Why is my dog not nursing her 3.5-week-old puppies as much as before?

If she stopped feeding them suddenly then mastitis would be a risk (she may refuse them because it is painful or the excess milk after she stopped could cause the problem after). If she is off form, has any fever or her milk glands are red, hot or painful to firm touch then she will need prescription treatment from a vet. If everything is otherwise good, just monitor for any changes. 48 hours of very light food if she is healthy and not underweight can discourage active milk production but do not starve her

They are too young to be weaned from milk, you will need to buy puppy replacer milk at the pet shop. there could be many reasons for the mother to stop feeding her pups, the most common would be mammary gland inflammation.

Please have her assessed by an emergency vet as soon as possible - it looks like she may have painful inflammation and infection known as mastitis which can release toxins both into the milk and into her bloodstream. You will need to handfeed the puppies also (a mixture of mousse textured, high calorie recovery food and warm water or canned puppy food should be ok at 3 weeks)

Hi and thanks for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach! This sounds completely normal for Gracie. She is trying to wean the puppies and her teats will get smaller over time. Puppies and Gracie should be dewormed with pyrantel pamoate starting at 2 weeks of age. The deworming should be done every 2-3 weeks on the puppies. Gracie should be dewormed at least twice 3 weeks apart. Good luck

That is a lot of puppies to feed and it may be that now that they are getting teeth, they are sometimes hurting her when suckling. Let her do what she has to do, and do not force her to feed them. She will feed them as best and as much as she can. You may want to give the puppies some canned puppy food as well as the dry food, as they will be able to eat more and bother her less. Make sure there always is water available for both the mother and the puppies.

The length depends on how hungry they are and how much milk she has. If your puppies are not gaining weight and do not have round full bellies after nursing, she may not have enough milk for them and you may have to supplement them with puppy milk.

Hello, congratulations on your new puppies. Pregnant bitches and those who have just birthed puppies will have a substantially higher calorie demand. Most of the time, we even recommend switching mothers to puppy food (richer in calories) to keep up with there caloric demand. Alternatively, at four weeks you may wean the puppies off from nursing an onto wet/canned puppy food so that mom stops producing milk and her caloric demand returns to normal. You may feed her up to 4-6 times per day while she continues to nurse. Hope this helps and best of luck.