Portugal and Pups

I really should be packing right now as I am heading off to Portugal tomorrow.
I have been invited by a Mediterranean Wolf organization to come and visit with shepherds and to talk about how we do things here with regards to predation, Wildlife Friendly and other matters on Co-existence.
I am super excited to have been invited to go and look forward to this adventure.
Nothing is nicer than visiting with sheep, shepherds and their dogs and talking about how better to co- exist with wildlife.

After Portugal, we are heading to the Netherlands to visit the family and then going on to Belgium to look at importing some new Brabant horses.

Much more about this later!

Pups:
I had to sneak in a quick blog about the puppies, as it will be awhile before I am back and can take new photo's.

So, the pups are now almost 4 weeks old.
They have gained weight and are now starting to develop their characters.
All the fun mouthing and invites to play, are developing.
They are eating well and happy to be on solids,  while still snacking on  moms milk.
Shara still has the patience of an angel with them.

They have been dewormed, nails clipped and have made a few exploratory trips around the barn.
They did meet the shrimpy lambs in the barn, and that was quite scary for... the lambs.
Nothing mind blowing as it is all very tentative still.

Here are today's pictures of the pups:

Well, I am sure I will post some pictures of my trip to Portugal on Facebook and will blog about the experience, once I am back.

Puppys galore

A shout out here to all moms raising more than one..
Shara's dozen are doing very well.
We had to supplement them somewhat as 12 meant their was just too much competition at the milk bar and the littler ones got a little left behind.
The pups are now eating and lapping out of a dish, Shara is still milking them full time .

They are hitting all their puppy milestones,
All have grown, all have their eyes open, all are walking and starting to play with each other. their vocalizations have gone from puppy grunts to little barks and howls.
They are looking great and starting to go from the mole stage to the puppy fun stage.

I trimmed 300 little puppy nails so they would not scratch Shara too much.
Wow, what a job!

The pups will be three weeks old this coming week.
I have some  poor cell phone pictures of them, and will post what I have so that you can see the progression since the last time I posted about them.

2 weeks old:

The pups have them remnants of the food all over their body, they look a little "crusty"

Almost 3 weeks old:

I had made a whole bunch of individual photo's but they turned out a too dark and were not good to look at, so will have to redo them.

I still have 4 males available from the litter,

please visit our website for more information

www.grazerie.com

Rex, the steady one

So, in my last blog I did a little write up about one of the two pups we imported this spring.
The other pup that came this way came all the way from Montenegro to come and live with us here in Alberta, Canada.
Thank you to Nenad for this pup, and to Stepanka in doing all the organizing!

Rex, as I have named him comes from a breeder that I am a little familar with.
He owns the sire of one of my breeding females, Katcha.
Katcha is a great guardian dog and so when the opportunity arose to get another pup, out of a different line, from this breeder I decided to take this opportunity.

Rex is the polar opposite of Kushi.
He is more low energy, calm and controlled.
Kushi ensures that Rex gets his exercise and movement everyday.
At times, I feel a little weary for Rex, as Kushi runs circles around him.



Rex is easy to have around, he blended right in with the sheep.
He is not out looking for trouble but will certainly stand his ground.
Rex is a more heavier set pup and has the type of temperament that is accommodating and easy to get a long with.

he is a little younger than Kushi, so is just now in the process of getting his dark adult coat.




He is joy to be around and as he matures he is going to be a strong, steadfast and confident male.
I am excited to see how he will be in a year or two from now.

This dog is pure joy

Kushi is one of the two pups that we imported a few months back.
He comes from an old aboriginal line of sheepdogs in Macedonia.
When we traveled to Macedonia in the winter of 2015,
we got to meet Kushi's parents, little did I know then that those awesome dogs would be the parents of our new pup.

Both his parents are working dogs, living the life of looking after and protecting the livestock in the mountains in Macedonia.

This is our Kushi's sire,
we named him after his father...also called Kushi.

And this is his mother.

I see the apple did not fall far from the tree, this is Kushi's mom:



and, here is Kushi;

Kushi was gifted to me by Ariton.
After a long journey from Macedonia, through Serbia and onto the Czech Republic he flew to Alberta Canada.

Today, was the first time he got a taste of our Alberta winters, with an early snow fall.

Kushi at the best of times, is energetic, active, loves moving
but, this snow was a delight for this  6 month old pup.
He was goofing around, tossing the snow around, racing around, playing with the other import pup (Rex).
He was dancing around, rolling around, rubbing his face in the snow,
it was pure joy.

I love this pup and he reminds me in so many ways of our Vuk.
Vuk had, as a pup, a similar energy, drive and enthusiasm.
I can really appreciate a lithe athletic body,
fluid movement and a great temperament to go with that!

I think Kushi will do just fine here!