Day 33

Zhora has gained a pound and a half! Some of that is weight and not puppies because I increased her food before breeding to get a bit more plush on her (she’s not fat, just not agility lean, like from a 4.5/9 to a 5/9 body condition score, Dr Gray said her weight was “perfect”),but some is hopefully grublets! She has a bit of a tummy starting and is losing her waist. She is eating well most days, although sometimes in the morning she is a bit nauseous (a couple of ginger snap biscuits seem to help and she usually eats her breakfast with gusto a bit later). One thing that has been very interesting is that Zhora is usually a Labrador when it comes to food, she eats everything in her bowl in a matter of seconds. The last week or so she is still screaming for breakfast, but then either nibbles and walks away, or eats quite slowly. I have been adding a bit of canned food and that seems to help her get going.

I normally feed one meal of kibble (breakfast) and one meal of raw (dinner), but I decided to take her off raw during the pregnancy just in case. Calcium especially is a concern in later pregnancy, and it can be difficult to keep calcium levels low enough with raw (too much calcium in the diet before whelping can predispose the dog to eclampsia), especially if you feed a commercial raw diet, which I do (I feed Doggone Raw, which is locally manufactured and awesome!). She will go back on the raw after the puppies are born.

We are doing everything we can to keep stress low (there’s no evidence that stress causes resorption, but why risk it?). Zhora is wearing an Adaptil collar (Adaptil is a synthetic copy of a calming pheromone that mother dogs emit while nursing puppies, it can help with many behavior issues but also just generally helps with relaxation and feeling good, and we also have an Adaptil diffuser in the room the dogs are in most). She’s stopped agility (I decided to be really cautious and she hasn’t seemed to mind) but is still playing fetch and going for walks (staying fit is very important for her physical and mental health, and also for increasing the chances of an easy whelping). She is definitely sleeping more than usual.

Thursday is day 35, which is the end of the first phase of gestation (embryogenesis). On Thursday the embryos become fetuses! They start really growing after day 40 or so, and that’s when they gain almost all of the weight and size they will have at birth.  They have eyelids now, and their toes will start to separate over the next few days!

We will increase her food next week (but then only by about 30-40%, you don’t want her to get fat, as that can make whelping harder), because that’s when the puppies really start to grow!

We have not yet decided on the naming theme for the C litter, we don’t want to tempt Murphy by naming our puppies before they are hatched! Stay tuned!

Bert goes home in two weeks, we will miss him! He is part of the family now.

Skip this bit if you don’t want to know gross dog stuff. This time around things have been markedly different, which leads me to wonder a) if she was even really pregnant at all last time or b) if there was only one embryo. This time her vulva didn’t go back to pre-heat size, it stayed larger and softer (this is how you know you’re a crazy dog lady, you talk about your dog’s lady bits on your blog). She slowed down quite a bit quite early. She had the clear stringy vaginal mucous last weekend which is one of the hallmarks of pregnancy in dogs (she didn’t have that last year).

Leave a Reply