Rearing of Puppies 
61 
clom have more than four to six puppies. Seven 
puppies should be the limit for a bitch and the others 
should be immediately destroyed. There is a tempta¬ 
tion to leave the puppies with the dam and appar¬ 
ently the dam seems to be amply able to take care of 
them during the first few days, but as the puppies 
begin to grow, the inability of the dam to feed such 
4 tt - 
Whelping Box. 
a large number makes itself manifest; weaklings 
begin to appear and the larger puppies, too, never 
attain the size that they should. The excess in a 
litter may be raised on a foster-mother, whose date 
of whelping should correspond as nearly as possible 
with that of the Shepherd bitch, so that the milk of 
both mothers may correspond in composition. 
There is no way of determining the choice of the 
litter at this age, in fact, such a selection can not 
be arrived at until puppies are from six to eight 
months of age, so the best advice one can offer is 
