We are the 10 Little Labrador – the first week in pictures

What is happening to Zina’s puppies? We will show you the events of the first week. We will continue our updates for two months in a weekly newsletter. Soon the puppies will get names, and you can choose which puppy will be your favourite. Follow us in this adventure!

Day 1

The photo was taken on the 4th of September after the delivery and cleaning. It is a good feeling that all the puppies are healthy and they can eat without problems. Zina became relieved when the tenth puppy was also born. Feeding the puppies produces oxitocin, so everybody is happy.

Day 2
You can see that the puppy’s head is big compared to the body. Its size is necessary to reach and feed from the udder of the mother. Their nails are very sharp, so it is easy for them to hurt Zina’s udder. When they grow a little bit, we carefully cup off the tips at the age of 2 weeks. The stump of the umbilical cord is just a little patch and their ears are triangles without fur. Holding them with our hands is important for socialisation. They get accustomed to not fearing of the touch of the hands.

Day 3
Believe or not, we did not arrange the puppies. After eating they rolled around and then they connected because they like feeling each other and it puts them at ease. The patterns of their paws are varied in this phase: brown, striped and patchy. As long as the dogs do not use the paws, they are not worn off. If they want to change position, they turn and roll about. It is difficult for them to transfer their weight as they roll around, who knows where. The outer part of their ears becomes white because of the fur.

Day 4
What you can see here is a useful, safe solution. We turned the delivery box into another place, which protects the puppies so that the mum should not lie on them accidentally while sleeping. Half of the group chose the shady part, and the other half is lying in the sun.

Day 5
Zina is embracing her puppy sort of… It would be difficult to embrace the puppy with these paws so it might happen that Zina lied down in this position and one of the puppies plopped in. They always look for the company of the mother and siblings but they cannot control their motions. The puppy landed like this and fell asleep immediately.

Day 6
There are two rows of udders and the puppies feed while the mother lies down. The puppies suck milk on their bellies, on their sides or on their back. In this picture on their side.

Day 7
How big they are! By the end of the first week, they have doubled their weight. On average, the puppies were born with 30 dekagrams, which is considered small in the case of labradors.
It has been typical with Zina’s litters that the puppies were born small. It proves the wisdom of nature, because it is easier and safer to be born this way and the puppies will grow outside the womb.

 

We will follow the story of the puppies from birth to the age of 8 weeks with photos and videos, which we will show in our exclusive newsletter first. Sign up with your name and e- mail address using this address: [email protected]

With regards,

The team of Baráthegyi Guide Dog School

We wrote about the birth of the puppies here.