Skatjie's 1st litter:

Skatjie in labour - what a good mother! Emma took all the labour photos and Erica assisted me with deliveries.

Skatjie was interested in her babies straight away, even when she was about to pop another baby, she was still worrying about the ones that had already been born.

Sadly we lost a pup yesterday, due to probable congenital issues - I will spare you the sad details. There really is very little a vet can do for a pup this young, except cry with you! As I explained to the kids... imagine how tiny their little lungs, intestines or hearts are at this age - there is no way a vet could do heart surgery to fix a heart problem. Besides figuring out exactly what the problem is, is so hard! Oh, the the dramas of breeding dogs, I had forgotten how hard this side of it can be on us as a family. (When I reminded Doug of the little Bichon puppy that had weeks of trauma in New Zealand he was quite traumatised at the mere mention of it - poor guy!)

But anyhow there are positives - we have six beautiful little pups in the litter to still enjoy! I took the pups and mum all back to the vet again today for a double check up, just in case. Yes I know - I am totally paranoid. But would so far rather be safe than sorry! Every one got a clean bill of health, even our skinniest, who is real tiny!(That is 3 vet visits in 4 days, two expensive out of hours visits!)

Emma's photo of Skatjie in labour, she had 5 breech births! And managed on her own - well done what an achievement lady!

 Interestingly, this litter - Skajties, has been so totally different from biginning to end to Bokkies litter. You never now how you bitch will do until they actually have a litter. Both are good mums but Bokkie is exceptionally good. The best whelping dam I have ever had (I have had 6 all together) I would never have guessed how they would fare as breeders. Bokkies to look at is skinny and tiny but oh, so calm and actually has a good well proportioned hip width to her advantage. Enough breeder's musings

All Skatjies pups have names names now! I will get their names up with photos in due course.

Here are all six of them feeding contentedly tonight.

These two are the royals... Prince William and Princess Kate. They are the biggest and strongest and always get the best milk, pushing others off to get the best spot - unless we supervise feeding times; this makes this litter quite hard work for us to manage.

Just look at this little darling, Sally Caramel! The smallest dear!