Where has the time gone? It’s hard to believe the puppies are 9 weeks old already — and harder to imagine that with most breeders they would already have gone to their new homes. Clearly puppies have been going to homes at 7-8 weeks for decades, with no apparent ill-effects in most cases, but I look at these pups and I just can’t imagine sending them off on their own right now! They do so much learning over the next few weeks — new people, new places, new experiences, and lots of learning how to be a dog and communicate with other dogs. We’ve had puppies that have come to us at 8 weeks and that have come to us at 12 weeks, and we have noticed that the older puppies are a little more self-controlled, a little more stable. It doesn’t mean owners are off the hook as far as socializing, training, teaching bite inhibition, etc. — at 12 weeks socialization is still very important and Boxer puppies are still little devils!
We’ve had a few mild days this week (and several more in sight) so the pups have had some good outside time — they love exploring the yard and they get some good sound sleep afterward! Potty training has been going a little slowly because of the temperatures, but we should be able to make good strides now that it will be comfortably above freezing. (They’re pretty good about going on the papers, but we try to get them going outside most of the time before they go to their new homes. They won’t be perfect, of course — they’re too young! — but it helps to give them a head start.) We’ll start crate-training in earnest, too, this week. They’ve had crates open to them since they were 4 weeks old and one or more sleep in a crate more often than not. Once we start closing the door, however, it’s a different story. They’ve had some 10-15 minute crating sessions when we’ve been cleaning their pen, so we’ll start from there and increase the time, then start on alone-crating.
The little girl is still little, but has grown by leaps and bounds since starting on solid foods. She is about 2/3 the size of her brothers, but she was 1/2 their size just a couple of weeks ago. She is a normal puppy in all other respects (knock wood, of course!), so we’ll just wait to see if she’s going to catch up to the boys or if she’ll always be on the small side. The boys are now about the same size as the pups in the last litter, so they’re apparently thriving on their raw diet. They’ve had chicken wings on occasion to get them used to raw meat and bones, and they’re getting some ground raw mixes — and still snacking on Emma a few times a day, as she lets them!
