The First Week

The Elements babies are 9 days old today.  They've all made it through the first week, but it's been a tough one at times.  Kali became ill with a fever and lethargy on Friday.  Fortunately she has now recovered with some antibiotics.  Then, one of the puppies (Argon) became ill on Saturday with some type of gastrointestinal problems.  He stopped nursing and was crying constantly.  Two trips to the emergency vet later, he finally began improving on Sunday.  As of today, he is doing much better.  He appears happy again and is now nursing on his own after requiring a few days of tube feeding.  Hopefully he will continue to do well.  Finally, three of the pups lost the stitches from their tail docking (possibly the result of over-zealous cleaning on their mom's part) and they had to be restitched yesterday.  It's been a week full of vet visits.  Hopefully we're past that now and the next several weeks will be uneventful.

I've had a few people on my list of those who wanted puppies tell me they have recently found other dogs elsewhere, so I still have a puppy or two from this litter available.  If you are interested, please let me know at kalwaspringers@gmail.com.  More info about this litter including pedigree and pics of the parents can be seen on my website at http://www.kalwaspringers.com/ Click on Puppies, then Kalwa Puppies, then the Elements Litter.  Puppy placement info is also on the website, on the Planned Parenthood page. 

Puppies are a lot of fun, but they sure consume a lot of time, energy, and money.  Sleep has been in short supply lately, and the cost of vet trips has added up rapidly.  Fortunately, adorable babies make up for a lot.  Here are a few recent pics of the puppies.  For some reason, Argon seems to find himself in just about every cute puppy snapshot I take.  I'll try to get a better representation in the future.  And if you want a real-time view of the pups, visit the Puppycam.

All the pups napping on 8/16

Cadmium and Argon

Argon

Argon and Palladium

Tungsten and Argon