Kennel van Stoopy
A-litter

When you want to see more pictures of A-litter, click on picture of Anouk and her pups

Movies, click Here

The first litter consisted of 5 pups, 2 males and 3 females. The first pup was born on the 24th of Decembre 2003 and the last one on the 26th of Decembre 2003. On the early evening of the 26th, the second pup of the litter got sick and got worse in a short period of time. She didn’t want to drink anymore either. She died the morning of the 27th.

Details of the first litter:
Alma-Noëlle: born on the 24th of decembre 2003, 20.05 hours, sex: female, weighing 380 grams;
Asta-Noëlle: born on the 25th of decembre 2003, 01.25 hours, died on the 27th of decembre 2003, 6.15 hours, sex: female, weighing 340 grams;
Alva-Noël: born on the 25th of decembre 2003, 15.52 hours, sex: male, weighing 420 grams;
Argos-Noël: born on the 25th of decembre 2003, 20.35 hours, sex: male, weighing 400 grams;
Aagje-Noëlle: born on the 26th of decembre 2003, 4.00 hours, sex: female, weighing 410 grams.

Graph (weights) of the first 26 days of the pups. Peak is on the 21st of January 2004 :

Click on a picture of the growing up pups to see more pictures.

Alma	Alva	Argos	Aagje
Pennhip 0,28-0.28	Pennhip 0,52-0.56	Pennhip 0,26-0.26	Pennhip 0,35-0.35

Development

I have tried to write a report/overview of the development of the pups up to their 8th week, for the ones interested.

The first two days after the pups were born, they've lost an average of 30 grams in weight, but after one week, their birth weight was doubled. This wasn't the case with Alma-Noëlle, her birth weight was doubled on the 8th day. On the 10th day, the pups weighed between 850 and 1200 grams. The pups were yelping sometimes in the first two days, but after that you would only hear them between 18.00 en 20.00 hours and when they couldn’t get to the nipple fast enough. Alva-Noël was always the most hungry one and tried to push away his brother or sisters when they were drinking, so he could get even more. This only worked a few times and most of the times, Anouk would stop that. Anouk would wash him rather rough and in the time he would get washed, the one that was pushed away, could start drinking again.

The "yelping hours" changed to 20.00 and 22.00 hours. On the 6th of January 2004, Aagje and Argos started to open their eyes, at least, they tried. There would be a fine line visible, with something twinkling behind that. Brother and sister sometimes tried to stand on their 4 little legs and then when that finally worked, they were staggering just to fall down shortly after that.
Alva and Alma didn’t really try to stand up or open their eyes. They found that sleeping and eating was much more important. On the 7th of January, Alma really barked. Anouk, who was in the room, didn't know what she heard and ran back to her puppy. She looked at me as if she wanted to say: "Was that you or one of my pups?". Anouk checked to see if everything was okay and went back to the room to lie down. She did this more often, when she knew her young slept and were taken care of.

When the puppies were three weeks old, they could see and hear and had small, sharp teeth. The walking got better too. Shortly after they could see, they wanted out of the whelping box and went to explore the environment. At this time they got to know eachother and really liked the tail of their brother or sister. As little as they were, they could growl already and could really make a lot of noise. When they would start growling, Anouk didn't know what to do, she didn't understand and just started to wash them. When someone would go near the pups, one of them would always wake up to come and see you. The others would follow. Their weights at that time were in between 3,5 kilogrammes (Alva-Noël) and 2,7 kilogrammes (Alma-Noëlle). The days and nights were mostly filled with sleeping and drinking, but if they were awake, they were very much awake.

One week later, the pups were then 4 weeks old, they were running around chasing eachother. They started to respond to sounds and knew which people were "theirs". They had several teeth and now and again they were tested on a sister or brother. They learned how far they could go and knew instantly that biting caused pain. The motherdog house trained them in the whelping box. Within two days they would relieve themselves outside the whelping box and their own hole would stay clean.
At this time, the pups got dewormed for the first time. Depending on their weight, they had to eat a certain amount of paste, once a day for three days. This was really necessary and a lot of worms came out with the faeces. I've tried to clean up the faeces before Anouk would be there, but that only worked a few times. Anouk was usually there before me. It was good that she got a cure herself, only two days longer. The pups would still sleep a lot, but the times they'd play got longer and longer. They also played with Anouk and they used her legs and ears as chewingsticks. Apparently, this didn't hurt her because Anouk just let them play.

The 5th week was there. The games would be rougher and fiercer, they all had a time that they yelped when one of the other ones harassed them. By this time they became "real" dogs. They could even jump in and out the box. They started to use the toys more often and discovered that there were many more "toys" in the room. Even the sheet and blanket had to pay for it. Even though they would still get enough to eat from Anouk, I started to feed them extra. At first they would only get milk and porridge. When they ate that, I started to feed them puppy biscuits softened in milk. They quite liked this and every day the biscuits got softened a little shorter. At the end of the 5th week they were able to eat the biscuits dry, with meat. The mothers nipple though, they still liked the best.

In the 6th and 7th week I didn't have enough eyes and hands. They learned a lot from the mother dog and from eachother. They really went to explore the place and wanted to bite in everything. They also got corrected by their mother and now and again pretty rough too. The difference in characters got more obvious and I found it very special to see that they learned so fast. At the end of the 7th week for example, they would walk to the backdoor to relieve themselves outside, after they ate. During playing they would forget to go outside, but by keeping a close eye on them, there were not many accidents in the house. At this time, the mother dog would seperate herself from the pups by going to a quiet place, but always so that, if necessary, she could interfere. Of course the pups got to learn a lot of new impressions because of me, such as the collar, walking on a lead, traffic, people in the streets, travelling in a car, other animals and different sounds. At first with their mother present and after that alone or with a brother or sister. They didn't mind people, animals and strange sounds, but they weren't too pleased with walking on a lead.

In the 8th week they got chipped and got dewormed for the last time. They mostly ate normal food, but now and again, they were allowed to drink with the mother as a tasty dessert, but only if they would be careful. They loved the garden and especially digging in the sand. Nothing was safe for them anymore. In the end you could tell that the motherdog used up much of her strength and that she was really tired. It is possible that she didn't really mind when the pups went to their new environments. One consolation though was that Aagje, her daughter, stayed with her.