Star and her Trekkies

Yesterday from 3:45 pm to 6:20 pm Star gave birth to 5 healthy little puppies. There were 4 boys and 1 girl and they were all between 7 3/8 oz and 7 3/4 oz in size. She is an excellent mom and really there wasn't much for me to do but sit back and watch her work. I actually missed the birth of the first little guy because I went downstairs to get heat the microwave pads for the puppy basket. I figured I was way early but, you know - better safe than sorry. I get upstairs 2 minutes later and Star is licking this little black blob.


Two of the boys are blondies, like Armstrong/Sunny if you remember that little foster guy that we had. As they age their markings will show up but for now they look solid. The first pup is a black sable with tuxedo markings and then the other two are dark brown with black sable and the tuxedo markings.


The girl's name is Milah Jo, and the boys are Worf, Rom, Sisko and Dax. All the names follow our space theme and are from the TV show "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine" since these five pups bring our current dog count to 9!

Blogger is being obnoxious and currently won't allow me to get photos in my posts from Flickr. So to see all the photos go to the Star set of photos over on Flickr.com.

Star

Star stopped eating last night and has been resting most of the morning. Now stage one of her labor is starting so we should have puppies tonight. Wish her luck!

2010 New Rattitude Rat Terrier Calendar is here!

The contest is over, photos have been chosen and a very nice calendar has been assembled and is now for sale over at New Rattitude's ReTail store . 100% of the net proceeds of the calendar sales benefit the rat terriers in foster care with New Rattitude, Inc.

The cost is $15 and if you order before November 1st you don't have to pay the additional $3 shipping fee. Order early because quantities are limited. Check out the preview Webpage to see the great photos that were chosen. I was very impressed with the final product.

Big ol' belly

As promised, here is a photo of our new girl, Star. She is a very sweet girl, around 3-4 years old and about 20 pounds right now, several of them baby pounds. She has a great big belly but still manages to go up and down the stairs. For a puppymill dog she is very well socialized and has settled in nicely.

She ate a nice big dinner of Orijen Puppy kibble mixed with a little Sojos Grain Free veggie mix and is now resting nicely up in the "nursery" aka office. I will keep you posted as to how things progress.

Introducing Star

Okay, so everything finally worked out and after 3 weeks we were finally able to get 2 puppymill rescue dogs out of the kennel they were in. The male will be going to another Washington foster home and the pregnant female, Star, will be coming to our house. I have been wanting to foster a litter for quite awhile so this is very exciting.

The photo above was taken over 3 weeks ago so she is actually really close to giving birth. She is already producing milk so I'm pretty sure that she will be whelping by the end of the week.

The story is that she was part of a group of dogs that were seized from a puppymill in Missouri. About 100 of these dogs were transported to a rescue kennel in Southern California but they couldn't handle the load of dogs, especially a pregnant mill girl. The rescue contacted New Rattitude and things finally came together this last week to get the two rat terriers transported to Washington.

So now she just needs to hold on until she gets here and we can get her in the nice warm whelping room that we've put together for her up in our office. Her and her buddy will be flown up here tomorrow morning in cabin, thanks to a couple of Alaska Airlines volunteers (thanks Peter and Amanda!)

The latest

Little Mr. Peanut has joined his new family and him and his new brother, a 6 month old rattie named Gator are already the best of buds, spending lots of time racing (and sliding) around on the hardwood floors. He is even already sharing the bed with his family which is quite a treat as he had to sleep in his ex-pen here.

For about the past three weeks I have been working on who would fill Peanut's foster spot once he went home. Because Franny is pretty alpha we needed to be careful. Well, this Wednesday is the transport day for our new foster girl but I still can't say whether it will actually work out until tomorrow when the volunteer in California goes to temperament test her and pull her from the kennel where she is at. If she gets pulled tomorrow I will be sure to post the exciting details. If she doesn't, I will be to busy moping. ;)

Fun Franny

Franny is turning into a very fun, playful dog. She is the only adult dog in the house right now that will tolerate 4 month old little Peanut's puppy antics and wrestles with him and plays chase for quite awhile before she gets tired of it. She loves lying on the back of the couch so she can see everything going on and although she doesn't like it, will go to her crate and sleep there if led on a leash.

She still won't be able to be in a household with another alpha dog, but somewhere out there is a household that will love and cherish this little dog who's loaded with personality and just needs a new start to life.

She is really slimming down now, thanks to the Sojos mixed into her kibble (veggie mix that replaces some of the kibble) and all the wrestling with Peanut. I'll have to get photos later so show that she has a waist now. Anyway, busy, busy... talk later.