From milk to solids

The pups are just over six weeks old now and Bett is gradually weaning them from feeding on the milk she provides to eating solids. As you can see from the video, Bett regurgitates partially digested food from her stomach and the pups eat it all up in very short order.

Moving to new quarters

We are still having problems uploading videos so here we are with some more still photo's and while you are left guessing as to what is going on let us first bring you up to date on Bett's feeding program - yep, writing about eating again so let's keep it short :)
The pups are 47 days "old" now and it has been fascinating to observe how Bett is weaning them off milk and onto solids. The video shows it all and for those of you out there who do not know how it is done you would probably go AAaaarg when you first see it :)
The process is that Bett upchucks half digested food followed by the pups cleaning it all up in very short order!! -- I bet you really want to se that video now, eh :=).
So, how about the two photo's - well, it is just as well that we are closed to guest reight now because we have reconfigured the dining room patio area into a puppy pen - it now looks like a war zone!! You will notice the boards that we put around the railings to stop the pups from falling through - also the paper in the corner which the puppies are already trained to poop on.
We figure that in about two more weeks we will move them to yet another living space that they can call their own. As for the deck, Ken already has a work order to sand and stain it before the end of March - before our 2008 guest ranch season starts - good idea? :O)

Video - hopefully :)

Eat, poop, play & sleep :)

If you say we show a lot of pictures of the pups feeding you are right and that is because they spend so much of their time doing that - when they are not pooping, playing or sleeping that is :).
The weather at Echo Valley Ranch is perfect for winter - blue sunny sky and temperatures above freezing. Even when the temperature drops below freezing, sometimes in the double digits, it still feels quite warm in the sun and with the right clothes on. Life is good :)

Out door accommodations

OK - so part of the routine is to take the pups out to the great outdoors every day. This photo shows one of our dog winter residences with the pups checking it out. If it was spring time, summer or fall for sure these little guys would be living outside most of the time - as it is, it is winter so they are out for about 20 minutes then back inside where they promptly poop on the news paper in their "play" pen :)

Puppy love :)

We take the puppies outside every day now and as you can see they really appreciate Nan for it :)
You can see Barney in the background - the head popping up over his back is Bett.
Try clicking on the picture - it should open up to full size

Pups first day out

Five weeks old and off to the races - this is the first day that the pups have seen the great outdoors and they loved it. The temperature cooperated too - a balmy +9C today!!

Standing room only

Standing room only, three each side :)

Nan is pups new mum :)

As you can see, Bett is having to share the raising of her pups with Nan who is shown right inside the puppy pen!
The top picture may be the first lesson the the pup at the tip of Nan's fingure is being given - I wonder what he did to deserve that.
The bottom picture shows a very happy Nan with a very happy and content family of pups :)
I wonder what Bett thinks about all of this?

Very active puppies!

A video of the antics of the puppies is really what is needed now but until we can get that to work for us still pictures are going to have to do.
As you can see the pups are now feeding out of a bowl - much to Bett's delight since she is getting a tad tender on the underside - combination of sharp teeth and sharp claws all doing what ever it takes to get the most milk.
We are having a lot of joy watching the pups develop - they are 29 days old today and out growing their temporary pen real fast - they can almost knock it down!
We have started to give the pups names and will let you know what they are when we take separate pictures of them

Video of Bett's pups on the loose

Here comes another try to upload the video.

Video upload failed

Oh darn! - after what seemed to take for ever the video upload looks like it failed. The full 54Mb showed that it had uploaded but it is now evident that it did not - will try again :(

Bett's pups on the loose

As you will see from this video, Bett's pups are super active even though they are only 27 days old.
The puppies are being raised indoors since our winter months are too cold to have them outside, most days in January are in the -5 to -12C temperature range but can drop to -40C.
There are two rooms that we use, the one in the video is the Echo Valley Ranch guest games room in which we have put up a pen to contain the puppies when we are not with them. The night room is a basically bare room with a smooth concrete floor that is easier to clean up.
We will put up a new video every week to show the progress; we have found the rate of development of the pups to be quite incredible!