Everyone is doing well

I’ve got a few minutes to catch up. Raina’s pups are doing great. Two of the girls have opened at least one eye as of 11:30 a.m. They are very healthy and thriving.

Penny has become so clingy. She tore a hole in the portable playpen, so now she is in a crate in the dog room. She wants to cuddle constantly and shrieks when she hears anyone around. She did not want anything to do with Raina’s puppies. So we are making sure she is well fed, she gets her medicine and spend as much time as we can with her.

CC surprised us Sunday evening by dropping a single puppy on the floor. The pup is a healthy female. We waited, but no other puppies arrived. At first CC seemed interested in the pup. She would lick it, but every time it tried to nurse, CC would walk away. Shannon spent the night with them in case CC had more puppies and to switch the heating pads on again every two hours. Early Monday morning, Shannon came to my room with the puppy. CC would just not feed it and it was crying pitifully. Rather than attempting a bottle-feeding at that point we decided to see if Raina would accept the pup. I love that dog! She took the additional puppy without any fuss. We have been holding Raina to nurse the Cocker puppy separately since she is not as developed as the Yorkies, even though she is almost the same size. I guess we don’t really have to hold Raina; I just put the puppy down alone in a bed to look for a dropper for formula. When I got back, Raina was nursing the puppy.

I was beginning to feel like the only one on baby animal detail until Shannon brought home a baby squirrel! It looks to be only days old. She is feeding it kitten formula with a dropper. Shannon has a great touch with animals. The little thing is perking up and eating like crazy. When it reaches the point that it can lap up food on it’s own, we should be able to take it somewhere like Yellow River Game Ranch.

Shannon suggested we try getting Penny to feed the Cocker puppy. She held Penny while I held the pup. After a few minutes of nursing, Penny calmed down and even stopped the shivering she has been doing for days. We returned the pup to Raina for bathing and will try letting Penny nurse her again later. A big hoorah for Penny!