Tink and Goer had a litter of four beauties on April 9, 2018.  Three males and 1 female.  All of these puppies have gone on to their wonderful homes and several of them will be in the performance ring or doing therapy work. 

Puma and Rio had four absolutely adorable puppies.  Two blue merle males and two black tri females. The merles had beautiful blue eyes! All were healthy and have gone on to their forever homes!

I set up their puppy room last night...as I can see that they will soon be scaling the walls of the whelping pool.  I want them to have a safe space to romp so I put up a puppy pen to contain them.  They will stay in that pen (I may enlarge it even more by adding more panels to it) for another couple of weeks and then I will transition them to the back porch and supervised outings in a portion of the back yard for more adventures.

Their eyes started opening at day 11.  Just the merest hint of eye.  Now, at 14 days old, everyone's eyes are open.  They are staggering about like little drunken sailors!  Gaining weight daily.  Fig and Sprout were the first to open their eyes.  
 
Prada is doing great. Eating 4 times a day (Nutrisource), a cup each time.  
I did notice, yesterday, that there were several scratches around her nipples and cut the puppies toenails to stop that from happening as much as possible.
She spends large amounts of time away from the puppies, catching up on some much needed sleep.  I couldn't have picked a better mom for the puppies. she keeps the swimming pool/puppy whelping pen immaculate.  
Even though she is friendly to all people and tolerant of other dogs, I don't let everyone who wants to visit come over because I am concerned about communicable diseases/flu etc being brought into the house.

In order to keep fleas and other insects at bay, I have doused Prada with diatomaceous earth (food grade)...just on her neck and back.  DE is a flour like product that is safe for people and dogs.
I change out their bedding/mats everyday.  Lately they spend half their time off of the mat/bedding and half on the cool plastic pool floor.  The room temp is kept within 72-73 degrees and that seems to be agreeable to Prada as well.  

The other dogs are all interested in the puppies but don't go in the puppy room. Prada has warned them away by staring them down.  Haha!  
These two videos are very short and show the puppies starting to hold their heads up and walk.  Little Twig is cleaning Willows ear as she sleeps.

I expect them to be climbing out of the box sometime during the next week.  I have a puppy pen that I will set up in the room and take the swimming pool out at that time.

This litter was born on the same date as last year's litter!  May 16th!  Must be our lucky day! Prada had a tough time moving the puppies down the two uterine horns so we took her to the Emergency Vet to make sure she was OK.  As soon as we got in the waiting room...BAM! She has her first puppy!  They got us into the Exam room and Boom! Another puppy! The Vet said she was fine and wouldn't have any trouble having the rest of her pups....and she was right! She had all 5 of them in about 3 hours....that is after starting contractions 24 hours before.  I'm a newby breeder, this is only my 3rd litter so I wanted to be safe rather than sorry.  Long story short, everyone is fine!  Three girls and two boys! All huge and healthy.  They are 13 days old and peepers are starting to open!
Willow is a blue merle female with lots of bling!  Root is a hunky dark blue merle male with lots of dark copper. Sprout is a gorgeous black tri female with full white collar and dark copper.  Twig is the smallest and is a black tri male with 3/4 white collar and the most gorgeous copper on his face.  Fig is a beautiful black tri girl with 3/4 white collar and lovely head and copper.  They are all unique and beautiful in their own way.
Prada throws beautifully marked puppies! I hope we have some blue eyes but it is hard to tell yet.
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