Just ranting really as my neighbour has informed me today that her bitch had pups last night. The conversation went something like this !

She knocked this morning and asked if i had any spare newspapers as her bitch had given birth to 5 pups in the middle of the night, she went on to explain how she had been so lucky as her girl had done it all herself and they woke to find the litter this morning. They knew she was pregnant but didn't know when she was due, she was mated to the family shih-tzu, she is a yorkie. She has had no vet care, no worming, whelped all by herself, they didn't even have a whelping box or pen for her. She has had no health tests etc etc.

It makes me so angry!! Tonight i am packing my bags and loading up the car as i am taking my bitch to be mated tomorrow morning,it is a 9 hr round trip, will cost a fortune in petrol,i will pay a stud fee, have spent thousands on health tests for my lot.Spent well over a year checking compatible pedigrees etc etc. She will have the best of everything, will  whelp with me by her side, in a warm, cosy whelping box and her babies will be reared with the upmost care and tons of love.

I am not well off, i am a single parent on a limited income, but would not even consider breeding my bitch without knowing i had prepared for every eventuallity.

So far today, i have given my neighbour vet bed, newspapers, my book of the bitch,tons of advice and i have cried tears for the poor bitch when i saw them going shopping and leaving her and her pups home alone. Rant over, like i said sometimes i just want to scream................................................

Today after only 6 short months of life an older friend of my OH lost his little JR pup, the Vets couldn't do anything or really tell him what the problem was..

when he first had her she was terribly ill, couldn't be vaccinated for more than a month.

She had been back and forth to the PDSA, people have thought he was starving her.  We were asked for advice, I took round goats milk puppy milk to give as a boost, advised something better than the Bakers puppy she was on.  Little thing was lovely, but weighed just 4kg and was skin ans bone though had a shiny coat, was fed 3 times a day with a bowl of dry food always down to, so there was food if she would eat it.

Sometimes she would sometimes not.

She would go from being bouncy to very lethargic etc, no-one could put their finger on anything specific.

We made sure she was wormed etc.

Turns out she was the result of a friend of a friends bitch being mated by her own father on her first season ands the bitch pups had been the runt of the two, but she was cheap"

Not really lots of vet trips etc, and heartache.

Yes I often just want to scream.

That poor girl.

Some people just ...well, can't write what I really think of them. :-( 

What an awful story - but probaly happens more often that we'd like to think about.  RIP little lady.

The symptoms the pup was showing is like my Mum's dachsie who had a Liver Shunt, she would have days when she would lethargic but we put it down to her over doing it the day before, then the occasional vomiting went to her being sick with every meal on Xmas Day, she was operated on 7th Jan and recovered very well, she was 8month old when she had her surgery and will be 9yrs old in May.

I hate to hear that a bitch has been left to whelp alone,no prep before and left to get on with it afterwards,  others do things properly and have problems, it doesn't seem fair.

I had a similar experience with my friend's bitch. They had mated their Lab male to next door's Lab bitch, kept a bitch puppy (to keep with her entire father... doh!). He mated with her on her first season, they thankfully had the injection to stop any pregnancy, but rather than then castrate the father, they then allowed him to mate her on her next season (still under a year old), and the first they knew of her pregnancy was when she started producing puppies. The OH was at the pub, poor bitch had to whelp in her dirty plastic bed lined with a blanket. She had 5 puppies so they went to bed, only to find she'd had a further 2 plus a stillborn by the next morning!

Like you say, I too cried tears for those poor little souls. I gave them BOTB plus another good book on raising puppies. I gave them blankets, vetbed, newspaper, and offered any help they needed. My friend's OH was bragging how much he was going to sell the puppies for, and how he had "beaten" me to it... we were expecting a litter a few weeks after.

They were having an extension built at the time, so the puppies were left in a crate all day whilst the owners went to work full time. I guess the builders must have let them out/fed etc, but when I visited at around 6 weeks, pups were all crammed in a crate, faeces everywhere - absolutley disgusting! When they let them out, they would have to put the bitch in, so she wouldn't get jumped all over.

Thankfully, the bitch was a star, although in the end after all the pups had been virtually given away (he tried to "sell" them but no takers), a friend of a friend offered to give her a home, she had after all, been given no training, was never taken out for a walk, and was just a pain! I've heard she went to a lovely home, lives with another dog, and has the life of riley, I'm so very relieved as she really deserved better!

I did distance myself from them for a couple of years after this (my very good friend of 24 years - I was really upset and disappointed in them) but I do visit now, and always make a fuss of their male (now castrated) who lives a solitary life, rarely gets taken for a walk, such a lovely boy - such a waste!

So I agree with the OP - I do wonder sometimes why people bother having dogs at all??

It's just as well I can't find the words for what I want to say or it would probably get me banned! :-(

What morons.
I know of a family who took in a Rottie that of course mated their Rottie (very dubious temperament) 10 pups later....no preparation, nothing. Woman turns off heating that night  & 2 pups die. The family were helped no end and all pups were sold (health tests what are they?). They had to be told when to worm, wean, what to feed, how ignorant can people be? On her next season she gets pregnant again, the poor bitch had been taken to the beach when she starts pushing. Again a big litter. Where these poor pups ended up I don't know, I think I can make a good guess.

my rottie is lying snoring at my feet as i am writing this, he is now 4 and half, and how i got him, a man knew a friend across the road from me and he took this tiny little puppy to my friends and said do you want this my friend said NO, but i know someone that will , she knocked on my door and said i know it has been nearly a year since your old  boy passed away he was a rottie as well, and this one is desperate for a new home the guy was standing beside him and said my year old male mated with my 13 year old bitch and she produced this thing, i was going to drown him i took this little mite and handed him to my husband who was standing at the door saying no you are not, he got hold of this little scrap and i then started to give this guy a huge lecture on what i would do to him if i ever found out that this happened again, when i went back into the house the pup must of been about 4 weeks old. we said that we would get him up to scratch and then find a home for him, he has turned into the most loving dog i have, is like a horse ,has manners to die for and i love him so much, he may of had a bad start in life but after 4 and half years i would not be without him he means everything and more to me.

It really brings a lump to my throat when I think of this; when I think of my bitch when she was in the throes of labour, her eyes wide, I knelt beside her and held her close as the pain took her, she leaned into me and I just knew she needed me as much as I needed to comfort her. To think that poor bitch didn't have the comfort of her loved ones beside her makes me so upset.

Unfortunately it's people like certain journalists who claim that mix breeds are healthier than pedigrees that induce such uneducated, thoughtless breedings. Like you, Lucy, I researched pedigrees for over a year before hand, I traveled an 8 hour round trip, and health tested my bitch (as I made sure the stud was, and the pups also were). I worked hard, probably the hardest I have worked for a long time, to make sure we were prepared in every way we could be. It makes me sick that anyone could give their best friend and loyal companion anything less.

Really hope those puppies are well and the bitch is well too. My OH's dog at home in Aus is a mix, JRT/Shiz Tsu or similar, and he has horrible skin issues and is in general a very nervous dog, of other dogs and people.

>It makes me sick that anyone could give their best friend and loyal companion anything less.

I totally agree.  My girls lean in to me too, when they are in labour.  I am proud that they trust me so much, and want me there. 

it's such an honour that they want and need me... my girls give birth in my bedroom and always wake me when they start contractions.  One helped her daughter to give birth, cleaned her and the babies, ate the afterbirths, seemed to tell her what to do, so very special :-) I couldn't bear to think they went through these things for me and I wasn't there for them or I didn't make sure the babies had the best chances in life.