Keeping the Litter Safe

About two days before Our younger Great Pyrenees bitch, Molly, whelped her litter, she became territorial around the kibble trough—uncharacteristically growling when either Luther or Heidi moved to join her at the trough. On the day her pups were born, after she and the litter had been settled into a spacious stall, our adult Pyr, Heidi, spent much of the day in a far corner of the stall doing what she does best—guarding. However, when Molly’s attention strayed from her litter far enough to notice Heidi, the new mom would bark, growl, and snarl most inhospitably. My words about Aunt Heidi helping floated off in the air, unheard. By mid-afternoon, had taken to attacking and Heidi was finally driven from the stall. Thereafter, Molly would growl and bark anytime a dog came into her field of vision.

With the communal feed trough located in its usual place under the run-in overhang at the back of the barn, Molly could see her former buddies coming to feed and would do all she could to discourage them. The snarling, growling, barking, and attacking was effecting—and while she wasn’t drawing blood, she was most definitely getting her message across: Stay away from my puppies!

As a human too long separated from canine companionship, it took me a good week to realize that this protective attitude was so intense because newborn pups are wholly defenseless. Eyes closed, limbs loose, they move about by squirming along on their stomachs. Only within the past couple of days have Molly’s pups begun to employ their legs in the service of movement. Wobbly pups push up in attempts to stand, bobble a moment, then fall—rolling softly over on their well-fed rounded bodies. Sleeping pups may flex their legs, tucking up a haunch or a foreleg.

When Heidi’s pups were whelped beneath the prize white oak and sassafras boards, the snarling barking Heidi who had appeared when Lucy’s filly Janet entered the world reappeared in force. Unlike Molly, Heidi did not distinguish dogs from other threats—goats, horses, and people were included in her list of beings to chase off. Indeed, I had to make a cattle-panel-cage around the front of her chosen lair to give her any peace. When she saw that no one could enter her guarded space easily, she relented enough that we could bring workers onto the back acres so long as they remained hyperaware of Heidi’s whereabouts and strove to stay out of her line of sight.

Then a few days back I happened to be heading towards the barn just when Heidi came bounding out of her enclosure—up over the piled planks and down, a puppy in her mouth. At first I thought she was moving her litter to another area—perhaps one less busy than the driveway turnaround.Shortly, though, I realized the pup she carried was dead—probably having succumbed to the heat plaguing us that week. She took her pup away from the litter, ducked down beneath of mound of hewn logs, popped up to check her litter and my whereabouts, then promptly dispatched the dead pup.

Appalled at this turn of events, I thought of Toni Morrison’s Pulitzer prize winning novel Beloved, and her character Seth who protected her crawling-already baby from the threat of capture and enslavement by taking the girl into the woodshed and killing her (I think she sliced the baby’s throat or chopped off her head). This behavior made perfect sense to the escaped slave mother, as did Heidi’s devouring her pup from nose to tail. Shocked and shaken, I stood by as Heidi’s witness, gradually understanding that by swallowing the pup’s remains she provided no lure for coyotes or vultures and thus protected the remainder of her litter.

I’m glad to say that both Heidi and Molly have returned to watching the flock from time to time. They spend much time ensconced with their litters, yes, but now come out for fresh air and companionship on occasion, and will even go far enough to trail the goats down to the stream in front for a time—before herding their caprine charges back uphill to me, and enabling themselves to return to their litters.

Once the pups were a couple of days old and Heidi had begun to leave her chosen lair, she again became affectionate. She often allows me to stand with her and rub her ears and neck and back, and to pull ticks on occasion. Sometimes she returns to her old dancing self, not wanting to be touched but willing to sniff at my hand before retreating out of reach, but such occurrences are less and less frequent. Heidi the momma bitch is finally a loving trusting dog, at least with me alone. It’s gratifying to experience this shift in her behavior—and to think it only took her five months to achieve!

Perhaps her trust was helped along by my trust of her. If she went down front, or even wandered off of the farm, I trusted her to use good sense and to return unharmed. During those days and nights when she and Luther took to slipping under the perimeter fence with regularity, I never tried to catch her (yet always chased down Luther) but simply waited for her to return and request a gate be opened for her reentry. Now over the past two days, I’ve grabbed at her twice as she slipped through an open gate, but as soon as she turned her head and I realized which dog I had grabbed, I released her—trusting that she’d not be gone long, knowing she would return to her litter in short order. Although I had feared that by grabbing at her coat I might be eroding our bond of trust, it hasn’t happened. She has seemed to realize that I was just grabbing at “dog” and to understand that I’d release her as soon as I saw she was “Heidi.”

Her intelligence brings to mind The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, which if readers here have not yet experienced I highly recommend. The human-canine bond of understanding and trust is exemplified by this tale like no other I’ve experienced (and believe me, as a child I often reread Big Red, Sounder, and the like).

As these dogs continue to educate me, my respect for them deepens and my affection for each as an individual grows. Although ours are not house dogs by any stretch of the imagination, I still ask myself: how did I ever survive a decade without dogs in my daily life?