Making an INCREDIBLY long story super short: if a bitch from a breed and line that would normally have around ten puppies was  pregnant with just 3 pups, what could be the cause for the small number? It is NOT likely to be mating on the wrong day as in this case the dog and the bitch were left together during the entire season to mate as and when they wanted so mated many times over several days (yes I know! Not my dogs). Bitch aged 3, dog aged 4, both healthy.

I know of a bitch who when spayed was found to only have one uterine horn.

It could be that dog and bitch are genetically incompatible; perhaps they both carry a lethal recessive gene, and of course not all pups inherit two copies of it.

Interesting -both. JG, do you know of any lethal genes in dogs and in what breeds etc? I know of them in for instance hamsters (mate two together of such and such a colour and 25 % of the babies will be reabsorbed, for instance), but have never heard of any in dogs.

It's dependent on how many eggs the dam releases - maybe she has only one working ovary?

If the bitch has had previous litters or C sections scarring can prevent as many implanting, ditto a poor womb lining, hormone imbalance.  Also contact with poisons causing bitch to absorb.

She's only 3, this was her first litter. None of them survived -she went very overdue and I assume she must have had inertia but nobody recognised it and the vet did not section her until day 69 when pups were dead. They had been alive the previous day as heartbeats were seen on a scan then.

Interesting -both. JG, do you know of any lethal genes in dogs and in what breeds etc? I know of them in for instance hamsters (mate two together of such and such a colour and 25 % of the babies will be reabsorbed, for instance), but have never heard of any in dogs.

There it the tailess gene Its dominant lethal, so one copy is fine bit two copies and there ment to be reabsorbed but there have been reports of corgies born with two and being dead and deformed.
I think it's In Australian shepherd, Brittany spaniel, Jack Russell's, midi, polish lowland sheepdog, schipperke, Pembroke corgie and vallhund. It's the same gene the person used for Bob tail boxers.
So breed two Bob tails together you should get 25% smaller litter, but u could be lucky and non inherit it and get a big litter or unlucky and all inherit two and have no pups. Due to this I know in some places it's frowned upon to mate two tailless together and think it's banned in some countries.

> the vet did not section her until day 69 when pups were dead.

I dont know about the number of pups sorry, but why would the vet wait until day 69 to do a section? I thought the normal limits were 59-67 days? Or did the owner not take the bitch to the vet until then.

The owner saw the vet on a daily basis, kept going back being worried so I blame the vet here...

When will the vets start using progesterone in house test to determine if hormone levels have dropped, to say when section needed, quite easy to use for that purpose.

> The owner saw the vet on a daily basis, kept going back being worried so I blame the vet here...

??? I dont understand vets! half the time they seem to rush into various treatments, operations etc when things would be better left alone. Then when something really does need doing they take a wait and see approach  until its too late. What a shame for the owner.

I had this with one of mine and felt after the event she should have had intervention earlier. My friend also had a C section at 70 days and tbh  I could not believe they waited until then but they did deliver the one large puppy she had alive. I kept telling her the pup would not have survived.
A difficult time all round so sorry for you.

Getting back to the OP - sometimes it might be because a popular stud dog is just overused!!   However, we had a bitch who had just 2 puppies in her first litter, and only one from her second, and last.   She was one of two bitches and one male we kept back from a super litter and although her sister was the more successful in the ring, gaining her UK title (they were bred and born in Canada), I always felt the sister was the more typical brood bitch.  Not so.  The Champ. sister had 9 puppies from her only litter - 5 were lost due to a delayed C.Section on the part of the vet (long sad story - we sued successfully, for what good that did).   The one with small litters was bred to two different males, a outside stud for the 2-puppies and one of my own males for the singleton puppy.

Moon in the wrong phase?   Fact is this is part of the lottery that is breeding - the best laid plans and all that.

ps    Going by her size at around 5 weeks, with the second litter from my own stud dog, I did consider whether she reabsorbed some of them much as she had a Section for the one puppy (typical - it sat so by day 65 I said get in there) and nothing unusual was found to indicate this might have happened.

The veterinary profession in this country really needs to rethink its stance over dog breeding.

While Young vets are discouraged from reproductive medicine we will never progress in the medical advances used world wide. So many vets treat pregnant dogs like cattle, the loss of the offspring is no big deal, the loss of a litter is 'nature'.
My own vet says that colleagues see dog breeding as a very grey area, one they 'deal with' but few want to encourage or facilitate.
I really do think the UK KC ought to get up to date on AI, encouraging movement of semen internationally thus encouraging vets to see it as a positive step and see more step up and specialise in the field,..and full obs and gynae treatment.

I think it's very hard for us, the breeders, to be as assertive as we WANT to in times like this (for me certainly). I too have been plagued over the last couple of years with small litters.
You know your bitch is pregnant but the first date comes and nothing happens. What do you do? Often they are mated over several days so you think "possibly we mated the first time too early, we'll wait". A day or so passes when you have slept downstairs with her and watched her every move...still nothing... so you go to the vet. By this time in my head I'm saying "it's half way through the possible dates now, if it's one or 2 pups she may never start, it's safe enough to go for a caesar now and I will suggest it". When I get there I am always dismissed as being "neurotic" almost and given the same old story of bitches ovulating later than they are mated and how they know someone who whelped on supposedly day 72 with no problems. They always ask if the bitch is distressed at all "no" then go home and let nature take its course.
They are the experts so what can I do? Even if I insist on an x-ray and it shows 1 pup they end up persuading me all will be well....go away. "We don't want to start having elective caesareans do we?" "You would prefer your bitch to give birth naturally wouldn't you" and worse of all "if we go in now and it's too early the pups will be underdeveloped and die"...best wait.
And guess what it's now the weekend!! Just to add to my stress levels the thought of a caesar out of hours now at double cost! I continue to watch and worry and the bitch, not fazed at all just seems to grin at me. Every time she moves I think "was she scratching then" "does she look a bit wet at the back?" but no she continues to eat and act as normal as can be. (how many times have I checked my dates now in case I miscalculated?)
I go back and forth until they relent.
Twice now it's been too late and I have had dead pups.
I'm sure to the vet it's just another pup...."oh well she's got other bitches" they don't realise how much emotional stress this has caused. How very much wanted this litter was, not just for us and our breeding plans but by the people waiting for pups, especially the lady who phones hopefully every month and this time I'd told I had a bitch in whelp!
I always think "next time I'll call the shots. I pay them after all. I will insist on a caesar mid dates to hedge my bets on too late or too early" but I know I won't!
Do other people manage this better than me?

As far as my bitch with the vet who didn't do the C.Section she needed....... I'll never know WHY I just left her there except in my defence, I always respected vets - pah.   So wrong.  My regular vet at that practice was on holiday (Sods Law) and the vet on duty, who was the Senior Partner, I discovered afterwards didn't DO surgery unless he was forced to.   There was a locum there and she told us afterwards was at home and could have come out if called.   As it was my bitch apparently had one huge puppy first, and then shut down and the vet clearly just went to bed.   The locum found her early the next morning (agan why I wasn't right there I don't know - but trust and all that) like that and immediately opened her up to find 8 more puppies in there, only 4 still alive.   Plus the one who came out first that made 5 puppies of the 9 she should have had and by the time we were there, which was around 7.30 am, we found our bitch just wandering around the corridor while the staff on duty were trying to bottle her puppies.   We bought them all home but lost another one (leaving 4 of the 9) with milk coming through his nose - clearly he wasn't strong enough to be bottled, which frankly they didn't need immediately in any case.   I got them all settled into the whelping box, with mum who was out of it by then, so I was able to plug them all onto her.   When the locum who did the surgery came round that evening to see how they all were, she was amazed to see we had them with mum and all were progressing just fine.

We were encouraged to sue which we did although we settled out of Court in the end.   How do you quantify the loss of 5 of 9 puppies, from a Champion bitch by a visiting American Champion dog in any case.   I let two of the surviving puppies go to another breeder and one took a CC before going to Holland, behind my back, with her brother.  I kept the other two, a male and a female, and she took took a RCC but really didn't enjoy the ring.  He was out when the record holder in the breed was in the ring, taking CC after CC.   Mum was later spayed and her uterus was shot in any case, so she'd never have carried another litter.

That started my basic mistrust of vets, big time.  I have had two excellent vets mind you, one out in Canada and another back here, but now the other end of the country - and how I miss her!!!

Marianne, my line usually has big litters ( 8-10 being the norm)  but I used  a 13 year old stud dog for my latest litter as he had qualities I felt the breed was losing .....I only had two pups , a dog and a bitch so obviously his age affected his fertility but both are of excellent quality so I'm glad I took the gamble !

Yvonne

Thanks everyone. Lots of interesting points, guess we will never really know. I have the litter sister of the bitch in question and she is currently pregnant so it shall be very interesting to see what happens.

Just out of interest, did the owner use the canine herpes vaccine? Could CH have caused a small litter?

No and this is indeed something I have been wondering about.

One of my bitches only ever had 5 pups despite mating several times with different dogs. Several years later she was spayed and the vet said she had cystic ovaries, maybe that could be why.

Oh yes I have been in your position and probably would do the same as you are always there thinking is it me being paranoid and they ought to know best.
I mated my girl 4 weeks ago and yet to know whether she is BUT it is her first litter and this time I am saying to myself that I will be the one doing the suggesting and pushing if I hit a problem and I will not wait while they stand assured there is no problem.

Not a C section, but traumatic whelping, with 3 still born and another retained puppy born 1 1/2 days later, as the vet refused to administer Oxytocin for at least three hours after first puppy and a long delay for her (she had never gone two hours between live pups, and was not progressing with third litter, after first pup born).

My normal vet (a lone Practioner) was out on call, and I had to use his cover practice.