~ The Sanaleikki (Corona) Litter ~
Well we did it and in spite of all the difficulties and obstacles in our way because of Covid, on May 2nd 2020 Ohra gave birth to a litter of four pups, two girls and two boys. Dandelion (brown boy), Burdock (cream girl) Fizzy (black tri girl) and Pop (cream boy).
So why Corona, other than for the obvious reason? And no, it's not because of the lager. Find out more here.
Ohra decided to start whelping a couple of days early - in the bloody garden! It was a nice day and, if I remember correctly, I was doing some general tidying up.
Ohra came out to join me to settle in one of her favourite spots The next thing I saw was her standing , immobile and in an unusual stance.
I went over to her and spotted that a pup had been half delivered, but bum first - not ideal. I called Lou down from the office and together we got her into the house and as she held her I managed to get the pup fully, and safely delivered.
We got Ohra and her pup upstairs into the whelping room and put it into the whelping box with Ohra - who showed no interest in it at all!
An hour later, and on the floor of the whelping room Ohra popped out puppy number two, again showing little interest in it.
Ninety minutes later up number three was again a floor born pup - mum was not impressed with the whelping box!
Ohra decided that she now wanted to get onto our bed, so we brought her three pups in to join her and before long number four was born - and from that moment Ohra became a loving and attentive mum.
The puppies thrived and were a joy to raise. The warm spring weather helped as they could spend much of their time outside with mum, with great-granny Kiva and Mylo.
By the time the pups were ready to go to their new homes they had gone through a couple of name changes as, in addition to being named by their new owners they would also have to be registered with the Kennel Club. To that end each pup would be registered with a name comprising a combination of letters from their dad's name (Kissa) and their mum's name (Ohra) - hence Sanaleikki, Finnish for wordplay
~ Lumikoira Sanaleikki Roshi ~
Dandelion ended up being named Henki by his new family, who then lived in Northants.
They now live on the Isle of Man where Neil is a trawler-man and RNLI volunteer, and Libbie is a midwife.
Libbie has contributed something to this site about life with Henki and it can be seen here there are also some photos of him here
~ Lumikoira Sanaleikki Aroha ~
Now called Eedi, Burdock had the shortest journey of all to her new home as Ben and Amy and daughter Tess lived all of 500 yards away from us.
As a result we do get to see a lot of her, which Kassi loves and it is magical to see the two of them play.
We did try mating Eedi last year but it was not to be, however we are hoping that she might have a litter in 2025.
~ Lumikoira Sanaleikki Kassi ~
"Shall we keep her?" said Louise when Fizzy was born. So we did and as a result Kassi became our fifth Lappy, and our fourth generation of Lumikoiras.
To be honest it was a brilliant suggestion because Kassi is just about perfect - even judges have thought so as every time she is shown she manages to win, or be placed thus qualifying her for Crufts. You can read more about her here.
~ Lumikoira Sanaleikki Oskar ~
Readers will have noted that my first Lappy love was a cream male called Oskar and it seemed only right that Pop be given that name in tribute to him
Ozzi, as they named him, went to live in Gloucestershire with Tom and Nicole where he would enjoy fabulous walks with them and trips out in their camper van before nature kicked us all in the teeth ...
Ozzi
May 2nd 2020 - September 25th 2021
Tragically Ozzi's life was taken too soon when in September 2021, at just 16 months, he was put to sleep due to acute liver failure. It was heartbreaking for us and we can only imagine what it must have been like for Tom and Nicole.
Fortunately I was able to help them get another Lappy, ironically from Liz Mowatt at TabanyaRuu (the wheel goes full circle), and they now have a wolf sable boy called Kodi.