I forgot Lotto.......

In my mama dog tribute, I forgot about Lotto in my haste to publish. Please don't tell Lotto, she'll send Mira after me and we all know what a nasty little ankle biter she is. Okay, Lotto is the mother of all the Doo's with the exception of Sunfire whose aunt is also his mother and yes that was a planned breeding. Lotto still thinks he's hers though, she thinks any group or single puppies who come in this house must be her's because she's never seen anyone else in the house deliver pups so by default they must be hers.

Lotto's first litter was an experience. As with most first time mothers, she wasn't sure what was going on with that first puppy but Mother Nature soon kicks in and she was delivering those pups like she had done this all her life. Now Lotto is a fairly calm dog and usually isn't in a huge rush to do anything except go for a ride or eat cookies and this carried over to whelping (birthin' pups). There was at least an hour between pups and 5 hours between the next to the last puppy and Riggins. Riggins was born in his own good time and has done everything else in his own good time ever since and dancing to his own music.

Sunny, who is the puppy's father was facinated by them and wanted to spend all his time with them in the whelping box. Of course that didn't go over well with Lotto and she would chase him away and bite him on his nose. That's a dominance thing with Lotto, when she wants to exert her place with anyone else she bites them on the nose. She even does that to me, but she doesn't bite down, just holds my nose in her mouth.


At some time during the first week of the pups life, Sunny hatched a plan to steal one of the pups for himself. He waited until Lotto went out for a potty break and went into the room that the puppies box was in. I saw him come out with something in his mouth and run into his crate facing the back. He opened his mouth and very gently let a puppy out and licked it and then laid his head down on it when Lotto came back. He definately underestimated Lotto's ability to count. She went into the room, came flying back out ran straight to his crate climbed in snarled and bit him on the head, took her puppy in her mouth and took it back to her box. After about 20 seconds, long enough to determine the pup was alright, she came tearing back and into Sunny's crate and tore him a new a_ _hole!! Sunny has never tried to steal another pup since.

As I said before, Lotto seems to think that whenever a pup or litter comes in the house, they must be hers. This has led to some amusing incidents. During my time working with Dal rescue, I've even fostered some litters or individual pups. Now all the other Doo's seem to get it, these little guys are here to stay until they are old enough to be adopted. Not Lotto. The scene usually goes like this. I will bring the litter or singleton home and set them up in a whelping box or a puppy playpen. At some point Lotto will come to see what I am doing and she always has this suprised look on her face. She will look at the pup(s) then at me then the pups and back at me etc. etc. I will hold the pup near her to let her sniff it and she will and usually lick it too. At sometime during the next hour she decides that these (this) pup is hers and takes up the roll of "mom". She doesn't nurse them but will hang out if they are bottle fed if need be. She will keep them clean, safe and let them run all over her and stay with them. I'm not sure if she really thinks they are hers or if she understands that she is a foster but she is a good mom anyway.

Now in the case of Sunfire, he came home at 4 months old. She treated him as if he was one of her pups and swhortly after, let him know his "puppy pass" had expired. She still treats him as she does Riggins, Siren and Mira and he treats her the way they do, with a lot of respect. If you could have seen her tear into Sunny over that pup, you would understand where Mira gets it from. Lottie is my all time favorite mother dog. She stays calm (except for that one case) and never gets her fur ruffled by a litter of pups. That's like giving birth to 6 to 8 kids at one time and raising them by yourself, NO thanks.....