Sweet Lilli Lou went into labor Wednesday evening, September 17th! We knew it would be that night because she experienced a substantial temperature drop earlier that morning, and her temperature hit its lowpoint around 6pm that day. She also refused food that day.
Lou's whelping box was next to our bed, so we did try and get some sleep before her hard labor began. But I was a nervous "grandmommy" so that never happened. Around 2am (September 18th now) I decided to just turn my light on for good and keep vigil with Lou. It was good timing because after barely any "notice" Lou produced her first puppy at 2:24 am. She made a couple of noises (the likes of which I'd never heard before!) before the girl puppy arrived, but she did it all by herself.
Once the puppy was born, we made sure she was okay and gave her a good rubbing. It only took Lou a few seconds to take over and then she took care of her baby! She weighed 6 and 3/8 oz, and looked just like her daddy, black with a white underbelly. We tied a soft purple piece of yarn around her neck to identify her. As it turned out, she didn't need the yarn to identify her as her coloring turned out to be unique!
About 45 minutes later, puppy number two was born with very little notice at 3:12 am! From that point on, Lou would just stand up and a puppy would unceremoniously plop out. Wish I could take a lesson from Lou on how she managed that. Puppy number two was also a baby girl, weighed 5 7/8 oz and was given an orange piece of yarn. Lou needed no direction in taking over with this puppy or any of the others following her arrival. "Orange" puppy is parti colored.
Puppy number three was born barely 20 minutes later, at 3:33 am. This was Lou's first baby boy. He weighed 6 1/2 oz and is white with black markings. He got a yellow identifier and was the only puppy born in a sac, which I did break. After his birth, Lou settled down a good bit and nursed her pups. We thought she might be done! We took her out to go potty, I cleaned out her box and just a few moments after she came in (4:25 am) puppy number four was born.
Puppy number four was the second and final baby boy, and he weighed 6 5/8 oz. He was the biggest of the puppies at birth. He was also white with black markings. He got a green piece of yarn. Puppy number five was another girl, and she arrived less than 15 minutes after her brother at 4:37 am. She was another black & white pup, and got a brown piece of yarn. She was the smallest of the puppies at 5 1/4 oz.
Again, Lou settled down and after a long night, we thought SURELY we were done! Again I cleaned out the box and we took Lou out...but an hour later another puppy arrived at 5:31 am. The last puppy was a white & brown baby girl. She weighed 5 3/4 oz.
So it took Lou just a few minutes after the 3 hour mark to have her 6 healthy puppies. We were all pretty exhausted at the end, but were so proud of her and how well she did.
We managed to take a few pictures throughout the night and some video, too!
Here is a slideshow:
http://s114.photobucket.com/albums/n268/oates4/furbabies/?action=view¤t=559889fe.pbwAnd here is a 5 min video
:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxpnfLdydhg
