Mom seems a little rough when playing with 5 week old puppies
Submitted by carries332000 on September 28, 2011 - 10:50amHi Bulldog World,
First I have to say I am very happy to be a part of this forum, I have learned so much from the forums. I am a first time breeder and have 3-5 week old puppies. Mom has always been really good with her puppies and just recently have began to allow her to play with them for about 10 minutes while I am right there. I want her to be able to play and she wants to play with them soooo badly. I am so afraid though. She gets so excited and I am afraid she is going to hurt them. I know that she tries to be easy but then she gets really excited and starts wanting to jump around to get the puppies all excited. Am I being to overly protective. I feel bad only letting her play with them for 10 minutes but I am so afraid that she is going to hurt them. Please tell me what is normal for play. She starts with putting her nose under their butt and then like pushes them, then mom will roll on her back and nibble them but mom will get really excited jump up and want to really really play with them, I am afraid she will step on them or be too rough and hurt one of them so I end up putting them back in the whelping box and then mom gets her toy and starts barking at the pups wanting them to come out and play. god I feel awful for not letting her spend more time with them. Let me know if this is normal play for a mom and her pups. And again she has been an awesome mom, even the vet told me I was very lucky. She does seem to be really easy with them but then just seems to get to excited and thats when I end it all. LOL Any advise is certainly appreciated.
Carrie
Bulldog Lover
Is she young and a 1st time mom?
She does sound a bit rough with them for their age, but you are doing the right thing to remove her before she hurts one of them. When she gets too bouncy and you are removing her, hopefully she will learn to tone it down. At this point she would be encouraging them to walk and follow her around, maybe pushing toys at them but still doing a lot of snuggling with them.
When the pups get to be 8 - 9 weeks old my girls romp in the yard with pups and sometimes a pup goes tumbling but none have ever been hurt.
yes, 1st time mom
Thanks for your reply
Carrie
Bulldog Lover
Ester
was pretty rough with the babies when they got to be around 6 weeks. I watched her like a hawk with the so she wouldn't hurt them. We weaned around 5 weeks. My thought would be to let her play with a couple of puppies at a time and watch closely, stopping her when she gets too rough. I do think they still need momma to play with them, they teach them valuable socialization skills at this age. Eventually Kohl got big enough around 10 weeks to let them play more....one on one was much better after the other puppies had gone to their homes. I still monitored closely. Now they play all the time...Ester plays rough and always has, even as a puppy.