👍🏽Daily ENS (Early Neurological Stimulation) for 4 day old Miss BLUE puppy includes holding her on her back for the count of three. Each day the nine puppies are weighed; all are gaining steadily.
More about ENS for those who are interested:
🐶The first three weeks of a puppy’s life are a crucial time. Puppies are very helpless at this stage. Their eyes do not open until around 10 days, and the sense of hearing starts around 2 weeks. Mama dog does most of the work at this stage; a breeders job is to keep everyone warm, safe, and clean.
🐶The most important way to interact with puppies during this phase is by touch. Gentle handling and stroking at least two times a day teaches them that human touch is a pleasant experience.
🐶Many dog breeders are providing increased environmental enrichment to puppies in the form of exposure to a large variety of toys, sounds, playtime outdoors, and interactions with a wide variety of humans and other animals.
Simple interactions early in a puppy’s life may increase its ability to learn and cope successfully with stress later on.
🐶Early Neurological Stimulation (ENS), involves applying gentle stressors to a very young animal (age 3 days to 16 days exactly) for very short periods of time (only to the count of 3) .
🐶The US Military developed this method designed to improve the performance of future military working dogs.
🐶The stressors include holding them in different positions, and gently touching parts of their bodies including running a q-tip between the toes of one foot.
🐶The link between stress and activation of the endocrine system is well known. The effects of short-term, very mild stress can be beneficial, creating “robustness” in the body and preparing it to deal more effectively with stressors later in life.
🐶Possible benefits of ENS:
1. Improved cardio vascular performance (heart rate)
2. Stronger heart beats
3. Stronger adrenal glands
4. More tolerance to stress
5. Greater resistance to disease
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