Puppies Sleeping

Question
Hi, I have 4 new puppies, and they are all about 3 weeks old. They sleep a lot, but they also seem to twitch a lot. I normally would just think that they were dreaming, but I was holding one and letting it sleep on me, and it really started to twitch a lot. I was looking down at it, and it looked like it's eyes were open, too. I'm worried that the puppy might be seizing. I picked it up, and it seemed to snap out of it, so maybe it was just dreaming, but I just wanted someone else's opinion. The puppies sleep a lot, and all of them seem to twitch, but it worried me.

Answer
Hi Shawna,

I think the puppy was probably dreaming.

Three week old puppies pretty much sleep all the time, they're actually still developing, even though they're outside of their mother's body. At 3 weeks old, your puppies are just now starting to hear. Not hearing you come up to him before you picked him up would certainly have been a surprise to the puppy, and that could certainly startle him!

You can read about the different stages of puppy growth, behavior and development here:

http://www.dog-names.org.uk/puppy-behavior-growth-development.htm

I hope I've been a help.
Best of luck,

Patti