My one dog Breeze, the blue merle BC comes from Contact Point Border Collies, Cherry that was living here for awhile is also from there. Last week Karen, who owns CPBC was nice enough to let me come and help out (watch actually but we called it helping, LOL) while her dog Nel had her puppies. Nel came from the Netherlands last year and was bred to my Breezes half brother/littermate Zing. Humm, so guess Breeze would be these puppies Aunt? Anyway, Nel has been trialing in herding-she is a really pretty black tri color with pretty wavy hair toward her hips. A really nice dog, she has nice structure and an awesome temperment from what I have seen. I also met one of her pups from last year Bean at some trials recently and he is a really nice pup. Zing the dad trials in agility and is AWESOME. He is a gorgeous red/white, which is my favorite color of border collies. We knew this litter had very little chance of red/whites because both dogs must carry the red gene to have red pups and it was not that likely that Nel carries any red. Sooooo, back to the story. Nel was expecting at least 10 pups, so a huge litter for a little border collie, Nel is really not a very big dog. Last year Nel had a litter of 11 pups before she was imported to CPBC.
Karen let me know on Wednesday she thought Nel was getting close. Nel was chewing on the boards in the whelping box, and nesting and did look ready to have her pups. Another CPBC owner Laura was also coming down for the birth. So we both got to the ranch and spent most of the day watching Nel and visiting and waiting for the birth. About dinner time Russ made us the most awesome cheese/tomatoe grilled sandwhiches and Nel held off long enough for us to have dinner before things started to pop.
The first pup, which is the pup I have my eye on...... is named Ginny (and I named that one that name because I could actually keep that name, LOL), a big black/white female with a lot of flashy white markings, was born at 6:30 pm. Pups kept coming at pretty regular intervals until I think about 1:30 at which time there ended up 11 pups. 6 girls and 5 boys, a few black and whites and a bunch of black tri pups. There were some medium size pups and a couple of little puppers.
Nel was such a trooper, that was such a lot of puppies, and at one point there were like nine pups and they are wanting to nurse and Nel was having contractions....what a good girl, and that had to be such a long night for her, but she handled everything so well.
It was really neat to see how Karen handled all the deliveries, you can tell she has done a lot of deliveries and has a good feel for how things are going. Before the delivery I had enough time to read some newborn puppy care books Karen had, so I feel like I learned tons! It was actually a pretty uneventful delivery except for the number of puppies and all the puppies came out looking really good and healthy. It was awhile after the last pup until we could all get a quick nap, it takes awhile to get everyone nursing and settled in and make sure all the puppers and momma were doing ok. We talked about how many pups must be lost when the mom delivers in a barn, unattended. That would be sad ;-( .
This is from the puppy web came and Laura and I got to name the pups ;-)!
Nel had 11 puppies on the evening of 7/22/09 through the early morning of 7/23/09. Introducing the "Harry Potter litter".
Pup # 1 female b/w full white collar "Ginny"
Pup # 2 male blk tri - spot on head, full collar, white front legs "Lupin"
Pup # 3 female blk tri - narrow blaze and collar, white foot "Luna"
Pup # 4 male black tri - dark pup with blaze and lightning bolt on back of neck "Harry Potter"
Pup # 5 male b/w - lots of white, white head "Huffle puff"
Pup # 6 male blk tri - lots of black, white diamond on shoulder, 3/4 collar "Sirius"
Pup # 7 female b/w - lots of black, narrow 3/4 collar, 1/2 white muzzle "Hermione"
Pup # 8 female b/w - lots of white, spot on head "Hedwig"
Pup # 9 female b/w - lots of black, small white spot under tail, black spot on tummy "Fleur"
Pup # 10 male blk tri - 3/4 collar right side "Fang"
Pup # 11 female blk tri - lots of tan, tan on inside right elbow, 2 white front legs "Fluffy"
Character name description at www.dog-paw-print.com/harry-potter-dog-names.html
I was very grateful for Karen letting me come to the ranch and participate in such an exciting event. Things were so busy though after the pups started making their appearance that I was only able to get a picture that was not that good and after everything was pretty much finished, but it does show the new family.