Asking in advance pups only 16 days old

When do you start to wean pups and what to give?
Just want to be well prepared and make sure they get the right stuff! Tia!

I normally start my medium size breed with litters of 4+ at 18 days.

I generally find that the smaller litters are fairly uninterested at first, and really only tasting, but it ensures that should they need it they have food other than Mum's milk, and large litters often quite keen.

I currently have a litter of three and I could barely get them to even taste soaked puppy food until nearly 4 weeks, though offered it from 3 weeks.

In fact they barely ate more than a handful between them per meal until a week ago, and they are 7 weeks old, but Mum still feeds them several times a day. Her milk must now be diminishing as they are now finally eating what I would expect for this age.

I start with one taste, then two the next day, then three and then four times a day increasing amounts to appetite.

Mum will happily finish off what they mess about and leave.

As to what you feed there are varied regimes.  My own was to soak dry pupy food, mash it and serve with some goats milk based puppy milk.  Others will start with scraped beef, others tinned puppy food and others raw natural feeding.

My own preference is a good quality complete, (with the occasional novel item, like scrambled eggs, chicken wings or thighs) as unless new owners are experienced raw feeders I prefer that puppies with their rapid growth have a balanced diet, as there is less room for error doing harm in fast growing pups.

At around 3 weeks old. Tried kibble and not very interested even though it was soaked and mushed to a paste.
Tried raw and there was no stopping them

Depending on how many and how well the puppies were doing, we'd normally start weaning by the end of week 3, going into week 4.   And we did this using warmed goats milk taking each puppy individually and teaching it to lap - some get this faster than others and it's messy.   Add to that we'd give a small roll of lean raw mince once a day.   It was usually eagerly eaten and it was tempting to give more/more often but we didn't in case of causing a tummy upset.

Once lapping was going well, we added puppy kibble mixed either with goats milk, or warmed water into a porridge, offered 4 times a day, again individually at first but then using a round puppy dish, on the floor of the box with mum outside until they'd finished at which point she was let in to clean up and allow 'comfort nursing', usually standing up, until the sharp teeth became too much at which point mum wanted out, fast.   Overtime, the liquid was reduced.   At this point, water in a shallow dish was put in the box.

Having bred many litters of Chi's, I never, ever made the decision to wean.  I always let the pups decide for me.  Once they started licking mum's dinner, then they got the same feed.  And I never, at any time, restricted access to mum.  I let her do that.  I made sure that she could easily escape if she didn't want to feed them herself.  As they have such small litters I never had to worry that mum could be drained by lots of pups wanting milk.

The above has worked for me with these tiny dogs for many years.

Just to add I never restrict access by Mum to pups except when they have food down.  I have found that some will stop feeding by 5 weeks, other than a sneaky comfort suck while she is interacting with them. 

With others they seem happy to continue to feed often, though I assume with diminishing supply as they are all certainly weaned eating well, by the time they leave.

I have had litters of 3 - 9 pups, but most often 4 - 7. My current 3 pups at 7 weeks are plump, eating well, and Mum still insisting on letting them have a good suckle several times a day (mostly morning and evening).

I found that starting the weaning process when and how we did, avoided the thing some Basset mums would do - regurgitate for their puppies.  Basset mums are usually very maternal

I'd wait till at least 3 weeks and if mum is coping well and all is good, 4 weeks is fine as well. 

Best way to start is to give the pups the food first and then let them top up from mum afterwards.

> Best way to start is to give the pups the food first and then let them top up from mum afterwards.

This is what we did and at first, the majority of their nourishment should still be coming from mum.  It's a good gradual/ natural way to deal with the weaning process.   As the demand on mum decreases, her supply will gradually dry up.  Again this is what we did rather than as some breeders do, and take mum off the puppies abruptly.

Thankyou everyone :)