The pups are getting bigger including little Sofia who is now weighing a whopping 10 1/2 ounces. Eyes are not opened yet but I do notice them trying to use their back legs more. It’s been very cold here in Georgia but the pups are under a heat lamp, have another heater next to the whelping box, and can curl up into each other to stay warm. Not to mention that they can snuggle right in with mom. It is a sight when all of them are lined up in front of Donnie’s belly. All the pups are well and have the curious alpaca females peeking in at them daily.
Update on Sofia: Sofia is nursing well off the bottle. When I first started feeding her she could only nurse 1/4 of an ounce of milk at each feeding. Today she can drink a little more than 1/2 an ounce. She used to be able to fit in the palm of my hand. Today she is definitely larger. I feel her belly getting bigger too. After each feeding I notice her almost rolling to one side or the other. Her belly putting her off balance. Other than Sofia’s cleft lip and her smallness she is definitely all puppy. She kneads her paws into the air as she feeds and then is off to plow into her siblings trying to squeeze into the middle of them all. Sometimes I find her underneath a pup or two and other times I see her riding away on top of her siblings heads as they are nursing off mom. Sofia is very strong willed and voices her opinion openly.
All the maremma lgd pups are available. If you have a farm or ranch and need a working dog please contact me at info@desertmtnalpacas or you can call 520-220-2778.
For more information on maremmas and the parents of this litter, Donatella and Santino, Click Here.
DMAR Peruvian Halston was born on 12/5/2010. His color is brown and weighs 14 lbs. Halston is strong, has straight legs, and nursing just fine.
We are not exactly sure what time Halston was born as we weren’t present. I can tell you that I am at the barn every two hours to bottle feed Sofia, maremma puppy with cleft lip, and when I was done with my noon feeding I saw Shasta walking outside with all the other girls. I saw no sign of her being in labor. That morning Shasta ate just fine and I noticed her going to the dung pile but she was actually using it.
At 2 pm I told Tom I was going up to feed the pup and he should come with me so we can scoop up some poop. He agreed and said he would meet me there. Once in the barn I went directly to Sofia and began to feed her. Tom came in shortly after and started to scoop the poop out of the barn. Yes, my dear girls think the barn is their dung area too. Afterwards he went out back to where the girls were hanging out.
Next thing I know Tom is yelling my name. When I answer him he tells me that there is a cria on the ground. A cria?!? It was so cold and the wind advisory was up to 40 mph. Then I saw the cria. It was kushed and almost dry. Also Shasta had him right at the gate so she didn’t have access to him as he was kushed in the little boys area. Not that they could have cared less. None of them were by the cria. I told Tom to get the cria into one of the stalls while I grabbed a heater.
Once cria and mom were in the stall I told Tom to get me some towels, hair dryer, and the container filled with cria sweaters and coats. Since the cria was mostly dry it didn’t take long to finish blowing out the fleece. I could immediately see the crimp inthe fiber and was very pleased. I checked the cria over and noticed he was a male and slightly dismature by the looks of his ears. One ear the tip is slightly bent and the other ear is folded outwards. I won’t do anything about it as it is my experience that they will straighten out on their own.
Since I’m on a kick with designer names we decided on Halston. It sounds strong. Halston was on his feet with in minutes of bringing him into the stall. In no time he was nursing. BTW Tom was busy trying to close the barn door to keep the draft out so I decided to try to wash and remove the wax tips off of Shasta’s nipples by myself. I thought this was going to be futile but amazingly Shasta stood still and allowed me to do it. I was even allowed to squeeze out some colostrum too just to be sure she had milk. Shasta was not born on my ranch and has never been friendly. Not that she is mean to me but just not the type to stand still. Birthing really changes some alpacas attitutes at least temporarily.
I put Halston into a sweater and then double coated him. Even with two heaters in the stall it was still only about 40 degrees in his stall. I guess that was pretty good considering it went down to 25.
Today Halston looks great. He’s able to stand and kush easily and needs no help in finding mom to nurse. Gotta love it when they are this easy.
Halston’s sire is Snowmass Incan Emperor. Incan is a mrg full Peruvian herdsire that we own half interest with Square Top Ranch in Arizona. Incan is a multiple blue ribbon winner. Incan has many crias on the ground that are ribbon winners. For us he is sire to DMAR Armani – 4x champion, DMAR Nikoli- multiple blue ribbon winner, DMAR Dolce – blue ribbone winner, and DMAR Dior – 2nd place winner. Snowmass Incan Emperor will return to DMAR in February 2011. Breedings to Incan are $2000.
Halston’s dam is Shasta. She is a white female who can throw color. Shasta’s fleece is very dense and crimpy. We wanted to add fineness, coverage, and less guard hair to her cria which is why we chose to breed her to Snowmass Incan Emperor. Shasta is a full Peruvian who has now produced two crias.
I want you all to meet Sofia. She was one of 10 maremma lgd puppies born to Donatella and Vincenzo on November 29th, 2010. She and one of her sisters were the smallest of the litter. I didn’t notice anything the first day of Sofia’s life but on day 2 I noticed that she just wasn’t latching on to mom enough to get a real good drink. I tried over and over again to help her but when she kept falling off mom’s nipple after only 2 or 3 sucks. I picked Sofia up and immediately saw the issue.
Sofia was born with a congenital defect of a cleft lip. Although her pallate has a crevice in it where it wasn’t fully formed I was relieved to find it was closed off at the roof of her mouth. I double checked this by running my finger along the roof. So I know that she should be able to swallow with little problem of the milk coming back out of her nose.
Luckily I had Tom prepare puppy milk a day in advance in case I wanted to supplement the pups. Donatella had a large litter last year and so I wanted to be able to help her if needed. Of course now I would need to help little Sofia eat. I went to the house and warmed up the formula which consists of whole cow’s milk, a raw egg, yogurt, and a little karo syrup.
I have never dealt with a dog with a cleft lip. I was nervous giving this tiny, tiny (I didn’t weigh Sofia on day 1 but on day 4 she weighed 8 ounces) a baby bottle. The nipple on it looked huge and how would this tiny little creature be able to open her mouth wide enough to accept the nipple? How wrong I was to be nervous. With a little persuasion I realize that Sofia has quite a mouth and it is no problem for her to accept the nipple. She was hungry but had a hard time getting enough suction to get any milk out. The first day I had to squeeze the bottle a little at a time to allow the milk to come out.
I brought Sofia into the house for the night. I had a shoe box with a towel inside that should have made her quite comfortable. I was so wrong to think that she would stay in it. Sofia might be small but she can sure move around and found little problem climbing out of the box. I ended up holding her against my stomach in the palm of my hand. She let me know how discontent she was being taken away from her siblings and mom. She moved around a lot and cried. Eventually she calmed down and took a nap.
Every hour and a half to two hours Sofia would begin to cry. She was hungry. The bottle took a little while to warm up but she made me feel like it was taking way too long. She cried so loudly that when I called Tom on the phone he said he couldn’t hear a word I was saying over her cries. It was like having a human baby in the house. She cried that loudly. Of course once I gave her the bottle she would quiet right down.
That night I had little to no sleep. I had her on my belly as I tried to rest but who can sleep when you are worried that you might roll on her? Not to mention that it seemed that as I finally got my eyes closed it was now time to get up for another bottle.
Day 3 in the morning after feeding Sofia I placed her back in with mom and siblings and from there I give her a bottle every 2 to 3 hours. I decided not to bring in Sofia that night. I was exhausted from the previous night and figured she needs to learn to suckle from mom.
Day 4 I was out to the barn early and Sofia was eager for her bottle. I no longer have to squeeze the milk out. Sofia can suck it out on her own. She is so small that she doesn’t even drink 1/2 an ounce at each feeding. However, she works the bottle. I wish you could hear her little feeding noises of content as she drinks and her little paws are kneading away at the air. I found my scale that weighs ounces and found that Sofia is 8 ounces. Tom wants me to bring in Sofia for the night but I said no. I think it is real important for her to stay with mom and siblings and learn to nurse more off of mom.
Day 5 I again go out early to the barn. Sofia is a little slow to start her morning feeding. It’s cold even though we have the heater and two heat lamps on them. Sofia ate a little less than normal. I’m worried and think to myself that if she hasn’t gained any weight then I probably should bring her into the house tonight. I weigh Sofia after her second feeding which went much better and find that she has gained 1/2 an ounce since yesterday. That’s progress to me and so she gets to stay another night with mom and siblings and I get to sleep again too.
I spoke to my vet and emailed her pictures of Sofia’s lip and pallate. She will review the pictures but she was thinking that all she will need is a stitch or two to get her lip as one. Other than that Sofia is nursing, breathing, and going to the bathroom just fine so there doesn’t seem to be anything else wrong with her. Sofia should grow up to be a fine lgd dog. She just needs to figure out how to eat her food to suit her mouth.
Sofia is quite the character and her cleft lip just adds to her overall personality. She has already won me over.
Sofia is for sale. Her price will be discounted due to her cleft lip, however, we don’t think it will stop her from being the ldg dog any rancher is needing. If you would like more information on Sofia please contact me (Janice) at info@desertmtnalpacas.com.
Donatella, Maremma LGD, whelps 10 pups on 11/29/10:
On the 28th Donatella refused to eat all day. I knew that the time of labor was upon us. At times while walking she would whimper. I sat with her for what seemed like endless hours just waiting for her to begin. After the evening chores I grabbed my laptop and some magazines. I figured I would spend the night in the barn with her. At 9pm Donatella was resting peacefully. It was cold so I decided to go into the house and would return at 11 pm. At 11 I went back to the barn to find Donatella sleeping. That’s it I was coming in for the night.
At 4:30 am I got up to go check on Donatella. Sure enough she had 4 puppies already on the ground. I had left the small heater on but it was still too cold so I went to turn on the overhead heat lamp. I sat with her helping to dry off the pups. While I sat with her she had 2 more pups. After cleaning them off I went back to the house to feed house dogs and the cat.
At 6:30 am I returned to the barn to find another pup was born. I helped Donatella clean up the pup and then proceeded to feed the alpacas and the other maremmas. Each time I did a feeding I would check on Donatella to make sure she was ok and look for the puppies to nurse. Sure enough she gave birth to another pup. My count was now seven, four girls and three boys.
By 10:30 am I was now just about done with my outside chores and Donatella was up to nine pups. I went to sit with her and give her plenty of attention for a job well done. As I did so out popped the 10th pup! This is where she finished. Vincenzo and Donatella are the proud parents to six males and four females. All of the puppies are doing well.
I am spending more time with the runt of the litter, a little female, who was born with a cleft lip. The lip doesn’t allow her to suck as well as her siblings but she is getting the hang of it. I supplement her with a bottle that she eagerly drinks. She is quite the character. I brought her into the house the 2nd night so I could feed her around the clock. I thought this would be easier but my goodness she can scream when she is hungry! I thought the bottle would never heat up. Last night I left her in with her mom and she did just fine. The vet said that she will be fine and we can probably stitch up the lip. Today I will take pictures of her and forward them to the vet to get the final opinion.
Now all I can think about is to complete our puppy proofing of the area. With the last litter of five pups I was running around like mad. I can only imagine the nightmare it will be chasing after 10 curious pups!
All the maremma lgd pups are for sale. They are $850 each which includes the first vaccination, first deworming, microchip, and registration paperwork. Our maremmas are registered with the Maremma Sheepdog Club of America. Both parents are onsite and guard an alpaca herd of 26. Initially the pups are raised sharing a fenceline with the alpacas. Eventually they are integrated with the alpacas.
