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Power Outages, Flying Puppies & Mouth Wars

Like a lot of people in Ontario, we suffered through some crazy windstorms yesterday, resulting in a day of sporadic power outages. From about five in the morning on, our power was on and off throughout the day, causing me some major inconvenience, and not a small amount of worry over keeping my puppies warm. With Bunny’s kids in one room, Solo in another, and the balance of the dogs split between the dog room and our family room, there was a lot of space to be kept warm, and just one airtight wood stove to heat it.

Thankfully, Sean had the foresight to purchase a gasoline generator a few months ago, in anticipation of days just like this. Hooked up to space heaters, it was sufficient to keep the entire house warm, and the pups content, if not thrilled about the darker than usual rooms. I’ve never been more thankful that we heat our house primarily with wood than I was yesterday, although I’m thinking of investing in a few kerosene heaters as back up. After all, people in the Muskoka area are still without power, and might not get it back until Saturday. That’s a long time to run a generator, and a lot of gas used. We have a pond out back for utility grade water, but we just noticed yesterday that our pump is hard wired into the house, and so can’t be run off of the generator. We’re going to invest in a dozen or so really big bottles of drinking water. After all, Sean and I can use up the bottled drinks in the house, but the dogs aren’t as keen on Diet Dr. Pepper.

The entire situation was made more hectic because it was the day Harley and Izzy were due to depart for their new homes. Lauren, Harley’s new mom and adoptive mom of our Lola, was flying in from New York City, and Sean had agreed to meet her at the airport to save her driving the five hour round trip to our house. Lauren had agreed to carry both Izzy and Harley back on the return flight, dropping Izzy off to her new mom in New York City. Susanna would then fly her back home to Texas the next day. That’s a lot of planning, none of which could be bumped just because our power was out. I had to make a lot of frantic phone calling to make sure everything was still on track, complicated by the fact our cordless phones weren’t working with the power out, and my cell was completely drained. Thankfully, Sean bought a new cell just before Christmas. Lesson learned – buy an old fashioned plug in phone, in case of future power outages.

So, Izzy and Harley are gone, off to their new families. The house is awfully quiet, and poor Dexter seems a little bit bereft. You’d think he’d be grateful, since Izzy spent the last few weeks terrorizing him at every given opportunity. Sean has taken their leaving rather hard – after all, this is the first time he’s raised up pups, only to see them leave for new homes. He felt a special bond with Harley, who enjoyed sitting on Sean’s feet when he found the rowdy grown up dogs a bit too overwhelming. Poor Sean. He just learned that every litter breaks your heart just a tiny bit when they go.

Solo is coming along swimmingly, and has finally reached the stage where he seems like a ‘real’ puppy. That’s the stage where this tiny little bundle of fur suddenly develops a real personality, and sense of consciousness. You look at them, and they are looking back, not just gazing unfocusedly into the ether. Solo has a vocabulary of little puppy growls and barks, and did his first puppy mouth war with me. He’s breaking his baby teeth, and likes to chew on the nipple of his bottle. He looks more and more like a baby polar bear cub.

Unfortunately, Mae is pretty thoroughly bored with Solo. She’ll give him a cursory lick now and then, but other than that they’re rather like two polite roommates sharing an apartment. Solo stays on one side of the pool, and Mae on the other. This disinterest on her part has given Sailor a new hobby – licking the puppy. After I finish feeding him, I place him in front of Sailor on a blanket, and she spends the next twenty minutes acting like a canine car wash. She licks him up one side, then down the other, and repeats the process for good measure. Solo gives off little baby growls when he’s had enough, but usually he ends up falling asleep on his back mid lick session. Sailor has been a veteran puppy licker since she first climbed into her mom’s whelping box to tend to Tessa’s new litter, and she’s been at it ever since. This is a photo of her licking her half brothers and sisters, shortly before Tessa told her to shove off and get a new hobby.

Sean took some pictures of the pups before they left yesterday, and some photos of Dexter settling in with the brindle bunch today.

See them on Flickr, or below.

Solo is Feeling Better… and a new video

Well, Solo is feeling a bit better. Thanks to the advice I received from some list members, I spoke to my veterinarian, and we switched him over to Zithromax on Friday. It seems to have really worked – his check up Saturday morning confirmed his lungs are MUCH less congested, and much ‘drier’ sounding, although he does now have rhinitis (a nasal infection, similar to a cold).

Luckily, he’s still managed to gain a bit of weight throughout all of this, likely because I’ve been getting up every two hours to feed him, then staggering back to nap until the alarm goes off again. I think as of today I might try stretching that out to every four hours or so, since if I don’t get some REAL sleep soon I’m going to go utterly crazy.

This is the first time since Thursday or so I’ve been on the computer, so now I get to wade through nine hundred piles of email…

Bunny’s pups go home next week – Harley to New York City, and Izzy to Texas. I shot some new video this morning, and there’s a scene in there where Tessa is defending Mr. Monkey, everyone’s favorite stuffed animal, from the puppies. They wait until she’s asleep, then stage a “Mission Impossible” style theft of him that involves sloooowly climbing over the bottom shelf of the bookcase.

I’m going to miss the mayhem they cause, although I’m pretty sure Tessa is already packing their suitcases and pushing them towards the door.

You can see the video here –
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23935blK1l8

Or it’s embedded after the cut.

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Happy New Year's, From the Boring Dog Lady

Sean and I spent New Year’s Eve at home, where we ate chips, a shrimp ring, and got wild by drinking a half bottle of wine. Woohoo! We’re officially boring dog people. Next up – I start whipping out photos of my dogs to show to strangers in the supermarket. Oh wait, I already do that.

Izzy, Dex and SeanWe spent most of the evening indulging in what he and I call “Puppy Freak Out Time”. That’s where we let loose Bunny’s seven week old hellions, and watch them tear around the family room, terrorizing any other dog foolish enough to get in their way.

Penelope and Delilah think it’s like having the circus come to town, only in this circus the clowns climb out of the center ring and bite you in the leg.

The older dogs pretty much just try to stay out of the way of the mayhem, but Tessa and Sailor set up some ground rules almost immediately – “I am older than you, and I will bite you if you piss me off”.

The puppies respect this rule almost all of the time, although last night Dex and Izzy spent ten minutes playing ‘barkbarkbarkBARK‘ with Sailor, in an attempt to get her to drop her nylabone. Since Sailor invented that game, she didn’t fall for it.

I took the time to shoot a ton of new video and photos, all of which can be found after the cut, including a compilation video of Mz. Izzy being super duper cute.

If you don’t want to watch them here, check them out on YouTube –

New Year’s Puppy Party
Dexter and Izzy Versus Sailor
New Year’s Day Puppy Freak Out
Growing Up Izzy

The Flickr photos are here –
http://flickr.com/photos/frenchbulldogs/sets/72157603604359049/

Sleepy SoloAnd check out this cute shot of a very sleepy Solo, just after his feeding. He’s doing really well, knock on wood.

Like I said, I’m not talking about him much, because I am a superstitious nut job.

Don’t forget – videos embedded after the cut.
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Solo at Ten Days Old

At ten days, Mae’s solo puppy boy (who, for now, has pretty much just been christened ‘Solo’) seems to be doing wonderfully. He eats like a piglet, wiggles non stop, and is generally a content little guy.

I don’t like writing too much about him, since I’m afraid I’ll jinx him…

He weighs 15.4 ounces, and is as cute as a little plush stuffed animal.

Mae has an allergy on her nose, from the wool blanket I had in her crate for a few days. Every time I take away the puppy to bottle feed him – I’m still bottle feeding him four times a day – poor Mae tears about the whelping box and her crate, trying to find him. Now I feed him in her room, while she sits on the bed next to us, looking worried. She settles down eventually, and I bottle feed him with one hand, while I rub her tummy with the other. She’s been such a good girl.

Photos here, taken minutes ago:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/frenchbulldogs/sets/72157603576147708/

This one is my favorite:

Mae's Boy

Carol

Mae's Pups & a Meditation on Breeding

Wednesday, when I went to bed at 10 pm, Mae was doing fine. No temperature drop, no funny behavior – just Mae, being Mae and looking happy to see me every time I came into the room to check on her, wiggling her Mae Mae butt and grinning her grin.

At 2 am, I woke up out of a dead sleep, convinced something in the house wasn’t right. I came down to check on Mae, and found her nesting in her bed, panting heavily and discharging signs of lochia in her pee. Despite being two days earlier than our earliest estimated due date, Mae was in labor, and there was no time to wait for our regular clinic to open at 8 am.

The emergency vet was wonderful – she worked fast, she anesthetized lightly, and she had the pups out within 10 minutes of getting Mae under and on the table. Unfortunately, two of them were dead before birth, with obvious signs of first stage decay. It kills me that there was nothing that could be done to try to save them.
The third pup, a little cream boy, is doing well, although he’s rather small. He eats well and vigorously, and Mae is being an attentive mom. The poor little solo puppy looks very small and very alone in that big whelping box, with no company. Mr. Monkey will be joining him for snuggling as soon as I give him a good clean, and we’ll give him lots of snuggling, but it really can’t be a substitute for the company of litter mates.

This has been a hard year for me with pups. I haven’t had a litter in almost seven years, and then two out of my first three have dead pups. I know it’s just all about bad luck and bad timing, but it’s hard not to take it personally. I’ve been lucky when it comes to breeding – until now, I’ve only ever lost three pups at birth, one litter due to veterinary negligence, and one week old pup. That’s pretty good, for almost 18 years of breeding. As I said to Sean, if I’d had this kind of bad luck in my first year of breeding, I doubt I’d still be in Frenchies. This kind of heartache is hard to justify on an ongoing basis.

For now, I’m just going to watch over this little tiny one, and give extra hugs and kisses to Dexter, Izzy, Harley and Delilah. I’m more thankful for them now than ever.

Here are a few pictures I shot yesterday. The rest can be found over on Flickr.