What do I need to do once my dog has given birth?

Once the dog's given birth, again, stay out of the way and let Mama do her thing as much as you can. But what does that look like? All I want you to do is be a conscientious observer at first. So I want you to ensure that those pups, shortly after birth, are nursing. If they're not, encourage them to nurse. If you have to, that's one way you might want to get involved. You can squeeze a little bit of milk out and try to put some on the puppies’ lips or tongue and encourage them to latch. You shouldn't have to, as most puppies figured out with the help of mom, but you should observe that they are nursing properly. You should observe that each placenta passes. If there's one puppy, that equals one placenta, so you should see that. You might have to look closely because momma might take care of that real quick. But you want to make sure that that passes.

You also want to make sure that she's cleaning them adequately. Again, I'm not implying that you jump in there in the first five seconds. Oh no, she didn't do anything. I'm going to dry it. But you know, after the first 10, 15 minutes or so, if she's not cleaning or drying that puppy, then maybe you can stimulate them a little bit with a warm towel and dry them a little bit, so they don't start getting cold. I would do that, but immediately try to put them right back with mom and let her take over that role, if possible.

So once your dog has given birth and you make sure that mom's healthy and the puppies are healthy, the biggest thing you're going to want to do is make sure mom has plenty of puppy food available because she's going to be producing a lot of milk for a lot of puppies. And that will take a lot of energy. And you'll want to take each of the puppies and weigh them on a little kitchen scale so that you know how they're gaining weight. So at least once a day, preferably twice a day, you can keep track of which puppy and how they're gaining weight so that if there's a problem, or if you suspect a problem, we can track it that way.

It depends on the dog and her experience level, but many of them will take care of everything themselves. They'll open the sack; they’ll lick the puppy and stimulate it and tear the umbilical cord. So they'll do all the work for you. Some newer moms or nervous moms may need a little bit of extra help. And so that's when you want to ride the line between being helpful but also giving her space so that you're not all up in her space at the time. But, if you're concerned that she might not know what she's doing, that's when you keep a close eye, and you might have to intervene.