Is it possible for pups in a litter to have different sires? Asking out of interest rather than anything else :-)
Angela

Yes there could be as many sires as available males that could have mated the bitch. The KC now require DNA testing if this occurs

Thanks Moonmaiden, read about it somewhere and the post about different parents reminded me to ask!

This is done occasionally in Silken Windhounds as they have a relatively small gene pool it allows you to use sires from two different lines in one litter. As every silken is DNA tested anyway it's not a problem.

> Is it possible for pups in a litter to have different sires?

Yes definately is. I had a border collie way back in the 1970's and I left her with a neighbour while I went on holiday. When I got back I spotted her loose in the garden of the neighbours house tied to a flatcoat dog! I was very cross as I had particularly asked my neighbour to keep her from male dogs. I told him I was now going to have to take her for the 'morning after jab' but he said there was no point as his spaniel pointer cross had mated her two or three days earlier.

Then I noticed she was coming out of season, so on consulting the vet was told it would be safer to let her have the pups. When they were born five were big black chunky puppies who looked exactly like the flatcoat and the other three were smaller and grey coloured with flecks of colur on their legs like the springer/pointer cross. I kept one of the flatcoat collie crosses, she was more like a flatcoat than a collie in every way.

yes my neighbours ft ch lab who he mated to an equally good ft dog, has just a half lab and half labxcollie :( litter thanks to farm dog next farm up the lane!!! and i dont mean mongrels....half the litter were pure labs and half were labx collies!

Id be quite mad if that were my girl lol.

Ive seen dual sire litters, of the same breed is that allowed by our KC?

I would be getting them all dna tested and be on the war path with farmer

> be on the war path with farmer

If the bitch hadn't been unattended and not in a secure place it couldn't have happened. ;-) Neither owner is guilt-free.

yes suppose so

yes and no JG. As it happens the bitch in question wandered off and met the farm dog half way :) however we have found the same collie on our fenced in dog area when we have had bitches in season and have had to have them bitch jabbed just in case....Id like to think they were safe on my own garden behind locked gates but this collie can scale 6 feet fence! (we got our own back by asking the dog warden to collect it and he had to pay 3 nights B&B at the kennels to get it back!!! LOL)

>As it happens the bitch in question wandered off

So she was unsecured and unattended while in season ...

When my bitches are in season they're either indoors with the doors shut or outside with me in close attendance. 'Wandering off' isn't a possibility.

> and i dont mean mongrels....half the litter were pure labs and half were labx collies!

same thing happened to family of mine many years ago but with their own dog- the bitch had been to stud and they thought they caught their dog in time, half pure frenchie, half frenchie/bullmastiff cross. strangest looking dogs!