Farmington Valley Golden Retrievers

The energy and movement in the whelping box is increasing dramatically every day now.

They still don’t interact that much with each other yet but that is soon to come. When Barb cleans the whelping box, the pups are now crowded into the little white box. As little as four or five days ago, they fit there nicely.

As you can easily see, they want to move and see the world now. These energy episodes are still fairly brief, and they fall asleep soon after to nap and then want to eat again. We will be starting the puppy food this weekend. Then the mess and cleanup work really begins.

We had two future golden retriever lovers visit yesterday from Barbara’s school. At this stage of their lives, the puppies are so cuddly and small that they don’t intimidate even the youngest children.

Although it was wet, dreary, and chilly outside, the atmosphere was warm and bright in the whelping box. The heater in the corner certainly helped, but mostly the warmth was generated by the spontaneous smiles and good vibes generated by the interaction of people and puppies. All good. More visitors, family, and friends shared the warm puppy atmosphere today. Everyone left smiling and happy.

Emma was a very good sport all weekend. I think she felt safe with all our visitors. These dogs have an uncanny way of judging the inner good of people, and everyone passed with flying colors.

The energy level in the whelping box has picked up considerably in the past two days. The pups are lurching around on all fours and starting to interact with each other more than just finding a sleepmate to cuddle. But cuddling is still their favorite activity right behind eating. They don’t seem to mind if they are on the bottom of the pile or on the top as long as they can snuggle.

Barbara changed the collars to the velcro ones now that the puppies necks are large enough to fill them. Here are our three little girls: Miss Yellow, Pink, and Purple.

Their eyes are open but they don’t yet react to most visual clues. Their hearing won’t be developed for another week, so they get around mostly now with their sense of smell.

The most exciting part of today was meeting some new clients/families who came to look the litter over. The excitement in the children’s eyes was priceless. So were the science questions from the young boy who wondered how the nipples worked. Like a straw in a glass of milk I think I told him. Hah! Our good friend and co-breeder, Donna Talbot also dropped by with her son Trystan. Each of us has a dog from the other’s litter.

For those readers who came to visit and don’t see your picture here, not to worry. We will get everyone in cyberspace before this adventure finishes. More visitors and adventures tomorrow.

At last some signs of growth and change in the whelping box. All the pups have been gaining weight with the two largest boys now over two pounds each. Here is Mr. Red on the scale, who still looks like an out of shape guinea pig.

But today a number of the pups started opening their eyes more than a squint. At the same time they seemed to get more strength in their legs and began to lurch along with their bellies off the ground for the first time. If you enlarge the thumbnail photo of the group, by clicking on it, and look closely at Mr. Red, you can see that his ear canal is starting to open as well. Miss Yellow had her eyes open tonight and gives you a golden paw hello.

Barb and I are just starting to socialize the pups by holding them one a time and have them listen to our idle chatter about each of our day’s events. As you can see in the photo of them in the white box, they are starting to get longer and fill up most of the space now.

I will be on call tomorrow and so no further posts until the weekend. There should be some great changes to share by that time. All the pups now have deposits as of late this evening. We are excited about the folks and families committed to one of our dogs and look forward to meeting everyone we don’t yet know. Stay tuned.

We trimmed the nails of all the pups last night. Let’s see, five claws on each of the front paws, and four claws on each of the back paws, times nine puppies. That’s a lot of nail trimmings! Their eyes are just starting to open a little now, but not enough to see yet.

Sometimes they all try to nurse at once, but yesterday we found them nursing in shifts. Five sleeping and four nursing. Soon after though they were all piled together. Emma doesn’t seem to mind either way.

And every so often a puppy manages to get a little personal cuddle with mom…

NEWS FLASH: Sydney Waller, our mentor, friend, and breeder of goldens for ? almost thirty years now, has generously volunteered to come down from her estate on Naragansett Bay to do the temperment testing at seven weeks of age. Thus no pups will be assigned until after she has done her evaluations. People choosing pups will then have more to go on than just the color of the dog’s coat and collar. I know it’s hard waiting to make your choice, but this is really in everyone’s best interest, including the puppies. That way everyone knows what personality pup they are choosing, and makes unhappy owners and puppies much less likely. We have never had a pup returned (so far), and that is because we are very careful with the matching process.