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It might be more than a few short of 101 Dalmatians but an Albury breeder has set a new world record for the breed, with 19 puppies born in one litter. But breeder Melissa O'Brien was just relieved all of them survived. "Records aside it is pretty incredible all of them are alive, we had to supplement and bottle feed a few for a while to help mum out," she said. "But they are six weeks old now and getting their own little personalities." The litter which was born on June 13 via c-section is the largest for the breed, beating a littler of 18 born in Ballarat last year. "I normally have big litters, they run in bloodlines, but this is easily the biggest," Ms O'Brien said. "They were born by C-section which I had already elected simply because of the amount of weight she had put on - she gained 15 kilograms. "Her water broke and we had to pretty much take her straight in because if we had waited a few more hours we would have had dead puppies." Despite having almost two dozen puppies to keep up with, Ms O'Brien said she can almost tell them all apart. "They are all named after Disney movies and they all have distinctive marks and colourings so we do keep track of them," she said. "Livers, or the brown coloured puppies, seem to be harder to sell because everyone sees the movie and wants a black and white one but I prefer the liver ones as I find them softer in nature. "I have had Dalmatians for about 13 years but have been breeding and showing them for just about 10 years." Ms O'Brien owns both the mum and dad of the puppies and said they have both been "incredible". "Melody is three and a half and Lukas is seven so this will be both their last litters," she said. "It is definitely the first and last for Melody, I had already decided to get her desexed before she had the puppies. "The temperaments are bomb-proof. They have to deal with my two-year-old so they are very used to small children and human interaction. "I am going to keep one boy but I haven't decided on which one yet." The puppies will go to their new homes from August 8. The Border Mail

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