Another in a series of articles extracted from Barb's recent teleseminar to

help explain and answer questions on the puppy weaning process.

The puppy weaning process or the puppy weaning system is the system of

getting puppies from nursing onto solid foods. Now on the outset that sounds

kind of simple - the puppies stop nursing and the puppies start eating

solid foods. Well, it is simple if you have the right instruction.

It's simple if you're doing it the correct way. If you don't have the

knowledge and you don't have the experience and you're not doing it

correctly, it can cause a lot of issues. At issue are the health of the

mother and the health and life-long socialization of the puppies.

So what weaning actually refers to is the process that includes the first

stage of development of the puppies when the puppies are completely reliant

on the mother. The mother is supplying them with their nutrition, the mother

is actually stimulating them to be able to urinate and defecate. Quickly the

puppies start to develop - their eyes start to open, they start to get

teeth - and as they start to get teeth the mother is not all that

interested in nursing them anymore. Most mothers aren't!

As human beings, in most cases we want our puppies to go to their new homes

anywhere from 8 weeks to 10 weeks to 12 weeks old. We want to ensure that the

puppies are able to sustain themselves on their own by the time we're ready

for these puppies to go to their new homes.

That's why having and sticking to a puppy weaning schedule is important.

If a female dog were out in the wild, females in the wild can take a long

time to wean... even puppies will still be suckling on the mother's nipples

until they're 9 months old. They can't get their nutrition that way -

by that time the mothers aren't actually producing any milk that's worth

anything -- so it's more of a social interaction with their mom and the pack.

But in our case two things are happening. One is that we want the new puppies

to be self-sufficient away from the mother for them to go to their new homes.

The other piece of the weaning process that most people don't talk about is

the process of getting those puppies connected and attached to the people.

Because as they were born, they're nursing with the mother, they can look

to their mother for everything they have. But as you know, when a dog comes

into your family whether it be a baby puppy or an adult dog, that dog then

looks to you as the family member to provide everything for them. When are

they going to eat? When are they going to go potty? When are they going to go

to the vet's? When do they get to play? When do they have to sleep?

So they look to us for all those decisions, and if you can wean them properly

and get them through in the proper sequence then when they go to their new

homes they are already ready to go to people and accept people as those who

will provide for them.

Thus socialization and the socialization process are a key outcome of a

proper puppy weaning system.

We'd love to hear from you! Is socialization an outcome you've focused on

when weaning your litters? Have you approached weaning as a vehicle for

socialization and other desired behaviors? What do you think is the most

important outcome of the puppy weaning process? How do you make sure that

happens? Please email us at info@weaning-puppies.com or post a comment to

our blog at weaning-puppies.com/blog.