The kitties have a new toy so thought I would share some cute video of Carmel playing with it.

I had been looking for a couple of littermate kittens to take over for Gadget and someday Beauty (didn’t think that would be so soon…). I thought Beauty would be around to show them to hunt but wanted them to have each other to play with and grow up with as I knew Beauty was already 12 years old and like wouldn’t want to play with them. I was right about that as she would hiss at them if they approached her. Carmel and Butterscotch were trapped by a person when she saw their littermates killed on a road. They were born in an abandoned house next to them. I was not having any luck finding a shelter or rescue to adopt kittens from as they all wanted them to be permanent house cats even if they were formerly feral kittens so I put an ad on Craigs List stating what I was looking for. I heard from some wacky people but then the rescuer of Carmel and Butterscotch contacted me. I brought them home that day (early May). When the horses are in the barn they are in a large dog kennel for their safety but now can be out running around the barn during the day/evening (with the door securely tied shut). They are having a great time exploring every nook, cranny and rafter of the barn. Carmel is a little girl and Butterscotch a little boy but don’t worry, they are already spayed/neutered, we took care of that last month at a “Spayathon” hosted by the Dane County Friends of Ferals, great program.

Cookie had a romance with Scotch Bar Man in June and we are happy to announce today’s ultrasound showed she is indeed in foal. So we will be expecting a large bundle of joy in mid-May of next year. Scotch has really nice conformation and a great temperament. He is also homozygous for black/tobiano so we are expecting a dark colored, colored foal. If you followed the story of Cookie losing her foal last year then raising a “foster son” for 6 months you will understand how happy, yet anxious we are about this new foal. We’ll keep you posted.

I’m sad to report that Gadget’s sister, Beauty, has now joined him at the Rainbow Bridge. Kent found her dead on the road in front of our house, hit by a car. She lived out here for 9 years and I guess I never expected to have such a sad ending to her life. I miss my sweet kitty. We were counting on her to train the two new barn kittens (I’ll save them for another post) to hunt.

After two years and lots of patience one of our little foster mares, Spice, has been adopted along with another one of her acquaintances from Spirit Horse Equine Rescue, Copper. She arrived frightened of everything (including people), a scrawny youngster and left as a beautiful, outgoing, confident mare. I was so proud of her when she got right into the horse trailer to leave. We will really miss her but she has a great opportunity to help others as she is being adopted by someone who does Life Coaching and Equine Assisted Coaching. Her “sister” Sugar is still here and actually is doing just fine without her. Hopefully she’ll come out of her shell more as time goes on but she has always been more cautious/wary than Spice so she may end up being a “permanent foster” here.

When we bought our farm 6 years ago two barn cats were included, Inspector Gadget and his sister Beauty. Gadget was the greeter here, very social, would visit agility classes (and try to steal the bait people were using for their dogs), mingle with our dogs, follow us around, etc. Beauty is friendly to us but more reticent with strangers.

Last night Gadget didn’t come into the barn when we were bringing the horses in for the night. Usually he will come running when I call as he and Beauty usually sleep in the barn at night. Beauty was hanging out in the barn but just seemed to be acting a little different so I went to look to see if he was locked in the garage as he sometimes goes in there when we pull one of the cars in or out. No Gadget but that wasn’t totally unusual but I felt a little uneasy for some reason. This a.m. when we went down to the barn there was still no sign of Gadget but Beauty was still just hanging around in the barn. My husband went to look around for him and found him in his bed in the milk house (we had a round bed in there that was heated and we could plug in for them in really cold weather). He was gone. I’m glad he didn’t suffer as there were no signs of any injury or trauma. He probably had a heart attack yesterday. He was about 12 years old and is survived by his sister Beauty who is missing him already. We did show him to her, the dogs, and the equines so they know he is gone. He is buried near the barn yard and agility area. Each time I go down to the barn I will be missing my “Gadge Man”. I thought we still had a few good years together.

RIP sweet Orange Man. You were loved and will be missed.

It’s been quite a summer having both a litter of puppies and a foal to watch grow up and become more independent. Foster has been here since May 3rd. He has been eating grain and hay on his own, drinking water from buckets and nursing less. He leads fairly well and stands for grooming and the farrier. Lately at times he and Cookie would even be a pasture apart from each other (but a gate opened in between) and they were fine not being right by each other. Foster also had become good friends with my gelding, Nick.

Seeing how he was getting more independent his owners felt it was time to wean him and take him back home. On Friday we loaded Cookie in their trailer and in a short time Foster jumped in with her and they were off to Foster’s owners’ farm. Cookie stayed there with him all weekend to help him with his transition and tonight she came back home, her job done. She didn’t have a problem leaving there but now she has been galloping all over our pastures whinnying and looking for him. Nick was calling for him (and probably Cookie) Friday night until quite late so Nick had to wean from Foster, too.

I know it will get better with time but right now we are all sad to have come to an end of life with Foster. Fortunately he is only 5 miles away and we can visit him. Plus through this experience we have made new friends. Maybe some day we will have a foal of our own to raise here. Thanks to Foster our experience with raising him has eased the pain of our loss of our own foal for both Cookie and ourselves and we’ve learned a lot.

If you hadn’t read the story about Foster the original post is here: http://dunnsmarshlabs.com/bbfarmblog/2010/05/foster-story-about-a-foal/

Sugar and Spice, our foster ponies/mini horses, would love to have permanent homes. They enjoy attention and both come up to the fence immediately when people come to visit. Spice can be haltered and lead around, stands nicely for the farrier and can be touched pretty much anywhere if you move slowly.

Sugar is gaining more confidence but still hasn’t had the halter actually fastened on her, I can slip it over her nose but that’s it so far. She is very bright and will take direction from me without being haltered including getting on the pedestal which is pretty amazing considering how fearful she was a year ago.

The best thing for them would be to go to a home with patience who does not put pressure on them. They can be separated and adopted separately (which actually might be best). They do fine with regular sized horses as well as with our mini donkeys so they could be a pasture mate for a lonesome horse.

They are very easy keepers. All they require is a thin flake of hay each evening right now and a few hours of pasture during the day (they cannot be on a rich pasture 24/7 as they could develop issues such as founder or colic besides getting too fat).

They are able to be stalled but they prefer being outside so we have a “dry lot” with a run in shed for them. Even in the winter last year they preferred being out there and only were in the barn in the most bitter weather. They would make a wonderful project for a 4H member.
They are available through Spirit Horse Equine Rescue but contact me if you have questions about them.

“Do you sleep by the whelping box when a first-time bitch is due to whelp? Have you breathed life into a stillborn puppy? And cried when it died… Have you studied pedigrees, planned the breeding, and watched the litter grow as proudly as the owner of a Kentucky Derby Winner once did? Then you can say with pride… Yes, I am a breeder (article by Cindy Smith).

As someone who is involved with dog and equine rescues, is on multiple dog e-mail lists, reads twitter, facebook, etc. I am aware that there are those who feel breeding any animal is a terrible thing. The “don’t buy while those in shelters die” mentality is that for every puppy born another dies in a shelter. I don’t buy that theory as many of us who are committeed to our breeds also rescue them and make room for “one more” many times at our homes. If I hadn’t gotten so involved with Labradors and Pugs including joining regional and national clubs for each breed, I probably wouldn’t have also gotten involved with rescue and placed who knows how many (100, more?) in new loving homes. I’m sure I never would have co-founded LABMED as I wouldn’t have had the ties with fellow breeders who helped and continue to help LABMED with their contributions.

Yes, there are bad “breeders” but they probably shouldn’t be called breeders but rather “producers” as they only care about making a product and not what happens to the pups the rest of their lives. They are a different type of person from the responsible breeders I know and hang out with. I and my breeder friends will always take back any dog that we placed as a puppy or adult dog. In fact most of us have contracts that insist the dog come back to us but sometimes people either have lost our contact info or sadly don’t want to admit they are having a problem with their dog or can’t keep it due to life changes so dump it in a shelter or on rescue. One friend, when notified a Lab rescue had just gotten in a dog with papers that showed her as a breeder, drove at 10 at night to the foster home that had the dog to reclaim him. So I was really happy to find the above article on line today as it really describes what I go through each time we have a litter of puppies here. This is the essence of a responsible breeder, one who always puts the dogs’ (or other animals) needs before their own need to eat or sleep.

So like Cindy Smith, I am proud to say “Yes, I am a breeder”.

On June 17th one of our yellow Labs, Summer, welcomed her first litter into the world. Summer did me the huge favor of whelping during the day between 10:25 a.m. and 3:58 p.m. Most times it seems like litters are born during the middle of the night making it hard to get ahold of a vet if you need one and also making it hard to find an extra pair of helping hands to sit up with you as you await the births. Fortunately my friend, Lynn M. was able to come and join me for most of the births and was a huge help.

Summer surprised me by having all three colors of Labrador Retrievers in her litter — black, yellow and chocolate. (There are only 3 accepted colors in the Labrador Retriever Breed Standard.) We knew that the dog we bred her to, Calypso, carried the gene for chocolate as well as for yellow (Calypso is black) but we did not know that Summer carried the gene for chocolate. I was really excited when puppy #2 came out and I realized he was a chocolate. This wonderful website explains all the possible genetic color combinations in Labrador Retrievers. This litter has 7 puppies — 2 chocolate boys, 1 chocolate girl, 1 yellow boy and 1 yellow girl, 1 black boy and 1 black girl so we beat the odds on the genetics chart!

The first couple of weeks the pups can’t see or hear. Their eyes and ears are actually sealed shut. Click here for a photo of a still sealed ear. About 2 weeks of age the eye start to open in the corners and the ears begin to unseal. Then the fun begins!

During days 3 to 16 we follow the program for Early Neurological Stimulation for puppies. It is believed that this Early Neurological Stimulation enhances a puppy’s development. Originally called the “Bio Sensor” program, these exercises were developed by the U.S. military for their canine training programs to give the dogs a superior advantage.. Their studies confirmed that there are specific time periods early in life when neurological stimulation has optimum results. Days 3 to 16 are one of those time periods.
The exercises (done for 3 to 5 seconds each) involve handling the puppies one at a time while performing a series of five exercises. Listed in order of preference the handler starts with one pup and stimulates it using each of the five exercises. The handler completes the series from beginning to end before starting with the next pup. (Note we handle our puppies more than once per day but these exercises are only done once per day or they may stress the puppies out.)

• Tactical stimulation (tickled between toes on one foot with a q-tip)
• Head held erect
• Head pointed down
• Supine position (on back)
• Thermal stimulation — puppy is placed on a towel that has been cooled in the
  refrigerator for at least 5 min.
  

Summer’s puppies were all walking around in the whelping box by about 10 days even through they could not yet see or hear so I do think these exercises make a difference right from the beginning.

The first couple of weeks the puppies are weighed every day to make sure everyone is gaining weight appropriately. Their nails are clipped with fingernail clippers every few days as otherwise they scratch their mom while they are nursing.

Deb takes vacation time from work or juggles her schedule so the pups are rarely alone. (The first week Deb sleeps near the whelping box as well so that no accidents, such as the mom laying on a puppy, happen.) Lots of laundry needs to be done as we use reusable cloth pads and fleece in the whelping box to keep the puppies dry and comfortable.

Having puppies is a very rewarding but busy experience and certainly not a money maker but a labor of love.

I will post more updates and photos as the puppies grow.