TWO WEEKS OLD!
They made it to their second big milestone – two weeks! Two weeks marks their first deworming with pyrantel pamoate (a very gentle dewormer to dogs, but effective against most common canine intestinal parasites). This is necessary even though Zhora has been on a 30-day deworming protocol with fenbendazole (Panacur C), which has been shown in studies to reduce the number of “encysted” larvae being passed to puppies in breast milk. No matter how good your parasite prevention is (my dogs get monthly heartworm preventative, which also prevents most intestinal parasites, along with flea and tick prevention, and I check fecals several times a year), canine intestinal parasites have this nasty way of “hiding” from the dewormers, called “encysting”, and can still be transmitted to puppies even if the mother doesn’t appear to have a parasite burden. This is why deworming is recommended for all puppies, even if their mothers don’t appear to have worms, and even if the puppies themselves don’t appear to have worms. Most dewormers are quite safe and gentle to dogs, even young puppies, and reducing parasite burdens on puppies can be a huge factor in their survival and general health. I deworm with pyrantel every 2 weeks starting at 2 weeks of age, and do a three day course of Panacur at about 6 weeks.
The puppies loved the pyrantel, it’s actually a human product I use (for treating parasites in children), and it’s sweet and flavored. They also get a probiotic although because they got colostrum and have been nursing well all along, their gut flora is probably starting to be nicely established.
We are now down to the last two days of Early Neurological Stimulation.
I’m still clipping their nails with a human nail nipper, but I will try starting the Dremel next week if their nails appear to be hard enough.
Weight check:
Ruffles – 842 grams ( 8.37% gain)
Orson – 925 grams (5% gain)
Chex – 880 grams (5 % gain)
Frito – 795 grams ( 10.26% gain)
Popcorn – 544 grams (9.9 % gain)
Once again the two littles were the biggest gainers, although Ruffles was right behind them. As long as they are all gaining 5-10% per day on average, they’re doing fine.
They are all able to stand up now, although Popcorn so far is the most advanced when it comes to walking. They are all trying to walk, even though if they’re in a hurry (like if Zhora has made an appearance) they revert to walrusing, since for now it’s faster for them. Frito can walk backwards but hasn’t quite figured out forward gear yet. The ones with open eyes are spending more time sitting up and Mr Magoo-ing around. Their eyes should be open all the way in the next couple of days, everybody has at least a sliver of eye open now.
What’s interesting is that, just as Jane Killion from Puppy Culture says, as soon as their eyes started to open, Zhora started licking and nuzzling their faces instead of just paying attention to their bottoms. She is starting to interact with them as individuals, not just furry blobs of need.
I want to thank those who reached out to me about my little rant about the anti-breeder folks yesterday. 🙂