Whelping Supplies Checklist: What to Have Ready Before Labor

Whelping happens on its own schedule, usually at night, and frequently faster than you expect. The supplies you didn't gather are the ones you'll need at 3 a.m. with wet hands and a puppy that isn't breathing.

Assemble everything by week eight — around day 50 to 55 of gestation, the same time you set up the whelping box. Keep it all in one container next to the box, not scattered across the house.

The Core Kit

Clean towels — far more than you think. Plan on a dozen or more for a medium litter. You'll use one or two per puppy for drying and stimulation, plus more for cleaning up between deliveries. Old, laundered, and stacked within reach.

Whelping pads or disposable underpads. Absorbent, disposable, and swapped out as each puppy arrives keeps the nest dry. Wet bedding chills newborns quickly.

A digital thermometer. For twice-daily temperature checks from about day 55 — the drop below roughly 99°F (37.2°C) is your best 24-hour warning that labor is coming. Also useful for checking a puppy you're worried about.

A gram scale. Weigh every puppy at birth and daily afterward. Birth weight and daily gain are the single most sensitive early indicator that a puppy is in trouble — a puppy losing weight or failing to gain is declining before it looks sick. A kitchen scale reading in grams is fine.

Hemostats and unwaxed dental floss or clean thread. For clamping and tying umbilical cords if the dam doesn't sever them herself, or does so too close to the body.

Blunt-tipped scissors, sterilized, for cutting cords after tying.

Iodine or chlorhexidine solution in a small dish for dipping cord stumps — the umbilicus is a direct route for infection in the first hours.

A bulb syringe or DeLee mucus trap for clearing fluid from airways. The DeLee is what most experienced breeders prefer; it gives more control and less risk than vigorous swinging.

Identification for puppies — colored collars, rickrack, or yarn bands. In a litter of similar-colored puppies you will lose track otherwise, and per-puppy weight records are meaningless if you can't tell which is which.

A heat source for the box, placed to one side so puppies can move away from it, plus a backup like a hot water bottle in case of power loss.

A whelping box for warming puppies temporarily — a small box or basket with a towel and safe heat, so a delivered puppy stays warm while the dam is occupied with the next.

Disposable gloves and hand sanitizer.

Notepad and pen, or the record-keeping system you'll actually use, for logging each puppy's birth time, sex, weight, color, and whether a placenta was passed.

The Emergency Kit

Separate, and hopefully never opened.

Your veterinarian's number and your emergency clinic's number, written on paper and taped to the wall near the box. Phones die and get lost. Know in advance which clinic handles overnight emergencies and how long the drive takes.

Puppy milk replacer and a feeding syringe or bottle. For a puppy that can't nurse, or a dam that can't feed. Have it before you need it — nothing about 3 a.m. is a good time to find an open store.

Karo syrup or a similar glucose source for a weak, chilled puppy, applied to the gums. Ask your vet in advance how they want you to use it.

A carrier lined with bedding ready to go, in case dam and litter need transport.

Cash or a card set aside for an emergency cesarean. This is a supply, not a formality. C-sections routinely run well over a thousand dollars and arrive without warning. Knowing the money is there is what lets you make the call quickly instead of hesitating — and hesitation in a dystocia is what costs litters.

What Not to Do

A few things belong on the list precisely because breeders reach for them under stress:

Don't swing puppies to clear their airways. It's an old practice that risks brain injury. Use a bulb syringe or DeLee trap and vigorous towel rubbing instead.

Don't pull a stuck puppy with force. Gentle traction timed with a contraction, in the direction of the natural curve, is the most you should attempt — and if it doesn't move, that's a veterinary emergency, not a strength problem.

Don't give oxytocin on your own judgment. It's prescription medication for good reason: given at the wrong time, in the wrong dose, or with an obstruction present, it can rupture the uterus. Only under direct veterinary instruction.

Don't let her eat every placenta. One or two is normal and harmless; a full set commonly causes vomiting and diarrhea you don't need during whelping.

Track Your Count

Count placentas against puppies as you go. One placenta per puppy — a retained placenta can cause serious infection, and it's the sort of thing that's easy to lose track of at hour six. This is also why an X-ray puppy count around day 45 is so valuable: it tells you when she's actually finished.

Get the Timing Right

Everything here should be assembled and in place by day 55 at the latest. Run your breeding or ovulation date through our free dog pregnancy calculator for the exact calendar dates, and make sure you can recognize the signs of labor before the temperature drops.

For the records themselves — birth times, weights, daily gains, which puppy is which — Breeders Companion keeps them per puppy and per litter, so the numbers you write at 3 a.m. are still findable at eight weeks when a buyer asks.

This article is for general education, not veterinary advice. Establish a whelping plan with your veterinarian before your dam is due, and call them with any concern during labor.