Hi all - this really is a 'What if' question as my bitch is only on day 2 pf her season,but I am still compiling my information folder just incase!
During the first few weeks of pregnancy (i.e before it has been confirmed) should i stop my bitch from climbing the stairs ? she sleeps in our room ATM,but am wondering if i should start knocking this on the head now just incase ? what other types of small changes should be made ? any advice would be great x

I've always treated my bitches as normal up until the last two or three weeks of pregnancy, and it's never caused any problems.

Me too, though in this weather I wouldn't let her go swimming ;-)

Another as normal here I find my girls slow down themselves when they are ready to.

Ditto the others.  Last few weeks I might avoid dog walking where they might meet over boisterous or aggresive dogs.

im the same but i walk her from day of mateing where its quieter i dont want any dog fightening her or stressing her just incase it courses her to reaborb xx

Pretty much the same, perhaps nothing extra strenuous like working trials if you had a breed that did that! And just try to make sure other dogs etc don't get too boisterous and bounce on her, particularly around 3 weeks when the foetuses are starting to attach instead of floating free.

I'm slightly different to the others (that's quite normal though!!) whilst normal household routine continued, stairclimbing, etc, she lives in the upper deck of crates (in house and van) so I'd already moved her into a 'downstairs' crate but that was more in readiness for later on in her pregnancy when I really didn't want her jumping.

I didn't go to any competitions with her (or any of the other dogs) from time of coming into season until pups left. That meant no competitions for 5+ months as I did not want to take her anywhere where she might pick infection of any sort or myself & the rest of the gang bring infection back home. I'm probably slightly more wary of this than others as I've had fairly disasterous consequences to 'minor infection' - I wasn't prepared to take any chances, at all. I also stopped walking her on my usual route where we met a lot of other dogs - for similar reasons. But I do have other, safe places to go, it just meant a trip in the vehicle instead of a walk straight out the house.

Have you got Book of the Bitch? There's a very good section in there telling you when the critical time during the pregnancy is in terms of when most suseptible to infection and also when foetus is attaching.

Thanks all.
My breed dont usually climb stairs and my boys never have,but both our bitches sleep in our room and have very strong legs etc so they sleep with us! :-) I was worried about her losing her balance on the stairs and falling or something ... ever the worry wart.
Have any of you give Canine Herpes Vacc ? ever heard of any side effects ?

My breed dont usually climb stairs

Wow, I know I can ask what breed but you're not allowed to tell me ... am very curious what breed don't climb stairs though!! Do they have exceptionally little legs? :-)

Have any of you give Canine Herpes Vacc ? ever heard of any side effects ?

My bitch had the CHV vaccination in the summer and the bitch I plan to mate next year will also have it. I have not heard of any side effects, and I've researched a lot and not come across any. Why did I have it? I have absolutely no idea whether my bitch has got CHV or has been exposed to it. The chances are that she has been exposed to it at some time, as will be the same for the vast majority of the dog population. However, something fairly catastrophic completely knocked my  breeding programme for six the previous year, the upshot was I wasn't going to take any chances on anything going wrong this time around. You can test for CHV, however it's one of those things that only shows itself under stress and is renowned for producing negative results, until the bitch is under stress, as she is during labour. The vast amount of money the previous year had cost, together with the heartache, worry & disappointment (me and prospective puppy owners) I figured £79 for the 2 vaccinations to be on the safe side was worth it.

We had a very healthy litter of 6 fabulous pups which is average for my breed.

If you put in CHV in the search part (put it into the Google one as that's not time restrictive) you'll find lots of postings.  Hope this helps.

I wasnt aware that I cant mention the breed ? lets just say they are a Giant breed and do water rescue work/trials.
We figured the same thing with the CHV - Having a hard time getting it,having to play a few vets off against each other - the vet that has said they will get it will only order it if I book the appointment - so it has been booked for Wednesday - but the vets that are doing her Progesterone testing were not able to get it.She had her levels re done toady and she is a 2.5 so we are re testing Tuesday - booked in for vaccine Wednesday (which COULD be the day of mating ... but might not be) so its a bit of a pickle!

Oh, so they don't have exceptionally little legs then!!

I can't fathom this mentioning breed business out ... from what I've worked out it's ok on other parts of the forum but not on the breeder forum - something to do with potential advertising of pups, I think :-O

With my vet I said I wanted it, they didn't disagree & were happy there were no side effects, they needed 24 hours to get it in, so when the first mating took place I rang them, they ordered it and she was vaccinated the following day. The last one 10 days before the due whelp date. My vets had to order direct from manufacturer, they were also quite willing to order in just one dose at a time.

>I can't fathom this mentioning breed business out ... from what I've worked out it's ok on other parts of the forum but not on the breeder forum - something to do with potential advertising of pups, I think

This was discussed not long ago: http://www.champdogsforum.co.uk/cgi-bin/board/topic_show.pl?pid=1198205

Oh ok, thank you ... I think! (scratch head)