Gingerbread "Little" whelped almost two weeks ago and had a very difficult labor. We had a big puppy stuck and was actually out in the yard getting in the car to go for a c-section when I managed to help her get the pup out. It was not alive and then she easily had two living puppies.
The problems started almost immediately as that dead pup was delivered outside and we took her back in for delivery...she began looking for the (dead)other puppy. She would not be quieted nor consoled. She was sure there was another puppy somewhere. She spent the next week barely feeding her living puppies all the while leaving them to look everywhere for the lost pup. This quickly let to us bottle feeding the pups that had become weak... The mother stopped milking and actually had a type of asthma-like attacks where she couldn't breathe! A lot of vet visits you could imagine. In just hours the pups were in such a negative state nutritionally plus dehydrated requiring them to have sub-cu injections of saline IV to rehydrate them every few hours. I started on tube feeding since they were just not getting enough bottled milk as their suckle reflex was so weak. We lost the first pup on Friday am 1:15. I became aggressive with the tube feeding and had the other puppy in a much better state by Saturday night.
Sunday morning at 1:00 feeding, Salty came to the rescue. She (we had tried her 5 days earlier and my son's dog too) started nursing the little pup. By Sunday night the little one was perky and nursing great.
Weighed her yesterday and she had gained 3 ozs, now up to 16.7 oz. Her eyes are opened now and her little razor backbone and ribs are being covered over in normal puppy fat! It's been a journey.
Snuggled up with her piglet....
Little is back to her normal playful self, puppy worries long forgotten. Salty, her grandmother, has completely weaned her big puppies and taken on the task of mothering this little girl.
No comments:
Post a Comment