). The sire was Elbereth Kimmi, himself from a litter of 4 males and 1 female.















L-R: Taika, Tuuri, Keksi, Taito, Kultainen, Seppo, Karhu

That's just how cute 4-week-old Finnish Lapphund puppies are. And here they are 2 weeks later.















L-R: Karhu, Taito, Keksi, Tuuri, Seppo, Taika

Neka was one of a litter of 7 (6 bitches, 1 dog) and her mother, Pigga, had 2 other litters of 6 puppies each. Neka's second litter was 9 puppies. We thought it best to stop there - who knows how many we would have ended up with had we gone for a third batch.

Here, in their entirety, are the Devon Nine who inspired the conception of this blog:











L-R (I think!): Jaana, Inko, Tarmo, Jaska, Sulo, Rauhan, Viivi, Maija, Tarkka

Albmi is one of 3 boys and he has sired two litters of 6 each; 2 males-4 females and 5 males-1 female. I don't know what his history has to say about this theory.