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Dog Equipment: How To Make A Puppy Box For Newborns
A puppy box for the first few arrivals is an absolute necessity that helps to ensure puppies' vigor. Correct and timely use of the puppy box keeps siblings from repeatedly being soaked and chilled with every delivery. Puppies left in the whelping box with a delivering dam can suffer irreparable or even fatal injury.
During contractions a dam may possess the urge to tear material. Danger is also present as the dam rises and turns. Puppies can be stepped on or chewed accidentally during these intense moments.
Puppy boxes are simple to make. They can be manufactured from any sturdy material, including a bureau drawer or cardboard carton. The puppy box size depends upon your breed and normal expected litter size. It should be large enough to hold one or two heating pads placed absolutely flat on the bottom.
Giant breeds and those whelping large litters may require two boxes and heating pads rather than one. The puppy box should be a minimum of ten inches deep to produce a proper environment with heating pad. Place the heating pad flat at the bottom of the box. Remove one lower box corner through which to pass the heating pad's cord. Do not make the aperture so large that a puppy could slip a head or leg through, getting caught.
Wrap the heating pad in a medium-weight cotton towel or diaper. Drape a heavier towel over the open box top. Set the thermostat heat on medium from the time your matron goes into labor. You have now created a simple and safe "incubator." When monitored, the air inside the box will feel warm to your hand, as will the towel wrapping the heating pad. Neither the heating pad nor the air inside the box should ever feel more than slightly warm.
By means of this controlled constant environment, the incubator protects "older" puppies, allowing the matron to concentrate fully on her delivery and cleaning of the next littermate. Keep the puppy box directly by the whelping box, or in a comer next to the mother. While having contractions for the next puppy, the dam is able to put her head on the puppy box's edge, keeping an eye on her offspring.
The heating pad you purchase should be square or slightly rectangular, be waterproof, have a protective cover and be free of any strings or ribbons. It must also be of the type that has a variety of temperature control settings: low, medium, high and off, at least. Some have infinite thermostatic controls between low and high. These may be safely set and left on at a medium-low temperature.
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