Hi,

My bitch just whelped 8 puppies three days ago, we figured her milk would be in by today and still isn't so we've been bottle feeding with goat's milk and just switched to Malmalac this morning, everyone had lost three ounces and one little girl was not doing well but is doing much better today. Anyone that has experience bottle feeding puppies, any advice, how often should I feed, should I keep them on Malmalac alone?, how long until they can lap on their own?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you,

Justine

To start off with I would be feeding about every two hours and I would stick to a formula milk like malmalac on its own.  Once they are established and taking more at a time you can cut down on how often you feed.  It will be about 3 weeks before they can lap on their own.

Joan
Take the rough with the smooth

are you still keeping the pups with there dam-ive found on one of my bitches it was 5 days  before her milked dropped down, i bottle fed until then, but putting them back with the dam, once the  milk was in they just about threw a tantrum if i went near with the bottle/ preferring to be with the dam,

Have you spoken to your vet? Sometimes if oxytocin is given it can help bring the milk down, think a calcim jab for your bitch might be an idea too.
Personally I don't like bottle feeding as there is always a risk of the pups inhaling the milk which can lead to pneumonia, as it hard to control the flow of the teat.
I have found tube feeding to be the best way, though some on here may disagree. The milk temp. should be between 37 and 40 degrees. With a slow feeder on the bottle this is also hard to maintain.
Your vet should be able to show you how to tube feed and if done  correctly and the correct check done before actually administering the milk then there should be no problem. Also when feeding a full litter it is alot less time consuming and tiring if you are doing it alone. You find that when bottle feeding if you are feeding every two hours by the time you have fed and toileted the last pup the first pup is due again, so you get no sleep :-(.

Hi, i have now had to rear 2 litters by bottle feeding, neither litter was a large one, but i was recently chatting to a very experienced breeder who did say that tube feeding was the best way to go as you then know exactly how much milk the puppy has taken. I would agree with the other posts that you will need the vet to show you how to do this correctly. The puppies should be able to begin lapping milk from about 2 to 2.5 weeks of age however i have found it best to top them up as you can never be sure how much they have spilt on the floor or all over themselves, by 3 - 4 weeks they should be lapping well and you should be able to wean them onto mushy solid food. The toileting bit is time consuming but can never be ignored and constipation is a common problem in bottle fed puppies. I would say that i did keep the puppies with the bitch and encouraged them to feed from her and have managed to keep some milk flowing, not a lot, but it all helps with natural immunity being passed from the bitch to the puppies. Plus it made sure that the mum still did her job with the rearing of them and yes she would still toilet them.

Good luck i hope it all goes well

Hi,

Thank you to everyone for their advice. The bitch is not producing much more milk, her pups are 4 days old today, we did use oxytocin to try and bring more milk down but it hasn't worked. Although I have to say she is being extremely good and is doing the rest of the cleaning and still staying in the whelping box with her puppies most of the time, I can squeeze a few drops of milk from her but that's about it!

I was afraid to do the tube feeding, we are still bottle feeding about 8 times a day, they get around 20cc's per feeding and everyone gained 1 ounce when we did the weigh ins this morning. Their stools are firm, no diahrea or constipation so far. We were using some malmalac which is a puppy milk replacer but it's hard to get where I live, I can only have some shipped here and it could take up to a week to get, one little tub only lasts two days, so we are doing half and half goat's milk. I found quite a few recepies on the internet for bitch's milk replacer, any ideas if these would be ok to feed? I'm afraid of nutritional cataracts and I have heard some of the commercial milk replacers sometimes cause them.

Also another little question I have is , would bitches producing no milk, would this likely be inherited since my bitch's full sibling produce a healthy litter four months ago and also had no milk!

Thank you again for the information, it's been very usefull!!

Justine

Hi Justine,  I use a milk replacer made from carnation milk, egg yolk, water and glucose.  have had excellent results with it.  It is very important to check your pups are  not getting dehydrated, although todays weight gain does sound very positive.

On the inheritance of traits like this, I would say it is very likely.  Lots of whelping, nursing problems seem to run in families.
bye
Gwen

Sounds like your puppies are doing well that's great. I'm sure you already know this but in case someone else is reading that doesn't. Always make sure the milk replacer you bottle feed them is warm. Like the same temperature as the dams body.

Are you sure that the bitch is drinking enough to make the milk??  It might be useful to add water or broth to her food or give her some milk to drink (if she can tolerate it)   Fennel tea is also very good for increasing milk production (voice of experience here ;) )
Also, if the puppies aren't suckling then there is no demand and milk production is determined by demand from the pups.

Hope this helps
Dill

Was just reading your post.. how are the puppies doing? Hope all is going well... I had a problem with a female producing milk and found that freshly cooked meats in with her food helped her produce milk quite quickly. I was told by an experienced breeder who is about 72 years old now... that one should never forget the three M's in breeding... Meat Makes Milk.. I have found this to be so true.
Hope all is well with the litter

Sue