Life in the day of a week old WPG

This pretty much sums up what is going on here. Eat & sleep. I put them in that blue rubbermaid bin when I change the bedding. Their coats are starting to change a little. You can already tell the ones that will have more white and ones that will be a little darker. But only time can really tell how they will shape up.

Displaced Cat

Everyone is continuing to grow. I have been giving some of the little ones some individual feeding time with mom. The rest of the gang protests loudly "not fair" with their little cries but I have witnessed the little ones getting beat out for the boob to often. I am predicting their eyes will be open by Monday. They are attempting to walk, rather then just crawl.
Well I got my answer on how the cat would handle the house of puppies. She has decided to reside outside for the most part. She has checked out the puppies a little but senses that area to be a "danger zone." Fern has also decided to start blocking Clarkes from the kitchen where Fern's food and water is. Fern will cut in front of Clarkes to heard her away from the kitchen.

The rest of the flowers

Here is the rest of the gang. Scott is gone for work for the next 10 days. It just me, Fern, Clarkes, and the Montana Wildflower Gang.










Missoula Phlox "Phloxy"-Female











Monkeyflower "Monkey"-Male










Arrowleaf Balsamroot "Arrow"-male










Heartleaf Arnica "Arnie"-male

Montana Wildflowers

Last night we decided to get organized. We took pictures of all the puppies, weighed them with a food scale and assigned names. Assigning names was always my favorite part of raising puppies when I was growing up. Growing up there was a lot of "Mooses" and "Wallys" and I recall a Ken and Barbie. As I got older we started to go with themes. My favorite was the litter named after towns in Vermont. This go around I decided I wanted to name them after wildflowers in Montana. Working with Montana's plants is my career and I thought it would be fun to draw from that inspiration.
So, we got a little crazy last night with and even created a spreadsheet to keep track of the progress the litter makes. Super nerdy.


Indian Paintbrush "Indy" -Male

Larkspur "Lark" -Male


Rocky Mountain Iris "Iris" -Female










Sunflower "Sunny"-Female











Harebell "Belle" -Female

day 4

Growing... They are so adorable. I can't wait for their eyes to open.

This picture is why Scott isn't able to be around much. He is trapping Canada Lynx for a ongoing research project about the animal and it's habitat. I am very proud of him, he works really hard and loves what he is doing.

3 days old

Sleep and eat, sleep and eat, sleep and eat. This is what the lives of the little babies consists of right now. Yesterday was a big day bringing them to the vet. They had their tails docked and their dew claws removed. They did really well. I was so nervous! Not about the tails and dew claws but about physically getting the little guys to the vet. I loaded them all up into a blanket lined laundry basket, pulled the running car around, rushed from the house to the car, then drove as quickly to the vet's office as possible. I was so nervous because these little guys cannot get chilled or cold, this could be deadly to them. Luckily, the vet's office is a 5 minute drive from my house. On the car ride there, Fern was a little upset at her babies being hidden in the laundry basket, she tried to crawl into the basket with them. At the appointment, the vet checked out Fern and consulted with me on the tail length. Fern and I did not stay around to witness the procedure. When we picked them up 15 minutes later, they seemed not too upset and Fern was happy to have her babies back. We rushed back home and I tucked them into their whelping box. Besides the choreographed trip to and from the vets office, everything is well amongst the pack.
-Lindsey

Voila!!! We have 9!

Fern delivered her first litter this morning. She handled the task well and after the initial confusion wore off she settled in and acted like a savvy mother. Lindsey was a great midwife and knew how to handle the puppies, I however was not. I will admit, I did make a great time and description recorder, but otherwise was useless.

Thus far the puppies appear to have quite a bit more white in their coats - a welcome trait! The sex ratio is 5:4 in favor of males, but all seem to be very healthy. Lindsey will bring them to the vet for a check-up, tail docking and dew claw removal; Fern will also get checked out.

As for us, we held up pretty well with very few freakouts or emotional breakdowns. After an extremely restless night, the first pup popped out at 4:50am. We had an hour break before the next pup, but then the "flood gates opened" and we were dodging pups left and right. So that's an exaggeration, but they did come quickly.

Anyway, check out the pics. We will be posting pictures regularly from now on. -Scott

8-12 ???

Fern paid a visit to the vet for her x-rays today and the prognoses is 8-12 with a chance of flurries. Apparently reading x-rays is like predicting the weather. The vet gives it a best shot guess, but in the end you just have to wait it out to see what truly will happen. I always loved the old Vermonter saying "If you don't like the weather in the North County, wait a minute, it will change." Well turns our every state has a version of that. Here in Montana it's apparently 5 minutes! haha. Anyways, that's off topic. Back to the matter at hand.
Our vet said she counted 8 for sure but she thinks there could still be up to 12 because they are packed in so tight. As far as she could tell everything looked good and the development of the puppies is right on track. We have about a week until we can expect her to start to go into labor. I was hoping the x-ray would have given me a more definitive answer on how many puppies to expect. A mid-wife generally likes to know how many babies she is delivering and when it's time to call in the Doc!

It is all I talk about

People must think I am a little nutty... All I talk about is the puppies coming. Me: "Yea, next week sometime." "Yup, we are getting her x-rayed on Friday to see how many are in there." " Yes, she is getting fat, she has gained 15 lbs. so far." And I go on and on. These are the last few days there will be a little bit of normal life around the house. I am so curious how the cat is going to react to the new arrivals. Wow, as I am writing this I feel a little embarrassed, as I have friends that are saying these same sentiments but are preparing for babies.
The papers posted above are Bullet's hips and his pedigree. He has excellent bloodlines and shares some common ancestry with Fern. Bullet's litter mate Jacque, is the 2009 NAVHDA Versatile Champion. Which is a testament to the excellent breeding and hunting abilities these dogs possess.
I cannot wait for FRIDAY!!!! We will let you know what the results of the x-rays are this weekend!
*Click on the images to enlarge them.

Counting Down

This is the month when our little bundles of joy arrive! We have been especially excited for these puppies to arrive for several reasons. 1) We freakin' love puppies! (obvious, who doesn't) 2) We are overly obsessed with our dog (again obvious, we have a blog about her) 3) We are keeping a female from the litter!!!!!! We have been talking about our new puppy well since we got Fern, yea, 2 1/2 years ago. We have sooo wanted a friend for Fern from the beginning but more so in the last year and half. When we got Fern our roommate had two dogs that kept Fern pretty well occupied through her puppy stage. But since getting our own home she is forced to consort with just the cat. We go on lots of walks in the mountains and occasionally our dog friends join us. I am excited for Fern to always have her daughter close by, to give her an extra source of security, comfort and vice versa.
And hopefully this isn't a trend and we don't become dog hoarders, cause there are shows about that and I don't want to be on TV.
Well the whelping box is in place and the towels and sheets are ready. We will head to the vet in about a week and a half and they will preform x-rays to give us an idea of how many pups to expect. After that we will keep track of her temperature as a dogs temperature drops drastically about 24 hours prior to them going into labor.