Breeding Dogs - Ups and Downs

The last two weeks, since June 25th, here at Shelamo have been very hard on us and has required many vet trips.

The wicked heat we've been through, breaking daily temps, has also worn us and the dogs out.  Just hoping our annuals, potted tomatoes and other gardens we're watering enough to sustain them.

  

Our Shelamo's Party Pack ROMC, at over 14 yrs of age, became ill and after 2 days of intensive IV fluid care and testing we found she's in stage 2 kidney failure. New food, meds and religious monitor has had to be upped to keep her stable.  She's doing well at this point, just means a lot of extra care.

Then, a bit earlier than expected on July 2nd, our Ch Shelamo Riding The Wind delivered two pups, unfortunately we lost one.  She's given us a real run for our money with just one!  She's one of the VERY few girls we have that wants to carry her pup around & move it to a different location from our standard whelping area of our kitchen.  I couldn't even leave for a minute without finding she was on the move again!  I was always asking - please give me your puppy!  With monitoring her, it meant sleeping on the couch for two days to ensure we got through the night OK.

 

and you're problem Mom is??

I was just about to .... you caught me!

(no pup was harmed in the taking of these photos :) )

She's had not wanted to eat well postpartum, so my stock of goodies, cooking up special meals has been endless, with a counter full of food, mostly that she hasn't wanted.  Her milk wasn't coming in well either, so I was supplementing the pup's feeding to try and maintain her birth weight, and then to gain some.  Trying to draw a fine line so that she'd at least nurse to try and cause the milk to come down hasn't been easy.  I think now, thanks to a Facebook neonatal page I'm on, I've found a natural remedy that I picked up this Friday that seems to have helped.  We're just 24 hours into it, so we'll see, but he pup now seems to have a fully belly when I check her and has put on weight.

Needless to say Chinook is a very attentive mom ... too much so!

She's gotten the nick-name of YoYo!

And then ... if that wasn't enough, on July 2nd ... in the afternoon, we had to rush our Ch Shelamo Burleigh Casino Rama CGN, CD to emergency (long weekend!) .... new post to follow .....