drying up milk - Page 2

You are heading for a nice case of mastitis in your bitch.  At 5 weeks, pups still nurse, but they do so once or twice a day, and they do it FAST.  Of course your bitch isn't still laying in the box with her litter, but if you let mother nature take it's course, she'll go in with the pups, they'll drain her and keep her from getting huge, draining, painful, life-threatening abcesses.  The pups have been started on solid food, so they nurse less and less.  It's a gradual process, far less painful to the bitch.  Mastitis, and mammary engorgement is a very painful condition.  It borders on abuse, frankly.

The bitches body produces the most milk at the 4th week post-whelping, then production begins to GRADUALLY taper off.  Breeders need to leave mothering to the MOTHER, and quit mucking about in the mother/pup relationship.

The bitch will nurse until it becomes too painful, puppy teeth.
Even then she will nurse when she must.   I never interfer until I see mom snapping at the pups and then I separate them only during the day to give her some peace.  After a while the pups don't even try for fear of being bitten. Plus they must be properly started on food.
The milk will be absorbed back into the mothers body naturally.  Never had Mastitis here, trust nature a bit more and try to let things alone.
Leave mothering to the mother and try not to interfer.