Kaya is a four-year old daughter of MBIS BISS Am/Au Ch Camelot's Code Red, ROM (Mojave), and Ch Camelot's Mistress of the Hunt, ROM (Artemis). She was bred January 19-20 to Ch Paradigm Aariel's Undisputed (Lennox). Lennox is son of Ch Kimani's Aries Above the Ground (Mafu) and Ch Paradigm's First Lady of Song (Ella). Kaya's puppies were born on March 19, 2010. There are 10 puppies, 6 females and 4 males, all ridged. It will be about six weeks before we are able to evaluate the puppies for their show and possible breeding potential and make decisions about which may be sold as family companions with a spay/neuter agreement (about May 1). At the moment, this litter appears to be mostly show-prospect puppies and I already have more than enough applications from families who prefer pet quality. Therefore, I am not accepting more applications for pet quality puppies.

Two very nice show-quality female puppies are still available to individuals who have an interest in having a show-quality puppy, and will make a serious commitment to show the dog to an AKC conformation championship. If you are interested in being considered as a family for one of these puppies, please download our questionaire and return it by email to Clayton Heathcock.

Sunday, April 11, 2010

We are at that point where Kaya is beginning to self-wean. She didn't feed the pups during the night and after breakfast this morning, did not rush back to the whelping room like she has been doing. Instead, she spied a chew bone in the kennel and curled up to knaw on it. Cheri and I both went off to our respective gyms and when we returned about 9:45, Kaya was ready to visit the pups and with some encouragement, did let them nurse. Then they curled up to nap for several hours and about 1 pm we gave them another meal of the goat's milk-rice cereal. They were much more civilized today--no one rolled in the cereal pan. Indeed, most stood and decorously lapped the gruel. then they curled up in their little varikennel for a nap.

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

On Monday I had work in San Francisco all day, so I took off at 8 am on BART and got back at 7 pm. Cheri stayed late and fed the pups their pan meal about 10 am and I fed them again at 10 pm. In between, Kaya returned to a more regular mom role and nursed them several times. This morning they looked like a bunch of little ticks. Weight gain over the last 48 hours has been 15% and we have two pups (Poblano and Nacho) who are closing in on 5 pounds, at which point they will outgrow my kitchen balance. Even the two smallest (Salsa and Pasilla) are 3 1/2 pounds. They are getting pretty adept with the puppy pan, although a couple always step in the food.

Monday, April 19, 2010

I haven't written in the blog for almost a week! Partly it was getting ready for and then making the trip south to Irvine for the Orange Coast RR Specialty and associated Western Hound shows. I got back Sunday afternoon and then there was just a lot to do. Today I am sequestered in the jury assembly room of the Contra Costa County Court House in Martinez. I had to report at 8:30 and survived all the morning calls. They let us out for lunch at 11:45, with instructions to be back by 1:30. Since I live close to the Court House, I went home and had lunch, then moved the pups to their kennel run. It is a 5 x 8 room with tile walls and sheet vinyl flooring, equipped with a doorless Varikennel, water bowl, large Costco-style dog bed, and ample newspapers to facilitate cleanup. They have a dog door to an outside run that is 5 x 30 with part being covered cement and the rest being uncovered pea gravel. The ouside run has a cyclone fence, with cyclone fence cover so that the resident hawks and eagles that partol neighboring Briones Regional Park are not tempted. The pups were not overly freaked out by the change of location, although it is really the first time they have experienced being out of doors. However, for the past week they have been spending days in the exercise pen set up in our bathroom next to a glass sliding door so they were accostomed to the light. They have already learned how to go in and out of the dog door from their little room to the outside.

We are pretty much in full weaning procedure now. We are feeding them two or three times a day and Kaya still likes to nurse some subset about once a day (she will lay down for 5 or 6 pups at a time, but not for all 10). Everyone has outgrown my little kitchen balance now and even Salsa and Pasilla are more than 5 pounds. Tomorrow I will switch to the postal scale and catch up on the weights for the whole pack. They are a very sturdy bunch of puppies.

The feeding regimen now is a mix of the goat's milk formula, ground Canadae grain-free kibble (the salmon variety) and Gerbers rice cereal. We started with milk and rice cereal and then yesterday started replacing the rice cereal with ground kibble. By tomorrow night we will be done with rice cereal and it will be just ground kibble and milk. At the same time, we are now starting to dilute the milk formula each meal and by about Thursday we will be feeding just ground kibble and warm water. After that I will start training them on Honest Kitchen for the morning meal and ground chicken backs for the evening meal.

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

The pups had their first full night in the kennel and things worked fine. The double-flap dog door that connects their inside room to the outside run is taped open and I have an oil heater in the room and a small forced-air heater blowing into the room. Most of the pups sleep in their 400 Varikennel, but even a size 400 isn't big enough for all ten so a couple usually are found sleeping on the dog bed. Clean up this morning revealed that about half the poops were out in the run with the other half inside on the newspapers. It will take about a week but before long all of the pooping will be outside.

I am on jury duty this week and spend the morning at the court house. When I came home at noon I cleaned up the pup kennel by opening the door to the large feeding-bathing room, with the outside door into our large gravel run open. The pups amused themselves by exploring the new space while I changed the newspapers and picked up the outside run with the pooper-scooper. One of the pups figured out how to get in the dog door to our large indoor kennel room. This was quite an achievement since he had to figure out how to navigate a double-flap dog door. Unfortunately, I neglected to note who this over-achiever was!

Now that the pups are essentially fully weaned, they have outgrown my little Salter kitchen balance so I moved to my postal scale. The average weight today is 5 1/2 pounds, with Poblano and Nacho being biggest at 6 1/4 pounds and Salsa and Fajita being the smallest at 5 pounds. Pasilla has particularly propered after weaning and is now well over average at 5 3/4 pounds.

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

It is amazing to watch a litter of puppies grow up. In the last week they have gone from being little rodents in their box to real puppies, chasing each other around the room, lying in wait and pouncing on another puppy, chewing ears, barking and generally raising hell. Average weight is approaching 6 pounds. They are getting three meals a day and by the end of today it will be just kibble soaked in water. Kaya had a 20-minute play time with the pups while I weighed them today and played the typical mother role, mouthing each puppies head and bouncing around when they all crowded under her to attempt to eat in the old-fashioned way. She is drying up fast and from here out, she will be able to be with the puppies for extended times each day to confer some of the important motherly disciplinary lessons.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

I spent the morning at the court house where jury selection was underway for a criminal trial. I can't write about the subject of the trial, but suffice it to say that the court has had a difficult time getting a jury. When I arrived, 11 jurors had been seated and I was selected as one of 7 prospective jurors to be examined by the judge and the two attorneys. Two of the people ahead of me were excused and I was pretty sure that another, a somewhat opinionated and outspoken woman, might also be excused. Therefore, I thought I was probably going to be seated, which would have greately complicated my life. In the end, I was excused because I had told the court that I would absolutely not be able to participate in the trial if it went beyond May 4, due to a professional commitment that cannot be changed.

That released me at noon and I went home to feed the pups. For lunch I ground up two chicken back-necks and mixed the ground chicken with three cups of kibble that I had soaked in hot water. They loved it and licked both puppy pans clean. Going forward, I will be adding ground chicken to at least two meals a day.

The way our kennel is constructed, there are two side-by-side 5 x 8 inside rooms, each of which connects to an outside 5 x 30 run through a double-flap dog door. In the room where the puppies live I have taped the dog door flaps open so that the pups don't have to figure out how to push their way through two flaps to get into and out of the room they live in. The outside runs are connected by a gate so when the pups are outside they have access to both runs. Today from lunch on I left Kaya in the kennel with them and when she got tired of playing with them, she went through the dog door into the room the pups don't live in. I figured that this would be a good retreat for her since the pups would not know how to push through two rubber dog door flaps. In addition, the bottom of the dog door is about 8 inches from the outside pad, so I have a wooden porch outside the door into the puppy room. Well, one of the pups figured out how to get into the room were mom was hanging out, not once but twice. It was Poblano, who was curled up with mom having nap on her dog bed. I'll be watching to see if any of the others figure it out.

Friday, April 23, 2010

I am going to work in San Francisco all day so I got up and fed the pups early. They got 3 cups of the soaked Canadae grain-free kibble with two gound-up chicken backs and necks. They love the meals with ground meat--there isn't a hint of any food left in either of the puppy pans. After cleaning the puppy room and kennel run, I opened the gate that connects the two 5 x 30 runs and left Kaya in the enclosure with the pups for the day. When I returned after a half hour in the yard, preparing for the grounds crew that comes Friday morning, I found that Poblano had again climbed up through Kaya's dog door and was curled up beside her.

Sunday, April 25, 2010 7:53 AM

I worked a ten-hour day in SF yesterday so I didn't do much with the pups except feed them early before and about 9:30 last night before bed. Cheri took care of the mid-day meal. They are big and robust puppies, with several over 7 pounds. They can race about the room and the kennel run at an amazing pace and have become very strong. This morning I fed them their two puppy pans of soaked kibble and while I was replacing the newspapers on the floor of their room, I heard a racket. One of the puppies was draging the space heater around the room by its cord (we always unplug the heater when the pups are in that room, for obvious reasons).

For a few days now I have had one of the dog door flaps down and the pups have become very comfortable with the fact that they have to push their way through the flap to go outside or come back in. The room stays much warmer with the flap closed and we are actually not using the heaters much anymore.

The really big deal this morning was that there was not a single poop pile on the newspapers in the pup sleeping room. Every single one had gone outside to do their business during the night!

Cheri and I are going over to SF to see the Giants-Cardinals ballgame today and this evening we are having Susan Whitehead and Vanessa Lawrence over to help me try to get the first set of "audition photos." We will see what we are able to get at five weeks--don't expect much.

Sunday, April 25, 2010 10:33 AM

Cheri and I cleaned the kennel today (mop, wash walls, etc) and while we did that the pups had their first time out in the greater world. They played in the backyard, on the grass and on the patio and even tried to climb the steps up to the hot tub. They seemed totally unfazed by the new surfaces and got along well with 8-month old Brutus, who tried his best to get them to chase him. Later. Monroe and Kaya were also out with the pups while the kennel floor was drying out. Now they are back in a spanking clean room. They have both connected runs and have all learned to use the double-flap door into the room that isn't theirs, so when we come back from the ballgame, I expect to find them distributed between both rooms.

Average weight today is approaching 7 pounds and one of the boys (Nacho) is well on his way to 8 pounds.

Susan and Vanessa helped me photograph the pups for their first audition. Vanessa has an incredible talent in getting 5-week old puppies to stack. The Hagen-Daz frozen yoghurt didn't hure.

The very unusual spring rains have returned. It was sunny long enough for the pups to dine outside for lunch. Five minutes later it was pouring rain and they all scurried back into the kennel where it is warm and dry. Grandkids Conner and Camille came over and played with the pups and here is a picture of Camille with a bunch sleeping on her lap. As it often happens about this age, I have over fed and for the last day or so the pups were all pooping milkshake. I switched them to the low-residue phosphooligosaccharide food (FOS) and that is doing the job. This morning I had only a couple of milkshake puddles and by tomorrow we will be back to normal and I can resume the half Canadae, half ground chicken meals that they like so much.

Friday, April 30, 2010

The pups are thriving and two (Poblano and Nacho) are both over 9 pounds. During the day when it is warm I have been leaving the kennel gates open so the pups can go out into the lawn and play. They are starting to explore the whole yard and when they get tired, they go back into the kennel and curl up in their little sleeping room. It is always fun seeing how fast puppies learn new situations. When I feed them, they also expect me to sit down on the floor so that all ten can clamber up on my lap and compete for my head rubbing.

I pushed the envelope too far by getting them back on the Canadae-ground chicken meals. The poops are now back to milk-shake with a couple being more like latte. Oh, well, back on the FOS food for a few days. The GI upset was probably exacerbated by the fact that I gave the piperazine worming medicine in their evening meal yesterday. When I picked up the kennel this morning I didn't see any sign of round worms. I de-worm all my litters when they are 6 weeks old, and I have actually only found worms in the puppy poop the next day on one occasion.

The pups will have lots of visitors this week. Saturday there will be some visits by people who just want to play with the puppies and Sunday we will have the 2nd audition, when Vanessa Lawrence and Susan Whitehead come back to help me stack. They have an appointment for general physical checkup on Monday at 1 pm.

Saturday, May 1, 2010

Today's blog is about the morphology of puppy poop. If you just had lunch, you might want to put this aside until later in the day. One of the challenges when raising a litter of puppies is giving them enough food to support their amazing rate of growth and fuel their ever-increasing energy level as they grow. It usually happens that I "overshoot" and give them more than their little GI systems can handle. Of course, like all Ridgebacks, they will eat any amount put before them. And the frenzy of competitive eating does not encourage moderation. As a result, it isn't uncommon for the litter to lurch into "the runs" along about 5-6 weeks of age.

What causes diarrhea in a dog is an overgrowth of the intestinal bacteria that do most of the actual food processing. Feeding the puppies more than they need to keep things in balance causes a bacterial "over-bloom" and all these bacteria extract extra water from the gut, resulting in soft stools. Cheri and I have a sort of descriptive scale that we use in our everyday conversation about the puppies (or occasionally about an adult dog with GI issues):

Last night and this morning I gave the pups only the phospho-oligosaccharide food and the poops are getting better. When I picked up after morning meal I found about half "tubular" and about half "cow patties".

So much for the kooky stuff. During the day the pups have the run of the kennel, their sleeping room, the next-door room that mom uses from time to time, and the whole yard most of the time. Here are a couple of pics of some of the pups interacting with mom and with 9-month old Brutus, who is going off to Santa Cruz today to begin a two-week "test drive" for a possible permanent home.

Sunday, May 2, 2010 10:13 AM

Totally tubular! The FOS regimen worked and we are through the runs. This morning I fed half FOS and half Canadae ALS grain-free. Tonight I will start adding the ground raw chicken back into the diet. The pups had lots of visitors yesterday; new puppy owners Joanne and Bob Scribanti, who will be taking Buritto, one of the pet boys, came for a visit before their two-week vacation trip to Turkey. Daisy Joe Dubois, one of my doctoral students, brought her daughter Soliel to play with the puppies. And last but by no means least, Alex and Darla D'Ambrosio brought Giovanni and Marlena, played with the pups and took Kaya home. We will miss her dearly--it has been wonderful to have her as part of our household these last two months. She will come back in 10 days to stay awhile so that the people who are coming to pick up their puppies in mid-May can meat mom.

Vanessa and Susan will be here about 3 for the audition photos. I am going to be grading the puppies according to the offical breed standard. Here are the possible points, according to the standard

My grading will not be on an absolute scale, but relative to the other puppies in the litter. That is, I will assign 20 points to the best ridge in the litter and scale others down from that, according to the standard. However, in the case of ridge, it might as well be on an absolute scale because three of the puppies have ridges that I consider essentially perfect--as good as any I have ever seen, even when judging the Best Ridge competition at a RRCUS National Specialty.

I will not try to evaluate gait at this point, because they are just at a point where they sometimes run without bouncing like bunnies. I will repeat the evaluation at weeks 7 and 8, and fully expect them to change as the pups mature.

At this point, I can say that the average quality in this litter seems to be stronger than in any of my 31 previous litters. There are no dermoid sinus, no kinked tails, no bad bites, no gay tails, and no excessive white. The heads are generally excellent. Ridges are also excellent for seven, with the only ridge faults being relatively minor. More later.

Vanessa and Susan didn't come for the photos. They were in Hollister for a show at 11 am and Honey (Camelot's Southern Honey) won Ridgeback BOB and they had to stay for group. It was a long afternoon and then Vanessa had another obligation so they didn't make. So Cheri pitched in and did the handling for the photos. You can see the results here. It is important that this is what I see today at six weeks of age. They are changing every day and some of the features may look very different in another week.

Monday, May 3, 2010

The trip to Bishop Ranch Veterinary Clinic for the general physical was a big success. The pups travelled in a wire crate in the back of my Highlander, covered with a sheet, and never made a peep coming or going! The vet techs helped me ferry the crew into the exam room where Dr. Liesl Pedersen did the exams. Weights on the official vet scale were:

• Salsa 6-13
• Churra 8-13
• Pasilla 8-7
• Tamale 9-3
• Tostada 9-9
• Fajita 8-6
• Pablano 10-1
• Nacho 10-0
• Burrito 9-1
• Taquito 8-7

Everyone was found to be healthy, no murmers, no umbilical hernias, 8 testicles, and 10 pee puddles on the exam room floor.

Tuesday, May 4, 2010

I've been in New Jersey since Wednesday and flew back home early this morning. The pups seem to have doubled in size in the three days I was gone! They are now seven weeks old and they got their first vaccination today. After the shots they all retired to their sleeping rooms for a nap. We will have lots of visitors later today and I will begin my next round of evaluations. Some seem to have changed a lot in a week.

Sunday, May 9, 2010 7:51 AM

Injury report:

Yesterday Cheri helped me stack and photograph the puppies and Susan Whitehead and her son Tyrus came and helped me while I evaluated all of the features except gait. I am posting the videos now and will post my complete evaluations and the still photos later today. David Bueno is coming over this morning to help with repeat stack photos on a few of the puppies and movement evaluation. Here is the link for the 3rd audition.

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

The trial I was working on in New Jersey won't be held because the parties found common ground for a settlement the day before opening arguments were to begin, so I am not commuting this month after all. Of course I have a big suitcase with a closet full of clothes in my hotel room in Newark, but one of the legal secretaries is packing it for me and will ship it home by Fedex today.

The pups are settled into a comfortable routine. They spend days in our large kennel run, which connects to the largest of our three inside kennel rooms. I leave the gate of the kennel run open so that they can play in the yard when they want to. The fenced back yard is about 1/2 acre and they make use of all of it now. When they are tired they go back inside and nap. Nights they still spend in one of the small inside rooms, the same one they have been in since they moved from the whelping room to the kennel a month ago. They are eating three meals a day. This morning I started moving them to FORCE, the dehydrated food made by The Honest Kitchen, which we use for all of our adults for the morning meal. Their breakfast was half FORCE and half Canadae ALS grain-free kibble. They wolfed it down even more enthusuastically than they do for pure kibble. I will make it 75% FORCE and 25% kibble tomorrow and move them to all FORCE for breakfast on Friday morning.

I am just about to take Sheila home to San Mateo. She has been here since her second AI at Bishop Ranch on Monday. Hopefully her breeding will be successful, which will give us another Camelot litter about July 10. By that time our master bathroom will be all torn out for the remodel, so Sheila's pups will be whelped in the kennel.

Thursday, May 13, 2010

The pups love the Honest Kitchen. This morning's meal was 4 cups of FORCE, 2 1/2 cups of Canadae kibble, and a lot of warm water. They cleaned both their pans. After I fed the adult dogs, Monroe asked to be left in the big kennel room with the pups and she is with them now playing step-mom. Monroe has always loved puppies and has adopted several like this. She is six years old and has had two litters of pups, one of which was a single puppy.

Taquito's injury is all healed and we have discontinued the thrice-daily application of triple antibiotic.

Friday, May 14, 2010

Kaya came back for a few days yesterday. We have visitors coming this weekend from Oklahoma and Alaska to pick up their puppies and I wanted them to be able to meet Kaya in person. When Darla arrived to drop her off yesterday, Kaya was highly motivated to go into the yard to see the puppies. She likes being with them--somewhat. But when the puppies all swarm her, she gives a loud growl and dances away. She is ok with a few at a time and has been playing with them out in the yard (see following photo).

The real "mom" is now Monroe. I have the kennel gates open all day so the puppies can play in the yard or retire to one of the inside kennel rooms to nap. Usually they partition between the inside rooms, with a few napping in each. Monroe is always with one group, usually in the larger sleepling room.

Saturday, May 15, 2010 - Audition Day

This is graduation weekend and we have had a stream of visitors to pick up the first puppies to be leaving Camelot. The first visitor to arrive was Judy Nickelson, who drove here from her home in Oklahoma City, by way of friends in Phoenix and Los Angeles. About 11 am, Rick and Susan Highness arrived to pick up Poblano. Here is the first of our family photos:

Shortly after lunch, Steve and Connie Wight, who flew to San Francisco from Anhorage, Alaska, arrived. Steve and Connie are both great Ridgeback fans, as you can see from Connie's amazing tattoo, which features Ridgeback and Lion heads, as well as a map of Africa and a number of African orchids.

About 5 pm, Cheri helped me stack the puppies for the 4th audition photos while Judy, Steve & Connie and Barb Bridwell helped find puppies. After finishing with the audition photos we all had a nice dinner and shared a couple of bottles of wine.

Sunday, May 16, 2010 - Graduation Day

This morning after breakfast I got Nacho and Taquito out and left the rest of the puppies in the kennel so that Judy could make one last comparison and select which she would take back to Oklahoma. The boys both have good points and she had a hard choice. Finally she selected Nacho, whose name will be "Camelot's Mischief Managed By Design." About noon, Judy and Nacho took off to visit a friend in Redwood City, before heading south for Los Angeles:

It is a glorious sunny day and I got a lot of great photos -- here are a couple (which are in the running for the 2010 Camelot holiday card).

Later in the afternoon Larry & Candy Smith drove up from Turlock to get Fajita, whose new name will be Sahara. She will be a companion to her half-brother Kruger (who was Radar in Kaya's first litter).

Monday, May 17, 2010

And then there were six. Today it is rainy in California and Steve and Connie and I just hung around. The pups have spent the day in the large kennel room, usually curled up with Auntie Monroe. I snapped the following picture of Salsa and Tostada with Monroe just before lunch.

After lunch Steve and Connie put Taquito in his Sherpa bag and headed off to SFO for their flight back to Anchorage. Henceforth, Taquto will be "Camelot's Northern Anchor" and his callname will be "Crosby".

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

It was a busy weekend, with visitors and house guests picking up four of the puppies. Six puppies seem almost like nothing! This morning I went out to the garden and all six pups followed. I took a little video that you can see on YouTube.

Here is a photo of Tostada, who is really growing on me, and one of Auntie Monroe napping with four of the pups on a dog bed that is on our patio.

Friday, May 21, 2010

Our big activity today was lunch; the six pups still here had their first raw chicken backs. It took awhile (actually, only about 30 minutes) but they are hard-wired carnivores.

Saturday, May 22, 2010

We are down to five! Bob and Joann Scribante came at 11 to pick up Burrito, who is now going to be Riley. It is a beautiful May day in Northern California and Cheri and I had a nice visit with Bob and Joann on the patio while the five remaining sisters said a final goodbye to their brother. Then Bob and Joann drove off with Burrito/Riley to their home in Redwood City.

Before Bob and Joann came, we took the 5th audition photos of the six pups still here.

Sunday, May 23, 2010

Graduation day for Pasilla. Gabe Chapman flew up from San Clemente, rented a car at the Oakland Airport, picked up Pasilla and headed south:

The pups always like it when people come for a graduation day. They seem to like to sit on the steps of the hot tub and watch the goings on as we explain various things and do paperwork.

Monday, May 24, 2010

Last night was the first day of crate training. The four remaining show girls, Tamale, Tostada, Chura and Salsa, slept in the house last night, two per crate. They slept soundly with no crying from 9:30 until we took them out at 5:30 this morning.

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

The night crate training continues to go well. Last night the four girls slept from 9:30 until 5 am. They probably would have slept longer but I got up to go the the bathroom at 4:30 and our toilet didn't turn off when the tank filled. The constant noise seemed to wake them up so Cheri and I got them up and led them out to their kennel room, then went back to bed for another hour. We are also starting to get them used to being in the house during the day. This is a new place for them and they are reluctant to come in and haven't gotten very comfortable being inside yet. The way our house is arranged, there is a dog door from the laundry room to the back yard. The adult dogs mostly hang out in the house during the day and can go into the yard whenever they want. Before today, the puppies have not tried to go into the house through this dog door, even though they are very adept with the three kennel dog doors and even though they see the adults going into the house through that door. Well, today the four puppies ran from the kennel yard to the house dog door and two of them (Tamale and Salsa) came in. The other two (Churra and Tostada) stayed outside. Tamale and Salsa came into the kitchen, but Tamale had second thoughts about being in such a huge unknown place. She turned around and went back outside and headed for the kennel day room where she curled up with Tostada and Churra. Salsa, however, explored the whole house and ended up in our walk-in closit helping Cheri dress for work. Finally I walked her back out through the laundry room and now she is out napping with the other girls. I am off to Minneapolis today and will be back late tomorrow, so no blog until Friday.

Saturday, May 29, 2010

This is graduation day for Churra so now we are down to just three--Tamale, Salsa and Tostada. At 1 pm we had a shot clinic for the seven pups who live in the area. They got their 2nd DHPP and had a good romp with each other. Poblano (now Jackaon), Burrito (now Riley) and Fajita (now Sahara) had a good reunion with their four sisters and all of the humans had a nice visit. Here is Churra's graduation photo with her new family, Alex & Darla D'Ambrosio and their kids Giovanni and Marlena. Kaya went home and will keep Churra properly instructed in manners.

Monroe will probably be sorry to see Churra go, but she will have the other three girls. Here she is napping with Tamale and Tostada.

For the last week the pups have been sleeping two per crate for about 8 hours each night. Tonight we will sleep one alone and the other two together (we only have two unoccupied crates in our bedroom). We have decided to keep both Tamale and Salsa as our house dogs. Tostada is still for sale if the right home who is committed to showing her turns up.

This is my first update in a long time. We have settled on names for our four show girls:

I ordered DM test kits for all four and yesterday I collected the DNA for Tamale, Salsa and Ruby. I will get Lola's this weekend when she comes for the final DHPP vaccination.

Salsa is turning out to look a lot like her gg grandmother, Ch Kwetu's Brownian Motion (Murphy). The following picture shows Salsa sitting on my desk, seemingly noticing the resemblence herself!

Now, the last part of today's blog is a bit gross, so you can stop now and go back to your morning coffee. Yesterday afternoon, Salsa started being listless (unusual for her) and crawled up onto my lap when I was watching the ballgame. She began to shiver and shortly after that got down and barfed. She continued to be nauseous and it continued into the night. Finally, about 3:30 I took her and the other two puppies out to their kennel room so Salsa would be able to throw up at will. This morning at 5:30 I went out to the kennel and she appeared fine. I checked the kennel yard and found the following artifact in a litle pile of runny poop:

It is a queaker form one of the little puppy toys. Probably one of the adults ripped the toy open and this was left, whereupon Salsa ingested it. As you can see, it is about twice the size of a quarter and it have been a pretty painful passage. Fortunately, it is flezible enough that it can be folded in half.