As most of you know, we have two litters due this week. Well, I can actually say “had” because Raven decided to do her own thing early!
While I was at the vet on Friday with Glory’s gang and a couple adults, she decided to be sneaky and have her pups then! Thankfully hubby and the kids were home to take care of things for me.
I really expected all black and tans or tricolors with lots of black, but didn’t think about the chocolate in both Raven and Rumor’s genetics. Raven’s half sister (same mom) Hazel was born chocolate but turned into a cafe au lait. And Rumor’s mom is Reba our brown Poodle.
So what did we get? We got two black and tan girls with white strips all the way down their undersides, one tricolor girl (with lots of white) and a brown phantom parti boy with lots of white.
Let me explain the terminology. When we have a dog with two colors, like Phyllis here…
….in the Cavalier world she is called a black & tan. But if she were a Poodle she would be called black phantom.
Stanley, we call a tricolor (in the Cavalier world) but if he were a Poodle we would call him a black phantom parti. And when we say “parti” it means the main color is white, with patches of other colors. (Think about Little Joe on Bonanza and his “pinto” pony; white with spots. Kind of the same idea. I know, I know, I’m totally dating myself with that reference!) 😉
So the little brown phantom parti (in Poodle terms) could also be a tricolor, but with two tones of brown instead of black and brown. So instead of a black tri, it would be a chocolate tri.
Since we are dealing with two different parent breeds with different terminology that basically describes the same thing it can be a bit confusing. I hope I haven’t made it more confusing!
Anyways, we have four gorgeous, uniquely marked F1b Cavapoo puppies. Raven is settling into motherhood nicely. The puppies were very small at birth (but Raven is a little girl herself) and her milk took a while to come in well but the pups are steadily gaining.
Oh, and back to the vet appointment on Friday. I took Smudgie in for an x-ray so we’d know how many puppies were hiding in her little belly. Her last litter was one ginormous puppy which I had to help into the world and I did not want that surprise again! If there is only one puppy getting all the nutrients, it can grow quite big. If there are multiple puppies they tend to be more even in weight and size (although not always). I figured she’d have an easier delivery and I wouldn’t worry so much if I knew it wasn’t one huge pup again.
Well, the x-ray machine was on the fritz and even after calling tech support the staff could not get it working! *sigh
So Smudgie came back home and thankfully hubby and I were able to do an ultrasound and determine she has at least two pups in there! And now we wait for her. (I wrote this last night and she is nesting!)