Exciting news! Nala and Conley are expecting a litter of Bernese Mountain Dog puppies on October 28th, which means they’ll be ready to go on December 23rd- just in time for Christmas! This will be the pair’s second litter together and we’re very excited since the first litter was so successful!

This has been a busy week as dog breeders. Lulu and Nala came into heat right around the same time which always means extra work. We have to separate them from the studs and, sometimes, from the other females if they get too hormonal and start fighting.

Then, there’s the work of breeding. Most people assume that that part of our job is fairly easy. Just put the pair together and let nature take its course. It’s not that easy. Females are usually fertile 10 days into their cycle. They signal their readiness by lifting their tail and standing still for the stud. However, some females act “ready” days before they really are, flirting with the stud one second and snapping at him the moment he tries anything. That’s how Lulu has been for days.

BREEDING LULU

Yesterday was day 13 for Lulu and we decided not to mess around (we’ve missed her last two cycles) and set up an appointment to get her progesterone tested at the vet’s. Dr. Mckenna informed us that she would be ready tomorrow (today now) and to have her breed then. No wonder Winston wasn’t having any luck with her!

Now, today is the day Lulu is supposed to be “ready”, but unfortunately, Winston still wasn’t getting anywhere. Another problem with Lulu is that she is so lazy, she just lays down and doesn’t want to stand. It doesn’t help that we’re going through a heat wave and it’s 95 degrees with a crazy amount of humidity. We called Dr. Mckenna again to see if he was available to artificially inseminate. He was, and Brian took her in at 10:30.

I anxiously waited at home to find out how it went. “Good,” said Brian, “except….” I held my breath.

“Oh no, what happened?” I replied.

“Nothing, it’s just that Dr. Mckenna looked at Winston’s semen under the microscope and it’s not great. There were only a few swimmers. The Dr. suspected the heat and suggested keeping Winston in a really cool place for the next few days.”

“So, is there any hope of this breeding working?”

“Well, the Dr. put it this way: if he was a human, he wouldn’t trust him with his teenage daughter, but it’s not ideal.” We both got a chuckle out of that. We’ve only just recently started going to Dr. Mckenna for reproductive veterinary services, but so far, we’ve appreciated his help. It’s not always easy to find a vet that’s pro-breeder and will do what they can to help produce a litter. Dr. Mckenna moved his schedule and worked us in last minute to help us out.

At this point, the plan is to keep Winston in a cool place and take them both back in on Thursday for another AI. We’re praying for better results!

BREEDING NALA

Since we’re trying to breed Lulu to Winston, we decided to put Nala in with Conley. By our estimation, she was only on day 9, but apparently, she was ready because he had no problem breeding her! We’ll try again with Nala and Conley on Wednesday. We won’t know if the breeding is successful until farther into the pregnancy, but so far, it’s been a night and day difference between breeding Nala versus Lulu. But, that’s just how it is in this business. Nothing is guaranteed and, just when you think you have things figured out, it changes.

MINKA

Minka is in her second week of pregnancy. We don’t expect to see any signs of pregnancy this early on, but we’re excited about the prospect. I mostly wanted to bring her up to share this cool graphic I made:

GOODBYE SQUEAK

Amidst all that, Squeak’s new owner came to pick her up. Squeak’s new name will be “Oakley” and she is going to live with a very sweet retired woman.

In the spirit of pulling back the curtain on dog breeding, another aspect that most people don’t consider to be much work or very difficult is finding homes for the puppies. But that in and of itself is a full-time job, especially with how the market has been lately. We’ve always been able to find homes for our puppies, but we have to work hard at it. For the last few weeks, Pookie and Squeak have been available and ready to go, but we’ve had zero interest. Usually, when we have available puppies, we’ll at least have some people asking about them, but the last few weeks have been dead silent. I had to remind myself that August is always a bad month to sell puppies. Kids are going back to school and most people don’t want to get a new puppy at the tail end of summer.

So, when this sweet lady reached out to us about Squeak, I about cried I was so happy. It was a huge morale boost.

POOKIE

We still need to find a home for Pookie, but just having one puppy left from Suki’s June litter isn’t so discouraging. Yesterday, we brought Pookie inside for several hours. The goal was to simultaneously do some training with her and take lots of pictures and videos for marketing. I was very pleased with the training we accomplished, but not as satisfied with the pictures and videos I got. They aren’t terrible, just not as good as I was hoping they’d be. The problem is that she is such a dark-colored dog that it’s hard to capture her. In person, she was adorable with her fluffy, newly bathed coat.

The training I worked on with her was this:

1. Sit to say please. This wasn’t the first time she’s worked on this, but it’s always good to do a refresher. Once they understand that they should sit to get a treat, I work on lengthening the amount of time I expect them to sit quietly. She was up to a full minute of attentive sitting during our session.

2. Potty training. Since she was inside for several hours, we had to take her out for a few potty trips. She successfully went outside every time and had no accidents!

3. Come. I worked on calling her from a short distance and steadily longer distances. Recall is such an important safety behavior that I’d prioritize that as one of the most important things to train in a puppy.

4. Crate Training. After all that playtime and training, she was getting very tired, which is a perfect time to do some crate training. A tired puppy will naturally seek out the comfort of a confined space, so we put her in the crate with a good chew and let her have a nap. It was mostly a positive experience. I say “mostly” because there was one point when she was entering the crate and Walter dropped a metal water bottle on the metal crate. It made a huge noise and frightened poor Pookie. We had to spend a bit of extra time convincing her that the crate was not scary or dangerous. She came around to it eventually, and I think she’ll overcome that fear soon enough.

Besides all that, Pookie had a bath and was brushed and blow-dried - another experience we try to keep very positive so puppies cooperate with their groomers in the future.

MAE’S LITTER

The Fall Litter is doing great! They’ve opened their eyes and can now hear. They are the cutest roly-poly things and it’s hilarious watching them start to try out their wobbly legs by waddling around like fat potatoes.

The Waiting List members have picked Cider and Harvest, so Pumpkin and Smores are available for adoption. They are stunning puppies, so I don’t think they’ll be available long!