Puppy Grand Central Report (Updated)

Sometimes people ask me about what stimulation we do with baby puppies. I wrote extensively about this based on a review of professional literature with our last litter in May but here are the Cliff Notes:

ENS (Early Neurological Stimulation) is not an evidence-based intervention with puppies.
Forcing puppies into distress floods the developing brain with DANGER hormones (BAD) and in some unknown “dose” of distress, WILL teach Learned Helplessness (BAD) .
Mastery is key to confidence — not distress.
Life is hard for a tiny puppy — why add extra Bad Stuff?!

Moonshadows: Kale (purple), Portia (lavender), and Neil (orange)

Because I am here with the babies, I see the ways they master developmentally appropriate challenges all day long.

They cannot see or hear, and so —for example — they use their tiny sniffers to find the Milk Bar, and they do this from greater and greater distances as they get older. Finding the Milk Bar is the perfect challenge for a tiny puppy: it is not super scary, it is do-able, and task mastery is well-reinforced.

These three started on the wrong side but quickly made their way around Claire and found their target.

The goal with tiny puppies should be to minimize distress — not add to it. We want to protect developing brains from getting activated by events perceived by the baby as trauma. Whether we think it is traumatic is unimportant — what matters is how the event is perceived.

Yesterday I trimmed tiny toenails — there are a lot of them around here! I waited until the puppies were sleepy and relaxed, and if one objected I just put him/her back in the whelping box and moved on to another, circling back later until all the nails were trimmed. Even puppies get to have opinions.

That is how we roll around here — we pay attention to this kind of stuff.

They are not just puppies — each of the ten plus ten are invitations to do something really well. They invite us to bring our best to an endeavor, and challenge us to honor the responsibility of intentionally creating life by being diligent, careful, and thoughtful.

Game On.

And speaking of opinions, Zaniah has one! It is so charming to hear puppies — and small humans — find their voices…

And I just looked out the window to see that the newest ten got a special message…

The Moonshadows are watched and loved, near and far.

Have a lovely day!

EVENING PHOTOS

Daisy’s milk was very slow to come in well and this little guy — the smallest — was losing too much weight. His name is Titan and he is a feisty little fighter. Claire nursed him last night to help him hold his ground until Daisy was producing enough.