FIRSTS Litter - Day 0 - Part 2

Well, she didn't whelp them on the 9th as predicted, but waited until the 10th. It was a VERY early morning this morning. Amanda is such a blessed person. She took over watching her around midnight so I could sleep. She woke me at 4:00am. Mars was having pretty steady contractions. We'd finally entered delivery stage II.

Adam, Amanda and I had made a wager last night on what Mars would be blessing us with. I said we'd get one boy and one girl. Amanda said two girls. Adam said 2 boys. Drum roll, please . . . we have added 1 boy and 1 girl to the pack. Green Boy was born at 4:40am, head first, and weighed in at 420 grams (~14.8 oz). He was a little reluctant to start nursing right away because he decided he needed to check out every nipple to find which was the best one. Stubbornness from his mother, I'm sure. A little over an hour later, at 5:50am, Blue Girl made her debut, weighing in at 424 grams (~14.8 oz) and screaming wildly. She was letting us know how vocal she can be, I'm sure. Her success on the milk bar was only hindered by her brother being in her way and thinking he was going to steal the good nipples first.

You may be asking why did we choose grams for the measurement? Because it's a tad easier to determine if they're gaining weight or not. Thanks to Siri, Google and Alexa, it's easy enough to convert the grams to whatever form you're used to seeing. By the end of this week, both puppies should have doubled their weight. And through the week, with daily weight measurements, we will be able to determine if either of them becomes sick and needs medical attention.

So far, Mars has been an excellent momma. She is very protective of her little ones, even from the humans. After they were born, we were drying them with a towel and removing extra fluid from their airways with a Delee suction catheter and Mars had to be right in the middle of it, making sure that her babies were not being harmed. We did return them to her when we were finished, to which she promptly began licking them again. Some battles just can't be won. As of this writing, she has settled down and is not licking them as much and actually trying to get some sleep herself.

In order to keep Momma Mars in good shape mentally, we are supplementing her with calcium. she's losing a lot to the puppies through milk production now, so its important to keep her system supplied. After each puppy arrived, she was rewarded with her own small container of vanilla ice cream and she and I shared some lovely mozzarella cheese whips. We are in the land of dairy cows, you know, so cheese is quite readily available. We are also giving her 1200mg of calcium every 2 hours. So far, she's had a dose at 8:00am and 10:00am. Eyes are not glassy and she's not trying to contort her body around the puppies (like Synnie has done in the past). We will be taking her temperature later as well, monitoring it twice a day in order to watch for health issues that may arise with her. Staying on top of all the dogs' health is of the utmost importance.

Until then, stay tuned for the next exciting adventure of the Firsts Litter.....