Ten Tails!

Skye finished whelping last night when the 10th pup, Miss Lilac arrived. We had a relatively quiet night as Skye and the pups got to know each other. Skye is a fabulous dam, attentive to her pups, obsessive about cleanliness but as calm and centered a dog as I've ever been with. I call her the Zen Dog. There were some highs and lows yesterday, as we celebrated the Southerners arrival but morned the loss off one pup. Through it all, Skye maintained her typical calmness. I love working with dogs like this!

All of the pups gained weight overnight and are nursing well. About 10 AM this morning, they started wagging their tails when they nursed. I love that point when you look at the litter and all those puppy tails are wagging. You can't help but smile :-).

So, who are the Southerners? Well, here goes:

First born was Miss Black who weighed in at 14.75 ounces and was born around 4:25 AM. Only she and Skye know since we were asleep until she was a few minutes old. She is medium gold with lovely pigment.

Then came Mr Blue at 5:28 AM. He also weighed in at 14.75 ounces, is medium gold and has good pigment.

At 5:49, Miss Raspberry was born. She was the biggest pup at 17 ounces. She is medium gold. About an hour later, at 6:44 AM, Mr Red was born, weighing 14.0 ounces. He is dark gold with a white spot on his head and white toes.

At 7:14 AM, Miss Rainbow was born, also at 14 ounces. Rainbow, also known as Peggy, has a deformed left front leg. Her shoulder to the elbow is normal but the foreleg is quite short with a partially developed paw. I've never seen this before so will have to get educated over the next few weeks but my conversation with my vet yesterday indicated that assuming she can nurse (which she can with no problem), she should be fine on three legs. As I always say, every litter teaches you something. Peggy is our lightest puppy and is quite cute.

Miss Yellow arrived soon after Peggy, weighing in at 15.0 ounces at 7:25 AM. Yellow is also a medium gold. At 9:30 AM, Miss Green arrived. She weighed 14.0 ounces and another medium golden puppy.

At this point, I was wondering if we were going to have any boys. It's really rare for us to have more girls than boys in a litter so on cue, Mr Rust was born at 2:50 PM. He's a big boy at 15.5 ounces and is one of our darker pups.

At 3:27 PM, Miss Rose, our darkest pup was born. She weighed 14.5 ounces and arrived with no fanfare. We didn't even know she had been born until we heard her cry. Finally, Miss Lilac was born at 8:02. She was 17 ounces and is another medium golden pup.

So, that's the crew--7 girls and 3 boys, ranging from light to dark gold. They are vigorous but contented pups. All are gaining well and thriving under Skye's watchful eye. I'll post some photos and a video as soon as my battery camera recharges!

Gayle