07/18/2023
Breeding is not for the faint of heart. There are good times and there are sad times. It's time consuming, energy draining, stressful, EXPENSIVE, exhausting....but at the end of the day, when a puppy snuggles into the arms of his or her new owners it's very rewarding.. I am absolutely exhausted, it's been a very rough 2 weeks at Von Wildmann's Shepherds... Cora, our mama dog, slipped out and attacked our two year old female Aries. We can only assume it's because she was pregnant and hormonal. But during the fight, Aries was injured badly, she has a fracture in her front right paw (wrist) as well as a huge wound that will take 8-12 weeks at a minimum to heal. So as I've been changing bandages every day and stressing over her health, and working my normal day to day job bartending, I knew we were getting close to delivery for Cora. I took her temperature daily until I had it pegged to the day she was going to deliver. That was yesterday. At 4 am Coras water broke and at 7am she started having contractions. By 7:30 am we had our first of 6 puppies born into the world. I spent the next 8 hours laying on the floor or couch by her whelping box to keep a close eye on her. We have concluded that she seems to have a tilted uterus making delivery harder for her. The second puppy came around 9:00 am and unfortunately the sac opened before she made her appearance (in the birth canal). Making her aspirate 😭 I gave her CPR, and tried other methods to clear her air way, but I lost her and my heart shattered. After that she delivered the final four all about an hour or so apart from each other. But I had to be sure she was done so I stayed by her side until she was relaxed and nursing her babies. Exhausting is an understatement. Our last puppy was born with a strange mark on his back. I have to get a diagnosis, but everything I've read isn't good. My point of this post, is aside from needing prayers, is to educate. If you are truly an ethical breeder, and do everything by the book, health testing, OFA certifying, Titling, etc. It's a hard freaking job. And it can be a heart breaking one. We never expect to loose a puppy, let alone have a possible injury to one. Its exhausting mentally and physically. These dogs have a piece of my heart, every single one of them. They are my legacy.