How do you bottle feed an orphaned puppy?

How to Bottle Feed an Orphaned Puppy

As anyone that has had a litter of puppies knows you have to be ready for just about anything.

Sometimes right away you see that a particular puppy may be in trouble and you think you should step in to help mom and the poor puppy out.

First make sure that the puppy can get a good drink of mom's first milk known as Colostrum. This first milk contains antibodys that the puppy needs to survive and thrive. A puppy that does not get this first milk is a puppy at great risk so do everything you can to insure that every puppy gets a chance to suckle from mom as soon as possible.
This formula recipe is from Leerburg.com and according to Ed Frawley it has 11 calories per cc.
You can use the formula provided by your veterinarian but I have had much better success with rearing puppies using Leerburg.com's recipe.

Things You'll Need:

• 1 10oz can of evaporated milk
• plain yogurt
• whole egg
• 1T Mayonaise
• baby bottle with nipple of apropriate size for the puppy

For your little runt puppy you will want to encourage it to suckle on mom as much as possible. With luck you can get this puppy on mom several times a day without being pushed out by it's larger siblings.

In a sauce pan place all the ingredients and slowly warm to boiling, then allow to cool. Place about 1-2 oz into bottle and put the rest away in a clean washed container.

Wash bottle and nipple in warm soapy water, fill bottle with warm water and check to see if it flows out of the nipple easily. You don't want it too fast as it could choke your puppy but if it is too slow the puppy will have a hard time suckling and loose interest.

Pour formula into bottle and close lid. check against the inside of your wrist to insure it is not too hot. You want it quite warm but not burning.

Hold your puppy slightly on his back and try to get the nipple into his mouth, you may need to squeeze the bottle a bit to get him interested in sucking. A healthy puppy will push his feet forward and kneed your hands almost like he is trying to push you away. He will wrap his tongue around the bottom of the nipple to suckle.

If he seems to be having too much milk running out of his mouth or seems to have a real problem latching onto the nipple you will want to put your pinky finger upside down into his mouth to make sure he doesn't have a cleft palate. Puppies with cleft palate often do not survive, they typically get pneumonia and die as a result. If your puppy has cleft palate you may wish to consider humanely having him put to sleep.

Puppies fed this formula tend to catch up to the others pretty quickly as long as there are no other underlying health issues to deal with.
If at all possible leave puppy with the mother dog to care for in between your supplimental feedings.