Puppy mania!

I've been planning to do a blog post dedicated to the puppies for a long time now. I am now back in England, and have just sat down to begin it. And then I hear some terrible news which has made me see the birth and growth of the puppies in a new light.

We had been waiting for Leako, a pure pedigree Siberian husky, to give birth for some weeks now. She is very timid around humans, especially men, and had been ill at ease in the Mummy/ Puppy enclosure since we put her there. Finally, last night, she couldn't hold on to them any longer and she gave birth to 6 little puppies. In minus 35. 3 survived. The other 3 were frozen solid.

I felt so angry, and so sad when I heard this. We'd had a hunch that she would give birth that night; she'd been circling and pacing in a way that was indicative to beginning labour, but we were told that we should leave her alone. As I said, she is timid around humans, it was sensible to give her space to give birth in peace. And she is a real dog dog- she doesn't like being inside with humans, she prefers to be out with the pack. But that night.... it was the coldest it has been for us. Minus 35. And she hadn't been eating for a few days. If she was inside, those puppies would have survived. The owner loves his dogs, he treats them incredibly well, but he is a man of the wild. He sees the death of the puppies as natural selection. The way of nature. But, these dogs aren't wild, they are domesticated, and we do have the power to intervene with nature. And sometimes maybe we should. Even if the worth and beauty of the life of little puppies is disregarded, those puppies, being pure bred with perfect papers and incredibly clever parents, would have been worth about 1000 euroes each. What a waste.

So, it is with a slightly less upbeat tone that I turn to talk about Livza's puppies, a husky who I saw give birth to 6 weeks ago. Because now, when I reminisce and look at pictures and videos and think about how they've grown I can't help but think of Leako's three dead puppies, and how they never will. This is tough.

Livza is an Alaskan husky. The difference between Alaskan and Siberian huskies is one that not many people are aware exists (at least, I didn't before I arrived). A Siberian husky is what you would probably think of when someone says 'husky'- the classic white, grey and black colouring, the bi- colour eyes:

Lobo- part wolf and part Siberian husky.

An Alaskan husky is not a breed, but rather (as Wikipedia helpfully informs me) "a type of dog (...) defined not by its ancestry but by its purpose, which is that of a highly efficient sled dog". So, an Alaskan husky can be any size, any shape, any colour, it is simply a dog which has been bred with many strains of dogs (including a large amount of Siberian husky) to create the fastest, strongest, most intelligent racing dog. So all of the below dogs, whilst looking very different, are all Alaskan huskies:

I digress.... Watching the birth of Livza's puppies was one of the most wonderful things that has happened in my life. Livza was bought shortly before I arrived, and we (and the previous owners) had no idea that she was pregnant at the time. We thought it strange that she suddenly lost interest in running, but thought maybe she would get better again. We got worried when we saw her belly starting to swell, but thought perhaps she had just got a bone stuck. We kept an eye on her. And then we noticed that her nipples were starting to swell with milk. Unsure whether it was a real pregnancy, or a false one, we took her home with us just to keep an eye on her. (The owner was away at the time, otherwise I suppose we wouldn't have been allowed). I guess she recognised a safe place when she saw it as within a few hours of brining her into the hostel where we lived, she circled around, and quietly and without any fuss, began to give birth.

Newborn puppies suckling!

Tiny puppies began to pushed out of her. For each one, she carefully bit off the birth sac, cut through the umbilical cord, and licked each one dry. She then pushed them towards her nipples to feed, and calmly produced the next one. The first five were born within about 10 or 15 minutes of each other. The 6th appeared after an hour, closely followed by the seventh. Time passed, we started to go to bed, and then suddenly number 8 appeared. And then number 9. Outside, a blizzard was raging and temperatures had dropped to minus 17. If we had left her at the farm, and she had given birth, we almost certainly would have arrived to dead puppies in the morning. Hearing about Leako's three dead puppies has reinforced, for me, the absolute relief in my mind that we took Livza home with us that night.

Nine beautiful little puppies spent two and a half weeks crawling and squeeling about in the hostel. We took Livza for lots of walks, gave her lots of food, and spent so much time cuddling and stroking the puppies. 4 of them were black and white and resembled her, 2 were blonde and looked like little Polar bears, and 3 were a beautiful shade of grey and white. Then came the task of naming them, for which we were lucky to have the help of one of our boss's beautiful 5 year old daughter.....

Sofia with Livza and the puppies!

So, we had five little girl puppies.....

Sydan ('Heart') is the blonde one. Otivar (the place in Spain where our hosts have an olive farm) is the one who is almost entirely black apart from a tiny tip of white on her tail. Kukka ('Flower') has a patch of white on her neck that looks like, well, a flower. Tahti ('Star') has a long patch of white on her neck that is pointed like a star. And Aussie is for my fellow workawayers Pam and Belinda, from Australia. We like to fancy we can see a patch of white that looks like Tazmania on her back!

And four little boy puppies.....

Stadi ('Helsinki')'- a long strip of white on his head that looks like the road into Helsinki! Klovni ('Clown')- Patches of white and grey and clown like eyes. Granada (the place in Spain where out hosts met) and finally 'my' one... Big Ben (also known as Champ(agne), the light blonde one who looks like a baby Polar bear.... He was going to be called Piggy as he was the biggest of the litter. This was then changed by little Sofia to 'Mr Big'. We then tried desperately to think of an English-y name for a puppy to represent me, which is when we decided to change 'Mr Big' to 'Big Ben'.

Now for some cute sleeping puppies......

Klovni

Sydan, Kukka and Klovni

 Milestones for the puppies: Day 12- they began to open their eyes.

Me and my beautiful little Big Ben

Video of Kukka climbing over Sydan....

Day 15- they began to walk, slowly, stumbley, carefully.....

Stadi, walking!

Day 18- time to take the puppies back to the farm..... Heartbreaking but time for it to happen....

And then they got in their new house......

And the bets were on as to who would be first out the house! We each chose a puppy, and if we were right everyone else would have to buy us a beer or a bar of chocolate.... I chose Tahti as she seemed to be the most curious.....

And then this happened....

Woop woop!

And then they all came out.... and wanted some of their Mummy's food.....

And then I had to leave them, with a variety of promises and threats for my friends to send me regular updates, pictures and videos of them. And I will definitely be going back to visit.

I'm not completely sure what their future will be. I think it was said that they will definitely keep the males, and maybe two of the females. They will then find homes for the others. Usually, in Lapland, most of the female puppies are killed. Definitely so if homes cannot be found for them- there are so many dogs and so many puppies and they are too expensive to keep. Thankfully, it has been very firmly repeated that no matter what, these puppies shall not be killed.
I can't help but think of all the others though.