When do puppies open their eyes?

Newborn and young puppies require special love and attention from their owners.

Apart from the mother caring for its little ones, owners should understand the art of pet nursing and breeding in the best way possible.

When little pups are born, they tend to be too small and delicate. As weeks go by, they start to open their eyes, with little body movements.

Once the puppy begins to grow and move from infancy to energetic young pups, the eyes tend to grow fully.

However, for owners who have a small pup at home, it is necessary to know the signs of puppyhood in detail.

Therefore, let’s dig into some facts as to when do puppies open their eyes and how to further take care of these little animals. 

The development of eyesight in little puppies:

When the puppies are born, their eyes are all closed. Their body color is generally pink, and it slowly transforms into the color of the breed.

As the pups complete on the week, the eyes remain closed. It is only in the second week that the eyes start to open slowly.

The average time required for a healthy small pup to open its eyes and catch hold of the light of the day is around 14 days.

However, owners should know that the pups won’t be able to see clearly, at first. A total blurred vision is normal for almost two to three weeks. 

With the assistance of the mother dog, the little pups get enough nourishment in the form of the mother’s breast milk.

This helps the pups to develop their eyesight further. By the time the fifth week arrives, the little puppies will start to open their eyes, much broader and will witness a clearer vision.

The eye color for most dogs, tend to be a little greyish and bluish. However, the vision may not be strong now, and a little hazy appearance is totally fine. 

The development of the eyes continues, up to the age of two months. If the mother dog is not present, owners have to take the responsibility of feeding milk to the pups.

This will give proper nutrition to the pups, hence allowing the eyesight to develop further. 

The full development of puppy eyesight:

As the eyesight continues to develop for the past two months, it is in week eight that puppies reach their full vision, thereby removing all blurred and faded appearances.

The puppies tend to realize their mom and start to cuddle. Once the eyes open, other body structures start to develop too.

With the eyes, the ears wide open, and dogs can completely hear in week eight. 

For puppies, which are born with deformed body structures or are slightly abnormal, the development of vision might slightly vary.

Immature little pups take a little longer time to open their eyes. Usually, healthy pups take eight weeks, while other pups with some immature signs can take up to three months.

However, there is nothing to worry about the vision, until and unless there are some noticeable eye problems. 

Eyesight helps the puppies socialize more:

As soon as the puppies open their eyes, they start to explore the world around them like mature dogs.

All newborn pups start to accept the changes and try to comprehend and imitate the actions of their mom.

Once their eyesight develops fully, the process of socialization begins. The physical maturity of the pups begins as soon as they can see things around.

Therefore, it is necessary to notice the time frame and other signs of the pups, when they start to open their eyes. 

Why are dogs born with their eyes closed?

Little puppies tend to have their eyes closed during birth. Unlike human babies, puppies cannot rule the world right after birth.

Little puppies are deformed and need some time to adjust to the world around them.

During birth, the nervous systems of these puppies develop fully, but the optical nerves stay in a developing stage.

It is only after birth that the optical nerves start to mature, which leads to the puppies opening their eyes over a slow time frame. 

Puppies are delicate to open their eyes when they are born. When the optical nerves have fully finished its development, the puppies come out of their comfort zone to address the environment around.

Humans, however, should not make the mistake of opening their eyes forcefully, which can result in damaging the optical nerve fibers.

In other words, the eyes stay shut as long as the nerves are in an emerging stage.

Depending on the puppy eye, pups have sensitive eyes, and the whole structure also takes time to develop. Therefore, a time frame of two months is normal for the eyes to grow. 

Some precaution for little pups:

Newborn puppies, whose eyes are going through the stage of development, need to have proper external care.

Owners should understand that dust can be pretty damaging to the eyes of puppies and can further prohibit the development of the optical nerves.

As a result, the puppy can turn out to be blind, even if it was born healthy. Nothing can be more disheartening for the mother dog to find out that one of her puppies is blind.

Opening the eyes, when they are not fully developed, can also lead to an infection in the eyes of the pups.

This can truly be painful and curb down the development process. This also prevents the optical nerves from maturing further. 

In the next case, proper nutrition is also necessary to help the eyes develop smoothly.

Healthy puppies, who can feed on their mother’s breast milk, tend to have healthy eyes as well.

Even if the mom isn’t present, proper nutritious semi-solid food needs to be given to the pups for their eyes to grow naturally.

The eyes remain closed after birth so that it can further mature safely.