The Tack Box Podcast
The Tack Box Podcast is an informative and relaxed show that covers all aspects of dog ownership. Join AKC judge and Renowned breeder, Dale Martenson, and new enthusiast, Tyson Wald, as they discuss topics ranging from acquiring your first dog, showing, breeding, marketing puppies, and running a Kennel.
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The Tack Box Podcast
Dog Whelping 101: What to do | How to Do it EP. 66
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In this episode, Tyson and Dale discuss the intricacies of whelping, sharing expert tips, personal experiences, and essential tools to ensure a successful and safe delivery for your dogs.
What is going on, everybody? Welcome to the Tac Box Podcast. We are here in Taxoma on a gloomy Tuesday afternoon to record this episode. We're talking welping because we have some awesome welping questions. Dale's got a litter that probably is whelping right as we speak. As we speak. Yeah. So what episode is this? This is episode 66, Dale.
SPEAKER_0166. Like on Route 66, and it's episode 66.
SPEAKER_00And we're talking whelping while you're welping. While we're whelping, you know.
SPEAKER_01So any minute now, Jane might be running up here with you know with the puppy. It could happen.
SPEAKER_00So you ran some reverse progesterone today and realized like, hey, this bitch is going to be welcome today.
SPEAKER_01Well, you know, so progesterone, which is of course, you know, the uh big game changer in breeding and whelping, helps us target both. And because it's not even so much the when you when you're breeding a bitch as to when you bred them, is like when they ovulated. Because then you might breed them over a week, 10 days, but the day they ovulated, that's the day that that's the day the the party got started. And on Sunday, I ran progesterone on on uh two girls, and one of them came back at a like a one-five two. She didn't welp until the following morning. And the other one was a two-five two, and she was welping at you know, she was welping when I got the test results. So, you know, some you know, some breeds, I think smaller dogs like chin, that they don't have to go as far down. Bigger dogs, they can ride that, you know, you can get a chin and you get something back, and it says it starts with a two, you probably got a puppy waiting for you, you know. And but like a cavalier or a little a bigger dog, you might go another 24 hours, you know.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's awesome. So you found out that you're gonna be welping today. So hey, you know what, you might be welping in the whelping episode, but we uh we we've talked about whelping, you know, previously, one of our very first episodes, we've talked through through some of the whelping, but so much has it has changed. We have a lot of new listeners that are asking questions about whelping. We have you've had you've had more experience? I've had more experience uh welping, so I might be able to give a little bit of my opinion on things or my experiences, and and we're just we're further along and we have new questions and and new things. So let's dig in.
SPEAKER_01Let's start out. There was a quote uh from uh Jane Martinson regarding whelping. She gives them some of the best quotes. Yeah, like let's make it into the great throwing like philosopher.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, she's fantastic, you know.
SPEAKER_01So we're sitting there at the at the show, and someone said, Gosh, I love whelping puppies, and I'm so good at it. And Jane didn't even look up at her, and she said, You haven't done it enough. So what with the the moral of the story is whelping should always be a major stress. You should always be uptight, you should never let your guard down, and you should always be trying your very best, and it'll, and maybe, maybe you will, it's like driving on ice. You maybe you will avoid an accident or crash. This is one of those times where you know what you do can put the finger your finger on the scales of fate as to whether you have the next day you have a beautiful litter and everything's lovely, or if you the next day you might have a major vet bill and everything's dead. You know, all of this is your choices that you're going to make during your whelp. And we're gonna give you some uh we're gonna give you some tools and some guidelines to help make good choices so you can come out on the other side of your whelp, you know, where then you can just sit back and relax until you start to wean them and you have another shot at killing them. But the uh But whelping is just it's so treacherous. You really have to be on your game.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So last week we talked about weaning, and one of the things that we've said for a long time on this podcast is welping and weaning. Those are like the two things where I feel like once you whelp and everything, you know, is alive and doing well for 48 hours, like probably good tell weaning, you know, and then you got it again. So whelping, I you know, is like I I think for me, like one of the biggest things that I've learned over the last year of whelping puppies is this like to learn that tragedy's going to happen. How can we minimize the tragedy in it? You're like, you know, how how can we, you know, preparation to minimize the tragedy? So it's like it is it's so stressful. It's one of those things where it's like when you first are doing it, you know, it's like you think about having a baby or you know, puppies, and it's like, oh, this is so great, and everybody's so excited, and it's the cute little bundle of joy and all the things, and it's like it's a fucking nightmare, you know. It's like it's horrible. Are they gonna yeah, are they gonna go into labor at 10 p.m. and you're gonna be up all night, you know, throughout the whole night trying to get these puppies out? Like if you're lucky, you know.
SPEAKER_01I mean, the the big the big thing is, and I mean, and this is where, you know, if you go ahead and put the work into knowing when your bitch ovulated, that's going to steer you to the window of when she's going to walk. Because there are a couple of steadfast rules that just apply. And mostly we're going to be talking, our experience is going to be geared towards smaller dogs, toys toys to mid-size. But this applies to big dogs too. You know, and if you can be there in attendance for the birthing, that is a huge benefit for you know, for the outcome. And no matter how you try, you're not always going to catch the first the first puppy. You're going to try, you know, but sometimes you're not. And but you really want to keep and that's again where progesterone kind of helps you tell you, like, you're you're at an eight, you're probably not going to whelp today or in the next five hours. You need to go get groceries, that's fine. You need to go sleep. Okay, go sleep. But once you start getting into the the window of whelp, and especially when you start figuring out the days, then you go, we're not leaving her unattended because we can come back to we can come back to a situation where there's a puppy hung up. You can come back to a situation where uh the your bitch had all the puppies and didn't take them out of the bags and they all just suffocated right there on the floor. Uh you can come back to they took the bags off and they got a little crazed and they took some legs off and pulled their umbilicuses out. You can come back to all a sort of array of horrors, you know. But if you are prepared and if you have them in your whelping spot, what we use is a kiddie pool, a small kiddie pool, and then we take a fitted sheet, which goes around the kiddie pool, and then we put like some pads and some towels in there for them to root around in and where they can kind of burn it off. And, you know, because before they get done with that welt, and I always love that Walt Disney kind of thing where they come back in from Lady in the tramp, and they come in, and the puppies are in this beautiful little wicker basket, and they'll have bows on them and stuff. Yeah, you know. This is not like this. This is more like that chainsaw massacre type of thing. You've got poop uh and every other kind of fluid going on, but you need that way after the whelp is done, you can pick up that little stink bomb, pull it up, and put the whole thing in the wash and and bleach out your tub and you're good to go for it for another run. But those you know, being prepared, once that bitch is in her day, so once you've bred your bitch and depending as to when she ovulated, then you should immediately go to your calendar. You have a calendar, a breeding book, and a calendar? Oh yeah. Okay. And I would say bare minimum from ovulation, not when you bred them, but from ovulation, you should move your bitch into the welping box five days early. Five days early. Because because you don't know exactly are we gonna go 63, you know, are we gonna yeah, usually it's gonna be close to 63 from ovulation, but it might not be. But you really and truly five days. That that that will can that will catch 99.95% of of your whelps if you bring them in five days before. And you know, where you just start because and what I mean by bring them in is you no longer leave it out in the yard with the other dogs to go potty. Once they're on whelp watch, it goes by itself into a plate, an X pen to go potty, and then back to the whelping yard. Because you will come back to your backyard with all of your dogs carrying a puppy running around the yard. This is gonna go badly. So yeah. Degrees of horror. You know, so once you're in that five-day window, she is either in the welping box, in an X-Pen. She is like, we're watching her. If you have a camera, awesome. You know, you're gonna you can watch her eating, you can watch everything. And you can start, you can start temping her all of these things once you go into the into the welp thing. So where do you where do you move yours to when they're about to welp?
SPEAKER_00So I have a X pen welping box type thing. So I have a little box, like sweater box type of thing, like you kind of have. So they got a potty pad, food, water, and just somewhere in the house where I can keep an eye out more. It's gotta be in the way. It's gotta be in the way.
SPEAKER_01You have to step over it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, especially if you're not running progesterone, right? Because you don't you don't even know when they ovulated then. So you're going off of, well, this is when they tied, so 63 days. Well, they could have ovulated two days before you tied. So if you're not gonna get it.
SPEAKER_01If you're going on that and you didn't breed on progesterone, I'd add a couple of days to pulling them up because you don't know. They may have ovulated 48 hours before you, you know, before you bred them, and they bred, you know, and they may have been two days ovulating, and you might, you know, so you if you're if you're not doing this on just, you know, rascal got her, tied her in the yard, and that's where we're day one, well then, you know, then I might pull them up seven days, you know.
SPEAKER_00And and been there and done that. I mean, I remember I had a bitch go, it was day fifty-eight, and I was like, I think she's going into labor, and I called you. I'm like, Dale, it's 58 day 58 too early. You're like, well, no, they're not gonna die, but it's probably not day 58, it's just what you're going off of based on not running progesterone. So it might be your day 58, but it's not hers. Yeah. And you know, and we had the literature.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, they were they're ready and fine, but you know, we weren't a hundred percent prepared either because we thought it was only day fifty-eight. We were expecting like two to three days later, you know. So preparation is yeah, preparation is huge, and and that that just that's another aspect with like not running progesterone versus running progesterone. I know we've talked about this before and we have an episode on progesterone testing, but the stress level that comes with not running progesterone because you got a week window of like she could welp today or she could welp in a week from now, and you're on high alert for a frickin' week all night long, you know. Yeah, and and and most likely it's probably gonna be the whole week because you're gonna be stressing out and you're not gonna sleep at night because you're like, Did I hear a noise? Is she whelping? And it's like, no, she's not.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. But well, I mean, we set our welping our welping sit pool under the television set in front of the fireplace. Because, you know, while you're watching TV and watching TikToks and Facebook and doing text messages, you'll go, Oh, yeah, you know, and you can start watching. And you really truly a lot of it is watching. Watching to see is their demeanor changed, are they starting to be shivery? Are they starting to grab a hold of the towels and do things? Are they getting dramatic? All of this is your pre-labor uh uh signs that you have time. And just like for the record, any bitch of any size might have to have a cesarean section. It's not off the table for anything that gives birth. You might have to have a cesarean section. So you it is up to you. You've got two months to kind of figure out what you got going on there, and you need to have a plan and a backup plan, and a backup plan to your backup plan as to because that it it that's not the time at uh at uh 10 p.m. to be going, well, we're gonna need to have sexual. What are we gonna do now? You know, well, you know, you're screwed. You know, you've got you had two months to get this done. You need to do this. So what I recommend is go to your first your first plan and say, this is going to be, you know, like you might have a someone that might do daytime or that type of thing. Say, I, you know, I have a bitch that could be on coming into day 60 about here, blah, blah, blah. Let the vests know. You know, have get some get some dialogue going here. Make them be a part of this. Don't just invite them to the party when it's going bad. You know, talk to they might want to do a C uh an x-ray, you know, to tell you this looks like this might not fit because you've got the ship in a bottle. You know, it's like, well, this isn't gonna happen. Let's just wait for her numbers or her to go into labor and to go ahead and do a section. You know, or you know, sometimes when you have one puppy, one puppy litters oftentimes ups your odds for disaster. Kind of like having super huge litters are not great either. You know, that's people, oh, that's so swell. She had 12 puppies. No, that's a nightmare. Probably everything's gonna die. You know, it's it's it's bad, you know. So all of this stuff is is, you know, I mean, involve your vet prior to to the whelping. You had to you had a section the other day uh um in South Dakota, and how many vets did you have to have that, you know, I mean, and you had already talked to them.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well, and that was one of the I mean, that's one where you you thought you were prepared, you know, and and and one of the lessons that that I learned, because it was like you want to be prepared and you think uh yeah, might need a section, so you have your normal vet, and you know, I took my I took her in for x-ray to you know day 55-ish, you know, it's like the vet did the x-ray. It's like she's at, you know, she's at day 55, it's gonna be coming, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You think you're lining everything up? Yeah, it looks like she's gonna push the puppy out just fine, you know, what they can see. But, you know, it depends on the the degree of education that your vet is. You know, are they pro-breeder? Do you know how do they have a lot of experience with puppies? Yeah. My vet, you know, didn't think she'd have a problem pushing the puppy out. She said her hips look fine, like, you know, like look, looks like everything's gonna be fine. So one of the things that I learned through that this process was the the the singleton thing that I didn't think about is like, yeah, well, that one puppy probably got bigger than they needed, than they would have with other puppies, or doesn't have other puppies in there pushing, pushing that puppy to the birth canal or anything like that. So yeah, we go into labor, you know, in the middle of the night, of course, you know, and then nothing happens within five hours, and you got a sack, you know, water sack coming out, but not getting pushed the rest way out, puppy's not moving. So now it's like, cool, we're gonna need a section. It's 5 a.m. My normal bed is not open, nor are they reachable because they're not answering their emergency phone line that they have. So you think, again, you think you're prepared. They, you know, they got an emergency line. I can call and text this line any time of day, and they're gonna answer until they don't, you know, until they don't answer because they don't have to. And uh so they didn't. And you know, so I had to go to the second option, which was you know, the emergency vet. And and not always an option you want to do because they're gonna charge you an arm and a leg, but if you have an emergency vet, at least you know that you're gonna get somebody available, you know. And thankfully we got into the the time that the regular vet was open and we could just squeeze into a regular time frame at that vet. But, you know, not one of those things that I was thinking was gonna have to happen or be prepared with this particular dog because I thought she's a good size, she's gonna, you know, she was her mom was a free welper, you know, everybody's been a free welper. So it's like, ah, she's gonna free whelp. There's only one puppy. Didn't even think about the the single puppy growing too big type of aspect until it happens, you know, and and and that's just part of what you get with experience, really, too. Because it was like, I don't think as tenured people, you know, as that you learn from your mentors of like, oh, this is a singleton, you might need a you might need a a a C-section or to be prepared for that. That's not something that you kind of think about as a tenured person to like educate somebody new on until that new person comes across it, and then it's just kind of like, oh yeah, yeah, that happens all the time. That's normal. But it it's almost so normal for educated people with experience that you don't think about it to tell new people, you know. So you learn from experience on a lot of things.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. And I'll tell you, you know, it's like, you know, because you had the plan of the vet and you had the emergency number, which was your backup plan, and then you had the emergency clinic, which was the backup plan on the backup plan. But the problem with emergency clinics are, you know, is that oftentimes they're anti-breeder. So they are going to come in and say, we'll do your section, but we're gonna spay your bitch. And this might be your top-winning show dog. This might be, this might be, you know, you this might be a bitch that has has no need of, because just because a bitch has a section one time doesn't mean she's gonna have to have a section the next time. That means none of that. So then they're gonna charge you an exorbitant amount of money because because they don't like you the fact that you're breeding, you should be adopting, not shopping, and all that. You got so you got that negativity going in there because they already think you're they already think you're skeezy because you're breeding dogs. And then and then if if it couldn't get any worse, they usually are bad. Because they don't do they don't do repo really. So they're you're gonna pay a ton of money, get crappy service and a lot of attitude, and they're gonna do a shit job. I mean, what could be more delightful? You know, like it's you know, so that emergency vet thing, that's just like that is the last house on the block. That's really and if you end up there, you probably made some choices along the way that were not not the best that got you know got you into that position.
SPEAKER_00So I mean, what tenured vet is working at midnight? You know, it's like you're gonna get the new vet. The you know, the person that's not nearly as educated or experienced or qualified. I mean, I guess they're all probably qualified or for the most part, but you're not getting the experienced vets, you know, at the emergency clinic at 1 a.m.
SPEAKER_01Right, right. So, you know, then the the next thing along with the one puppy thing is like if you're running progesterone, because you know, progesterone goes up, up, up, up, up, and then into ovulation, and then, you know, then it, you know, they breed, and then then when they're going to whelp, it goes down, down, down, down, down. Well, I have run, I had a section bitch, and I was running progesterone on her to see when she fell and where she would be into the safe zone of having the puppy. You know, so like on the machine we were using, which was the minivitis, you could you could really pretty viable in the threes. Sometimes people would take them in a four. I preferred to get into the threes. You know, the twos meant that. Within 24 hours, you were gonna well, that kind of a thing. Well, this bitch is hanging out in foreland and hanging out and hanging out and hanging out. And finally, uh, and I'm testing her twice a day, kind of thinking, you're running out of days, sister. You gotta have this puppy. And uh, you know, and then I noticed there is a green discharge. Whenever you another steadfast rule that you can write down, when you see green, go. It's not gonna get better. You see green, you're in need of veterinary care. At that point, you're trying to, you're saving your dog, you're saving your bitch. You might get a puppy, you might not, you know, because green's a problem. Well, I went in and and we did a section, and and the puppy had already died. And and I'm thinking to myself, like, I've been testing this dog, you know, every you know, every 12 hours for like the last four days. You know, how how'd this happen? And the vet at the repo vet said, when there's only one puppy, sometimes it just doesn't fall. So not until it's too late. So if there's one puppy, then you go by ovulation and breeding date, like the when you bred them, when they ovulated, and then figure into there if you know it's gonna be a section. You don't go ahead and wait for that to fall like you would on a normal type of thing. So a lesson learned, you know. You have to, you know, one puppy, one puppy's tricky. You know, you've got you've got for for any kind of well. So then the next thing is so you have you have your you have your bitch set up, you have you have your spot, you have your hot box going with your little heating pad on warm, covered, covered in a terry towel. Preferably you're gonna have that box going somewhere where the mom's not gonna hear the puppies, you know, fussing, because that doesn't tend to make them pay closer attention. You know, that's like so like when we're welping, we usually put puppies in the bathroom.
SPEAKER_00But you know, stir them in the bathtub, you know what he does.
SPEAKER_01Put them in the bathtub. There you go. Clean them up. And you know, you've got you've got that where they're warming and they're saying, you know, it some you know, I mean, if there's a long break, if it's gonna be a uh something that's gonna have a bunch of puppies, you might take and give let those puppies hook on and nurse for a few minutes in there. But usually toy dogs, we wait for them to be totally finished before we bring them back to the uh to there. But get the, you know, you know, get them out of the area. You're gonna want to have the glove that we talked about pulling out the placentas, is with every puppy being born, you need to keep track of did the placenta pass? If the placenta did not pass, if it broke in delivery, it's not the end of the world. Just keep an eye on it. You know, keep a, you know, be aware whether or not she's retained placentas or not. You know, you're gonna want to have your set of towels there, good pair of scissors. I like that uh little twiny craft store uh string for tying off the umbilical cords because it's got a little bit of grip to it. You know, uh sometimes you don't have time, sometimes you do, but you know, I think that when you cut them, I usually like to leave them about about an inch. You know, about an inch is is a good cut, you know, because you can grind it with your fingers a little bit and stop. But you know, if you're if you get it shorter than an inch, you're gonna have to tie them a little bit more because it's gonna bleed. You know. And you also have to one fun thing, sometimes you'll get a really amped up mom and she can't get past the umbilical cords, and she'll like work them, and they can actually pull them all the way out and gut the puppy. Or they can rip them up so bad that they're that they've got got a an abdominal hole. So you kind of really, when you're putting the puppies with them, I feed my I feed my girls because when they're done welping, they're gonna eat. And so I give them, I give them canned food or whatever, whatever that, you know, just I get them eating. And if they seem like they're amped up on the puppies, I feed them more. I keep feeding them just like a Thanksgiving type of thing where you get them on some kind of tryptophine coma. Get them so full the idea that I can't eat another thing. I just not lay here and let these puppies nurse. Good. Good. You know, get your crazy butt settled down here because we don't need you, you know, working on these. You know, so that's you know, watch that, make sure that they don't go after those cords after they're born. You know, we have one we were talking about this the other day, and because we were watching a show about uh calving, pulling calves, and how you know, how you know cows and they're out there and they're in the field and all that. And I and I was said and I said something to Jane about, well, you'd think they'd have more natural sense. And she said, and this is true, it's instinct. Animals will have a degree of instinct, but they don't necessarily have sense about raising their puppies. They have to learn. Some of them will have that verse litter and they'll take to it like a duck to water, and they're great. Some of them are idiots. We all have friends that are idiots with their kids, you know. We know those people, you know. But you have to guide them to the path of how to take care of their babies the way that they have the optimum chances of surviving. But you want to utilize that instinct, but you can't expect them to just, they should just know there's it's not magic like that. Yeah. Were you ever surprised about that? How like they had like, yeah, you know, they're there.
SPEAKER_00I've been surprised both ways, I think. You know, I think like I'm kind of surprised, you know, it's like first-time moms when you get, you know, he's like you well, you give them back all their puppies when they're done. And it's like you so sometimes you just see them, and it's like they're just gonna lay down there, and then they kind of start using their front paw to like push the puppies in to like, come nurse, come nurse. And they're like kind of keeping them in there and they're cleaning them and licking them, and it's kind of just like, hmm. How like just their instinct is just like to be a mom, and this is what you you need to be down here doing this. And then I've had some, you know, where it's just like they don't, you know, almost don't want like they don't know what to do with the puppies. Like, what is this thing down here? I'm gonna sniff it and I'm gonna lick it a little bit, but I you know, it's like I've had to hold them down, you know, keep them laying down and like put the puppy on them, and you know, it's like it was an instinct for them, and they got it, but after I held them down and showed them, you know, like your puppy's got a nurse and they got a latch and you gotta lay here and let them feed, and you know, and then it's like after a day of doing that, they you know, then calm down and and figure it out. But some of them are a little crazy, like what the F is going on here, and some of them just kind of get that natural instinct right away. But I also, you know, something to talk about too, like that big difference between whelping and them having puppies and a c-section, right? They're knocked out on a c-section.
SPEAKER_01That's a whole nother area where things can go way south. So when you're doing a section, the good part of having a section, if you have, I mean, if you're right on your days and you've got all this on there, you got you got your hot box packed, you got everything ready, you got off schedule, you know, you got your Starbucks, you're heading on in, and they do the section, bam, bam, bam, you know, all the placentas are taken care of, you know, you know, everything's good. It's like bam. Like you get a really good vet, and they can section out five, six puppies and have mom back to back uh on the the road to recovery in half an hour, and you can have the babies are all warm and you're tootling back home and you feel like, I got this. This is so great. You know, I didn't stay up all night. I didn't go ahead and have that, have her labor for an hour to present one foot that you've got to try to get the head turned and get pulled, all that. You you feel like you're pretty smart at that point. Then you get home and your bitch is coming around from her from her anesthesia, and she goes, No, no, no, no. I want no part of anything to do with any of this. And you go, the party's over. You know, there is you cannot let a bitch wake up with puppies on them. It can go really bad. She might kill them all. It can totally happen. You know, they're they're not, you know, when you've taken when you've taken the birth birthing end out of the equation, you have to then reintroduce those puppies to her. So you get home, you lay them out on a pad, you hook them on, you watch her, you don't leave her with them. You let them fill up, you put them back in the box, and you put her when she is to, and sometimes it will take 48 hours. I've never had one go longer than 48 hours, but I've had more than a couple that took a full 48 hours for them to come into their mind and into the milk and everything, you know, by you know, that by the time they're hungry and wanting to eat and they're starting to want their babies, then you're back in business. But you have to continually like monitor that situation. Is she ready for them? Is she wanting them? Because if she's doing this, you know, doing the side eye, she ain't ready. That's not the time to leave her with those babies. Another little fun thing you can do, and it gets uh it gets some uh good looks, is uh in your hotbox, bring a sandwich bag and bring home a placenta. That's that'll get you a look or two. But if you can have her come back around and and like throw that placenta in there, that's natural oxytocin. That's gonna help her come into milk. It's gonna help her feel like she's had babies, it's gonna trigger instinctual feelings, or she should, you know, hopefully, please, she should be wanting those puppies more. And that's something that, you know, because you know, uh you have to ask for that because I mean, unless you have a a repo vet that's kind of like with it and has maybe raised a litter of puppies or two, you know, but there's there's a a little something to that. But what's the longest you've had to take one to accept the babies?
SPEAKER_00I mean, first of all, asking the vet when they're doing a c-section to give you the placenta in a plastic bag will generate looks. Like they're like, why? What? You know, it's like, well, because that's what we do, you know. But yeah. So I think uh it wasn't even the in when I had the c-section, it wasn't even the aspect of that she didn't want the puppies. It was the aspect of not trusting her fully with them because she was so loopy. Like she was so out of it for over a day. I remember, I remember picking her up and it was just like she was standing there, and I'm like, Are you sure she's ready to like she's good? Like, because she was so like out of it and everything. And it's like so I was like, get her home, sit there latching the puppy on, you know, letting the puppy feed while I don't move. And at that point, the dog was so out of it, she was just laying there, you know. It's like I probably could have left the puppy in there, but you don't trust the mom in that scenario because she's so out of it. It took her till the next morning to actually like be a halfway resemblant of herself. And she seemed, as she was coming to, like, I want the puppy, like I'm gonna lick it, I'm gonna clean it, and all the things, but still so loopy that it was just like, I don't know that you can really trust her. I I think general rule of thumb probably is if she's licking and cleaning the puppy, probably good. But you know, especially if she's eating, if she'll if she's eating food and doing that, you're probably safe. But better safe than sorry. I waited until I felt like she was like pretty much 100% herself and not crazy loopy anymore. It seems like it took a while for her to wear off all that anesthesia, but you know, it goes well into the second day.
SPEAKER_01The anesthesia thing is a huge, huge that's a topic all in itself. And I've had them where they were sitting up and totally with it taking them home. I've had sometimes, usually when it involves the the backup plan of my backup plan, I've had those sections where they've been, they've knocked them so far down that my bitch couldn't stand for two days. Like gone. I'm rolling her, you know, trying to like on, you know, sitting there thinking, is she gonna come back from this? You know, and I mean they're so over anesthesized. So all of that. And another thing, if you uh when you're doing a section, a lot of times, if you're especially if you're good at it, one thing it's always important is to ask, who's gonna resuscitate the babies? Because resuscitation of your puppies is everything. And it's such a short window. It's like, it's like breaking your car before you come up to the stoplight. You know, you've got that moment where you can make this just a great experience and it's gonna turn green and you're gonna go on into adulthood. If you don't get them resuscitated right, if you don't get them to come around, if you don't get their lungs emptied out, if you don't get them stimulated, they may or may not need oxygen, especially on a section. You know, you have to really, and and I see people in their resuscitating and they're doing this with their tips of their fingers going, there you go. And it's like they don't slap the babies because they just hate kids. They slap the babies because they want them to cry. You gotta cry. You rough those puppies up. I mean, don't drop them, but you rough them up, you're rubbing their, you're rubbing their sternum because they hate that. Everybody nothing likes to have their sternum rub. You know, all of that, pinching them up, just I get them going, get everything circulating. Because once the baby starts to cry, your baby's gonna live. Your baby doesn't cry.
SPEAKER_00Swinging them to clean out their lungs.
SPEAKER_01Like okay. If you can't afford an expressor bulb to suck the snot out and they're like a dollar. They're a dollar. If someone needs me to go ahead and send a, you know, if they can't come afford that, you know, then we'll see if we can try and find you one. You know, you suck the snot out. There have been times when you have been in those situations where you weren't anticipating whelping and you've got the puppy and it's born there, and you take your and you suck the snot out yourself.
SPEAKER_00Because you do what you gotta do to save that.
SPEAKER_01You do what you gotta do. You got this little moment in time where you can bring them around. And if you go past that, you get dead. So, you know, the swinging them is that's old school where they put you, lace your fingers together, put the head at the tips, and swing them down through your knees. Usually what happens is because you've been up for nine, ten hours, uh, you're gonna either fall, uh, you're gonna let puppy go, or you're gonna smack it into the coffee table because you didn't realize you were standing so close. It's ideally is to expel out of the lungs, but it's let's not do that. Let's go with the bulb. And uh, you know, and then like if you have uh one of those with the oxygenators, those are great. You know, I had a puppy the other day that it was, I was just I was working him. He wasn't coming around fast enough, you know. A little bit of two things that I like to keep on hand for whelping oxytocin injectable, doprum. I think if you play your cards right and try, you can get it, you can make a relationship with a vet that they'll they'll let you get that, you know. You I mean, you have to have that relationship first. But I think the doprum, a little a drop or two under their tongue helps kick them in. That's sometimes when you're doing that section, you know, because some vets will let you come back, some won't, but you can always ask, can I resuscitate my puppies? Can you just bring me the puppies once you got them? I'll get the snot out of them, get them warmed up, get them stimulated, get them crying. You take care of the mom, let me take care of the puppies. Uh I mean, that's something I always ask. If they they don't want you in the back, if they've got text, because a lot, you have to remember, like a lot of these situations, they're tending to the bitch, and they just throw these anesthesized puppies in a in a wet heap, and they might get they might get brought, and you know, who's who's bringing them back around? So that's an important time. That's because if they get cold, if they get slow resuscitation, it's gonna up your mortality rate substantially, probably, probably, you know, a third to a half. You know, so bringing them around is a big deal. You know, get getting those puppies resuscitated, getting them warm and getting them crying, you know. The thing about with oxytocin, have you done oxytocin yet? Yep. Okay. Oxytocin after every whelp, a shot of oxytocin is a good thing. Make sure that we got all of the placenta out. Bring in the milk. Sometimes there is, if you have a you'll have a bitch that'll just kind of stall out, and you can just give her a little shot of oxytocin just to give her a little kick to keep out. The problem that sometimes vets will have giving it is because people are stupid and they give them too much. And you can blow their uterus if you give them too much. Just try not to be stupid. You know, in 41 years and a gazillion litters, I've never blown a dog's uterus because there's a couple of really simple things you have to remember. You know, kind of how much how much your bitch weighs is if she is in labor and if she is having contractions, no oxytocin. Because she's already contracting. And if one ox shot of oxytocin doesn't make it happen, two is not the answer. You know, I mean, you've got you, if there, if there's more puppies coming and she stopped having puppies, and you give her a shot of oxytocin, and 45 minutes, an hour down the road, you still haven't got a puppy. Well, you're going to the vet first section. You're not giving her another shot of oxytocin. You know, that kind of thing. Just have a have a little common sense with that, and I think you're you'll be fine. But dopram, oxytocin, they're a wonderful thing to have on hand. They last a long time.
SPEAKER_00What's the doprum do?
SPEAKER_01The doprum is is a is is used for reviving to get the heart rate growing. It's like it's a stimulant, and they just a drop under the puppy's tongue, and uh just kind of a little ping, kick, kick start them going. And uh it's it's any, you know, the good vets will will have that uh whenever they're doing a section, they'll do a whoop, and you know, because especially if they're if they're not born crying, it's it's uh, you know, because you want them, you know, that is the biggest thing. I've had I've left bitches for other people to whelp, and they have done their best, and whenever you leave your dog with someone else to whelp, you take whatever they do, because they're gonna try. You know, but you get what you get, so you come to acceptance with that. Like if this goes well, you were all brilliant. If it goes badly, maybe don't do that again. But you know, when when the when a puppy crowns when its head's out, you know, for me, I'm not gonna wait very long. I'm gonna get that bag off its head. You know, I'm not gonna sit there and let her have ten more contractions as she works the puppy slowly out. No, no. If it's down in the in the vulva, I'm gonna pull it back up, get it out, get it behind the backs of its ears, get it on out, get that head cleared off. Get them breathing. Because that's when you'll lose them the most. What a stillborn puppy is, is a puppy that suffocated in birth. It developed the whole gestation period, carried it to term, the whole thing. Stillborn puppies, they died. They died in in it was a either bad positionment or, you know, I mean, if it, you know, sometimes a bitch will push them and they'll get them halfway out and they'll say, I'm gonna have to take a break now. Oh, I only have its back feet out. Well, I'm gonna sit here for 15 or 20 minutes or maybe an hour and just let the bet and let the pet puppy suffocate. Because they don't they they have instinct, they don't necessarily have sense. And And so that's where you're watching there going, Oh, we got a puppy. Get that sucker out, get its head cleared. Let's get working on it. You know, get that out, see uh get the accountability, the, you know, get the uh the cord cut, get them warmed up, get them breathing. The better you do on that, the higher your success rate is.
SPEAKER_00Both, really. You know, as I think generally I'm helping. You know, it's like if they start presenting the puppies and it's down there, you know, it's in the vulva and it's like they're pushing. It's like just get in there and help, you know, get you got your grippy glove, get in there and help, get it out. You know, I've welped one with you before, and you're a little bit more aggressive than I was. So it's a learning process, you know, just like I think I think initially it was just like, you know, once there's enough out that I can help grab and and pull and you know, help get it out, like great. But uh, you know, after welping with you and learning, you know, just learning and the experiences like you can get in there a lot quicker and get that puppy out faster. And generally, I mean, that could have saved minutes, you know, it could take them minutes to get a puppy down there. But I've also had I've also had situations where I'm cleaning off the puppy that I just helped to get out, and while I'm cleaning off the puppy, boop, there goes another puppy out on another puppy. Yeah, and it's like, you know, sometimes they take two hours to push another puppy out, sometimes it's five minutes. Sometimes you're cleaning that first one off, and plop, there goes another puppy right on the ground, and you didn't even know, and it just fell right out, you know.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, no. I and that's one thing when you feel them coming down, you first feel the outside. Is it a is it a head first? I mean, yay, head first, that's uh always that's the best if there could be head first. I mean, it you got you got a substantially high percentage of of whelping success if they come head first. But you know, if it's if the head is there and it's getting hung up on the shoulders, and that's where your puppy was, is because it you had a big old head and it was hung on the shoulders, and that's where you're gonna get a hold of that head, right behind the you know the head, and you're gonna pull it to the one side and you're gonna get the shoulder out and then pull it to the other side, because once you've got both shoulders out, the puppy comes bam right out. But it could take for a long time if they're hitting the width of the shoulders there and they're just like stunk, you know, and they'll they'll stop pushing sometimes. So that's kind of where you're doing. If it is a breach presentation, that hot that definitely ups your your percentages of uh stillborn puppies because you know that they can suffocate on that a lot easier. That's where you want to have the tail on the try to get the where the tail's on the top side, the back feet on there, and then you're gonna pull down and out, and you're gonna get your hand or your fingers around in front of the hips of the puppy and with her as she's contracting. And sometimes you might even gently help her contract as like just a little squeeze that she's doing, and I push up and then pull down, and where you can help get that get that baby out in moving down the the brook now. They don't tend to get as hung up on on breach, but it can be a slow presentation, and it's a bigger chance it might suffocate.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. All right, we got a few questions that we haven't answered yet, so let's get to some of the questions that listeners asked about whelping. So one of the questions was if you don't x-ray and know how many puppies are in there, how do you know when she's done? Is there signs to tell, like she's had three puppies and she's done now? Or how do you know?
SPEAKER_01Well, that's a that's a good question. And that's when you pull out your Ouija board. But you uh when when you when you pick her up by the front legs and you run your hands down, do you feel ahead? You feel ahead, there's another puppy. Sometimes there'll be some like nodding and stuff, and you'll think, is that another puppy, or is that you know, but what one thing you can do is when they've had the last puppy and you got them out there, you've given them the oxytocin shot, you throw that uh that uh uh canned food out there and they snarf it down, it's probably done having babies, you know, but just by visually watching how they they're acting. They're like, done, you know, they're stopped shivering, they've stopped all that. But you can picking them up by the front legs, you know, you have somebody help you, and you can run your hands down, and you should be able to feel, you know, is there a puppy? And you can squeeze pretty hard, you're not gonna hurt anything. And if there's if there's more in there stuff, you know, that's where your your clean out shot, and then whether she's willing to eat or not is usually a pretty good thing. I'm don't usually get x-rays, but I can usually tell. But sometimes if you get like a a plus-sized girl that's got a little extra bulk to her, you know, you go, is a puppy, you you know, and you might wait a bit, but you put her in there and she takes to the babies and she's eating, she's probably done.
SPEAKER_00Cool. All right. The next question was is along oxygenators. Uh like what's the so the question is what's the point of the oxygenator and how do you use it? I always put it in the incubator box. I just have the oxygen flowing into the incubator boxes. How do you do it?
SPEAKER_01Uh, you know, that's one that's a wonderful thing to have it just flowing into the incubator box, make you, you know, keep that uh, you know, throw a little towel over there and keep that oxygen high in the box. That's that helps bring all the puppies back around. But if you have like a puppy like I did on Sunday, uh, that was just like he like doing the you know, and just not crying yet, you know, took that, took the hose and just put it in his little mouth and just working the heck out of him. And then when he would do the gas, we would get a full lung full of of oxygenated air. And that that did bring him around a lot faster.
SPEAKER_00So do you normally do that with every puppy, or do you normally kind of just No, if they're if they're crying, if they're crying, they can go in the box.
SPEAKER_01You know, if they're crying and they're on there and they write themselves where they're up upwards on there in doing that, then they're good for the they're good for the box. If they're doing this where they're laying there like a fish out of water and doing the gasp, you've got a cup you've got like 10 minutes to get this situation turned around, or that puppy's that puppy's a statistic.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And I know I know quite a few people, a lot of people use oxygenators really. And yeah, I know a lot of people that will put them in, you know, their warming box or whatever and just have oxygen flowing in there. It doesn't hurt anything. You know, yeah, no, it's it's good, it's a good kick start for them, I feel like gets them going well. So yeah. And then we have a question on C-sections. So she wants to know what do you do in a scenario where your bitch has a C-section, come home, all the stuff, but milk never comes in.
SPEAKER_01Milk always comes in, you but you're gonna have to work at it. I mean, the so the problem is you've done the section. Maybe she's not really supposed to have those puppies for 36 hours. So the body's not there. So that's where you can do a little com combination cocktail of get a couple of small shots of oxytocin every 12 hours. You can do there is there's a medication that's called Dom Darion. It's uh it helps bring lactation in. Uh, there is another form of that also called motilum. Uh, you know, you can buy that at Meximed's. You know, you can do that. The biggest thing I have found on getting bitches to come into milk is getting bitches to eat. Because if they're not eating, they're not gonna come into milk. So if you if they're eating like they're everything in sight, you know, so if you work towards getting them to eat, whatever that might look like, I don't care if you have to hand feed them, syringe, you get them to eat, they're going to process, they're gonna feel like they're gonna get hungry, they're gonna have a normal bowel movement, then they're gonna get hungry again, and they're gonna keep on eating. So get, you know, work on that, get them eating, and uh, you know, and then use your use your Dom Darion and do your oxytocin, and uh, and that's sometimes sometimes you have to have, you know, you're gonna do some foster moms or maybe some supplement feeding or whatever. You know, go ahead and let the puppies nurse and then go ahead and bottle them afterwards, like stimulate her, but then turn around, don't let them burn up all their energy doing that. This is kind of some of this stuff you just kind of get a feel for, you know. You kind of like going, okay, they're nursing on on her and they're going to town, but they're not getting enough. So you let them nurse for five minutes, pull them off, give them a bottle, you know, fill them up, you know, then that kind of thing. And you can keep doing that until until her milk really comes down.
SPEAKER_00I think that's part of like I have probably any animal breeding in general, but like especially with welping, you know, this is one of those things it's like you can be as prepared as you want, and you can ask as million questions as you want, and you can have as much advice as we give, and and somebody that's whelped as many litters as you can give me the rundown on whelping, and sure shit, the first whelp I have is gonna be something that we didn't talk about because there's so many different scenarios and and and things that are that are gonna happen that you know it's like and I ha I haven't even I haven't welped that many litters, but you learn something new with every single litter, and then it starts becoming I wouldn't say a natural thing, but it's like okay, I've seen this one before, like I've seen this scenario, you know, it's like right away, it's like never seen this, never seen this, never seen this, never seen this, and then eventually you welp enough to where it gets to like, okay, I've seen this before, I know what to do. And I would assume the more you have a repeat of like, okay, I know what to do in this situation, or I have the feel for this. This feels normal, this doesn't feel normal, this does feel normal, you know, and you get just that experience of doing it, and you kind of just learn how, like, yeah, this is going well, or this is not going well. This something doesn't seem right here.
SPEAKER_01Well, and knowing your dog too, once you know your dog, you know that bitch, you can kind of have a feel for it. Like you kind of like know she's in labor or she's not in labor, or she's like, she's her, you know, she's in distress. You can kind of like, you know, because you know, from when they start into to driving labor, if you don't have a puppy within, say, three hours, you need to have, you need to be doing to your plan B, you know, because you can still turn this turn this train around and you can still have a healthy bitch and a healthy litter. You know, if you commit to that path and say, well, I'm just gonna such and such, well, they might be, you might be doing a section tomorrow and they might all, the puppies might all be dead. And if you wait long enough, maybe you'll lose the bitch too. Those are all viable options that are directly related to your decisions, how you chose to play them out. And so you've got no one to thank or blame but yourself. And and the more you're paying the more you're checked in and the more you're paying attention, the better it's gonna go. I mean, invariably, because you could just you know your dog, you know, and you know when she when she's when she's right, you know.
SPEAKER_00What about like a water sack? Like I've had some letters where it's like the bitch will have a water sack and it'll come out like as a water sack, and then I've had some where it's not, like I would assume it's all there and it's like just broke before.
SPEAKER_01So how is so if sometimes when a puppy is born, if they especially they've been in labor for a little bit too long, that they'll you'll you'll see the puppy and they'll have a yellow bag, and that's when they've passed their plug in the bag. That's bad. It's uh not necessarily super bad, but it means that puppy's in distress. If the if your bitch is having hard driving labor and just the uh a bit of the sack comes out and it looks like you got a little water balloon, but the rest of it's not there, that is a pretty good indicator you're probably going into section land. Uh that means that they've labored pretty hard, they got the placenta coming out, puppies not coming. You know, and so, you know, I mean, and the more conservative and the you know, quicker you go ahead and spring into action on that, it kind of depends on your breed, kind of depends on your bitch, kind of depends on your options. But, you know, if I see if I come out there and they just got a bag hanging, I just take them in and get a section. Because I probably, because if they're gonna, if they're gonna free whoop them, they'll probably have a puppy on my way to the vet. And if they haven't had the puppy by the time I get to the vet, they needed a section.
SPEAKER_00So that's that's I think that was exactly what you told me when I said, like, oh yeah, she's got a like a water sack hanging out. It's like, ah, just go to the vet and get a section because that's where it's gonna end up. That's where you're gonna end up.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And you can you can paying for the section sucks, but it sucks even more if there's nothing alive afterwards. Yeah. It's like, it's like, you know, it's like, wow, I did we did all this and then nothing. You know. So yeah, you you it's like, you know, when it's sort of when one of those moments, one of those pivotal moments where you can put your finger on the scales.
SPEAKER_00All right. Sounds good. This is a great episode on welping. Anything else you want to add, or do you think we covered it all? I think we could probably talk about whelping for like 10 episodes because there's so much. There's so much to it.
SPEAKER_01And there there is so there's so much to it, and and it's so much, it depends on so much on breeds and all that, and uh, and where different challenges are. Like I I've welped a litter of golden retrievers one time, and I thought, oh my gosh, this is big dog country. This is gonna be so easy. And I had her in the utility room and had the the welper box up, and I don't know, I was you know, went into the other room, whatever, and came in, opened up, turned on the light in the kitchen. She'd opened up the she opened the door to the utility room, and there's three puppies laying in the throughout the kitchen floor, of course, totally in their bags, going flailing around, and I'm like, you know, I'm like trying to tear the bags off. I'm like, big dog whoping is hard, you know, and uh, you know, so I mean none of it's you know, instinct is there, you know, since I thought it was the first look, first letter, first letter bitch, you know, you're gonna have to be there. So attendance is mandatory. I think is that should be the uh that should be the takeaway from this.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and if you're having a good time, you haven't done it enough. And a lot of times people be like, oh, well, they do it in the wild all the time. And it's not like, well, Japanese chin are not wild, you know, like they're not. No, you know, maybe so no, they don't do it in the wild all the time. I mean, wolf dogs, wolves, you know, like ancestry, sure, maybe, but the way that we've created animals.
SPEAKER_01Well, you know, people should say things would say stupid stuff like that all the time, like, well, that's such and such, and they don't have to do that. It's like, well, that's probably true. They probably didn't have the near the stuff that we do for people now. But life expectancy was 40. You know. So, I mean, if you wanted to live beyond 40, you might want to do a few of these things, you know. So, you know, that's that's kind of the thing. If you want, if you want to have the higher success rate, if you want to have have a higher success rate with your puppies, all of these things are stuff you can do because you wanted to make the most you can from the the least number of dogs and litters you can. Maximize your efforts. And I think that's maybe we've given some good tips on that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I definitely think so. Hopefully, somebody somebody learned one thing from this episode. I know I did, so I think. Save one puppy. That's all that it was worthwhile. He saved one puppy and it was worth it. All right. Thanks everybody for joining this episode of the Tac Box Podcast. Uh, we do have an episode coming up in a couple weeks here. Stay tuned for that, but we're gonna have a show chair on uh be able to talk about show numbers and just what they've seen, you know, changes and entries. And yeah, that'll be super fun.
SPEAKER_01So and did we tell every did we tell them that I don't get to go to the dog show in Dallas that I forgot that I was judging in in Seattle, and Jane reminded me as I was going to put in entries, like, oh, you can't do that. You're judging somewhere.
SPEAKER_00So that's now you're not showing. You know, it's like now we just no. No. I guess August in Houston will probably be the next time. Yeah, there we go. There you go. We're back to it again. Come to the Chin National and Yeah, yeah, train your puppies, come to the national. Yeah. All right. Thanks for joining this episode of the Tack Box Podcast. We got we'll talk to you guys all next week. Have a great day. Bye bye.
