New Born Care
New born pups are just wonderful, they are also a lot of stress and hard work.
I take three to four weeks off work and sleep in the room with them and mum.
Temperature of the room needs to be kept static, keeping mum comfortable and not letting the pups temperatures swing too far cold or hot.
The main consideration now is to feed mum, and keep feeding her enough to not only keep up with her own dietary needs but now she has a number of hungry little mouths hanging off her that she also needs to keep up with. For at least the first four weeks you need to make sure she is getting more than enough to keep up with demand.
Some issues here to be mindful of, bulldog babies are well known for aspiration pneumonia. This is where they drink so fast and technically drown themselves while feeding, milk will back flow out their noses, not to be confused with a cleft palate. If they breath in at the same time they will take milk down into their lungs and will turn to pneumonia. If they present with discharge from the nose or are sounding phlegmy or rattly and are not feeding properly they may very well need some antibiotics.
Rash - if you notice little yellow looking pustules, pimple looking please don't ignore and call a milk rash. This can often be the first signs of the whelp battling with a strep infection. Antibiotics
A whelp that is not feeding properly can dehydrate and/or become constipated.
Dehydration is noticeable by pinching the skin together and seeing if it drops back or does it stay pinched together, pup will be lethargic. Subcutaneous fluid is possibly necessary. Constipation will make the baby very grizzly and not want to feed, the whelp must be toileted and get things moving.
Whelps don't tend to grizzle for no reason, you have to work it out. Are they too hot, this shows by them being bright pink and moving away from each other, too cold they look pale and are piling up on top of each other to keep warm.
If mum is being kept away from the pups in between feeds for whatever reason you may find they overfeed when she arrives at set meal times, this often leads to tummy aches and/or diarrhea which in turn leads to very sore bottoms which can become weepy and infected looking. Babies will be very unsettled after feeding as they have sore overloaded stomachs. This is why I stay with mum and babes so that she is in with them as much as possible.
Over feeding also brings up the issue of Swimmer pups. If left untreated this can become life threatening as the pup cannot breathe. When pups are born you can feel the curve under the chest, as they feed and become heavier the chest gets flatter so looking at the whelp side on you can see how narrow and flat it looks.
The following is a good site to read more about swimmers,
http://www.showdogsupersite.com/kenlclub/breedvet/swimmers.html
This first four weeks are the critical ones, they are nerve wracking and stressful and alot of guessing on your behalf about what is going on, sometimes no matter how much we do we can still loose some babies. Mother Nature is a stronger force than we are.