WEEK 6 OF THE LAB NURSERY DIARIES We hope that sharing some of our experiences with this litter will be fun for the new owners to read as well as informative to those thinking of purchasing a Lab puppy in the future or possibly breeding their Labrador Retriever. WEEK #6 The Puppies Explore Their Environment What happens during Week 6 with the litter: Puppies venture more into the surrounding environment when given the opportunity to do so. Puppies are introduced to different surfaces. Puppies learn basic behavioral patterns specific to dogs such as body postures. Puppies play with each other and their mother more and learn to be submissive to her. Puppies learn what it is like to bite and be bitten by their litter mates (this helps them learn bite inhibition). Puppies interact more with our other dogs (and cat) under supervision. Puppies bark/cry when they see people or other dogs outside the whelping box. Visitors come to help socialize the pups. Puppies continue to increase in weight rapidly. By end of week 6, they may be weaned from nursing, depending on whether their mom wants to wean them or not. They will need solid food 3 to 4 times per day as well as water now that they are nursing less. 3/11/05 Happy Five Week Birthday to the puppies! Look back at week 1 and see the difference in sizes!! Or course this means the messes they make are a lot bigger as well. In WI it is just too cold to have them outside (except for that one unusual March day) so we have to change their bedding 2 to 3 times a day. That means we do 1 to 2 loads of puppy bedding laundry per day and go through about a paperbag full of newspapers each day. 3/12/05 We were fortunate that one of the owners of Augie (the sire of the litter) was in town to judge a match and came to visit the pups. She helped stack (pose) each puppy so we could evaluate him/her and take some photos. Here they are! Each pup now has a nickname except in Coach's case -- that will be his real "call name". 3/13/05 The pups are getting much more agile. Tonight when I got home from a meeting and opened the door several of my adult dogs went running or trotting out as usual. Right behind Ali was a small yellow boy.....he had scaled the whelping box wall and decided to follow his mom right out the door! 3/14/05 When we are preparing the puppies' food and changing their bedding they get to run around in the kitchen. They love the freedom they have to run around, chase each other and interact with our other dogs (under supervision). Of course afterwards the floor usually needs mopping but they need the exercise and playtime so it is worth a little bit of mess. We also are exposing them to different obstacles -- a board to walk on, a box to run through, etc. More "Labrador Nursery Diary" Pages No text or images may be used without permission.