Leave Newborn Puppies with Mom? (5 Risks +Supervision Tips)
A mother dog has just given birth; her puppies need her warmth and milk.
Why wouldn’t you leave her puppies tucked up next to her?
Are there any risks?
Puppies Need Mom
Mom provides the newborn pup with warmth because the puppy can’t regulate its body temperature for a couple of weeks after birth.
Milk is available on-demand, and the puppy is entirely reliant on its mother for the first few weeks.
What Can Go Wrong?
Not every dog is a natural mother; a first-time mother may not instinctively care for her puppies and even abandon them.
The mother may also have health complications following the birth that reduces her ability to look after her pups effectively.
Even if the delivery is smooth, you can’t leave the mother and puppies unattended immediately after birth.
1. Getting Dangerously Cold
Puppies have heat sensors in their noses to track their mom’s body heat. Despite this, a newborn puppy can end up apart from its mother and littermates in the whelping box.
In the first few weeks, the newborn pup can’t regulate its body temperature, and you need to watch for a puppy left out in the cold.
You can heat the room to avoid temperature issues, but the pup also needs to be close to the mother to get fed.
As a precaution, most breeders use a heat lamp over the whelping box to keep all the newborn pups at a comfortable temperature.
2. Starvation
Weaker pups may lose out regularly; the mother dog won’t police which puppy gets fed. That is your role as the human partner.
If a pup is crying, it’s worth placing it close to the hind teats where most milk is available to ensure it is getting fed.
Daily weighing of the puppies identifies any feeding issues. You can weigh the pups while mom is on a bathroom or feeding break.
If the mother is producing insufficient milk, you may need to supplement the newborn pup’s diet with a milk replacer.
Your vet can advise if this procedure is necessary.
3. Attacking the Puppy
Instincts are a funny thing; your puppy mother may attack and injure or kill her puppies.
Various triggers are at play:
- Unbalanced hormones may cause this behavior.
- Loud cries may trigger an urge to kill the noisy pups to hide the others from predators.
- Inexperience means she’s too rough with the puppies and accidentally injures them.
- Too many people handling the pups may change their scent to threat rather than protect.
4. Crush Injuries
If there isn’t enough room to move, the mother dog can roll or crush her newborn pups, not intentionally but through the cramped living space or inattention.
Newborn pups can end up under a pile of other puppies and be unable to free themselves.
5. Abandonment
Sometimes a mother dog will abandon her puppies and refuse to allow them to feed from her.
The reason may be stress – if there is too much noise or the scent of other pets near her litter, the actual cause may never become apparent.
Sometimes you can persuade the mother to reunite with her puppies by providing a quiet, dimly lit space with the security of a den or by remaining close to the litter to provide additional reassurance.
You Need to Supervise
You can’t leave a mother dog to go through pregnancy and puppy rearing by herself. If you choose to allow your dog to have a litter, you take on the responsibility of pack support.
Ideally, the whelping is straightforward, and the mother bonds naturally with all her puppies.
You can help by being prepared to help during the whelping and the first few weeks of the newborn pup’s life.
Look After Mom
You need to keep an eye on the mother dog’s health and watch for post-birth infections. Your vet will discuss the warning signs with you as part of the preparations for the delivery.
While the mother is nursing, she will need a constant supply of high-quality food, water, and regular bathroom breaks.
Look After the Newborn Pups
For the first three weeks, the pups rely on their mother’s milk. A well-fed pup suckles every couple of hours, is plump, and sleeps a lot.
Whining and crying may indicate hunger.
Daily weighing means you can assess puppy health according to the expected weight gain for their breed.
Your other role is to check that the puppies don’t get into distress with their mother or other pups trapping or injuring them.
That means you or a trusted partner needs to be available day and night for the first couple of weeks until the puppies are moving independently and beginning to try their first few bites of puppy mash.
Prepare to Welcome Your Newborn Pups
When your family pet is ready to deliver a litter of puppies, you need to have a plan to minimize the stress you and your puppy momma experience during this magical time.
Plus, if you are ready to support, you provide the newborn pups with the best chance of survival.
Organize Your Human Team
Realistically you need to book holiday time and have a team of willing dog sitters to ensure that you can supervise the puppies for up to four weeks from birth.
It would be best if you had day shifts and night shifts.
The more family and friends can pitch in with supervision, the easier it is for everyone.
You need to take account of mom’s natural instincts not to want too many strangers near her puppies, so much of the supervision is going to be hands-off but available in an emergency.
It helps if everyone realizes that they have a watching brief with some tasks – pup watch is not an excuse to pick up and play with the newly born puppies.
Organize Your Puppy Nursery
You need space for the birth and aftercare of the puppies – generally provided with a whelping box.
You can buy or make a whelping box – the purpose is to provide a secure space to contain the newborn puppies with the nursing mother.
Ideally, you provide dim lighting and a heat lamp over the box.
Momma dog can easily exit the box to eat, drink and have a bathroom break, but the pups remain contained. The heat lamp means the puppies don’t risk freezing while mom is taking care of business.
Some mother dogs will try and move their newborn pups to hide them in a more secure place. This behavior typically occurs when the mom stresses, possibly about strangers or other pets being near the puppy den.
You can make your preferred area feel safe – dim lighting, covers to create a cave and keep other animals away from that space.
Ultimately you may need to compromise between the mom’s preferred area and yours.
Buy Food
Consult your vet for an approximate guide to how much your dog will need to eat while producing milk for her newborn pups. The amount even a small breed needs to eat is staggering.
While nursing, your dog needs an enormous number of calories, and this need increases with more puppies.
You feed a nutritionally dense nursing mother dog food rather than your standard diet during this time.
Ideally, your dog remains plump and healthy throughout the nursing weeks.
Have an Emergency Plan
Ideally, nothing will go wrong with your litter, and soon you will be waving goodbye to your healthy pups moving onto their forever homes.
But having a plan for coping if things go wrong means everyone is comfortable if you need a more hands-on approach to puppy rearing.
If you need to bottle feed the newborn pups, you are on a two-hour feeding cycle – day and night. Either have emergency supplies (bottle and milk replacers) in-house or know where you can get them on short notice.
If you have emergency supplies and don’t need them, you can donate them to a local animal shelter.
Write Down the Task List
If you have a written list of care instructions for the litter, it will help some of your human team cope better with what needs doing.
Your list can include:
- Emergency contacts, including the vet.
- Bathroom breaks for mom.
- Keeping the feed and water bowls topped up.
- Warning signs of distressed pups and what to do.
Technology Can Help
Webcam helps you and your family monitor the puppies without disturbing their mother. You can spot if a pup is left out in the cold or at risk of injury.
It is also a way of sharing the excitement of having puppies with remote family members and some younger children who don’t understand why they can’t disturb the litter.
Baby monitor – distressed puppies tend to make a noise.
A baby monitor gives you the comfort of listening out for the puppies while relaxing to have a meal, bathroom break, and perhaps a couple of hours sleep in your bed.
Conclusion
The best place for a newborn puppy is with its mother, but as a responsible dog owner, you need to be available for help and support to ensure the newborn pup has the best chance of survival.
Raising a litter is a team effort involving the dog mom and her human companions.