Puppy Management

It's been a few weeks since I have posted here, and for that I apologize. I've been super busy with so many exciting things, in addition to puppy care, that I haven't had a moment to stop and write a blog. I will write about those adventures soon, but in the mean time, I wanted to give you a glimpse into our daily routine of puppy management.

Taking care of 8 puppies and 3 dogs (chickens and cats too) is not an easy task, so animal care is a team effort. In our house we all work together taking shifts to get the job done. Either myself, or one of my teenage daughters will wake at about 6 am and prepare 3 trays of puppy food, then we venture out to the kennel where we are greeted by 8 hungry pups!

Arbeitshunde Kennels

Before we feed the pups we bring them to our puppy yard (which is set right next to the house) and that's where they eat. The kennel is pretty messy in the morning so we never feed them there. They will play, eat, and sleep in the puppy yard right up until their last feeding, which is about midnight. We like having the pups close to the house because it makes it easy to check on them throughout the day. We tend to spend a lot of time on the two porches bordering the puppy yard so they get a lot of interaction from us.

Puppy Yard

While the pups are eating their breakfast we do the dirty work of cleaning out the kennels. Kennels get scrubbed daily with a bleach and water solution, then they are left to air out so the pups will have a clean (and safe) place to spend the night. Sometimes we will put a big fan in the kennel to help speed up the drying process.

A Clean Kennel

There you have it, folks! Puppy Management 101.