My girl had her ultrasound today using mobile canine pregnancy scanner. Day 33 from one and only mating. The scan man is reputed to be proficient. Defra approved, scans sheep, cows etc. Says he is never out on number more than 1.

As soon as the probe was in place - definitely pregnant as first puppy seen. Scanner op said def 1 puppy possibly 2. I said what's that there then. He said, yes 3. Said she is having 2 or 3. I said what's that there then, just move your probe to the left. He said, yes there is another one. She is having 4. Now that's ok, I'm fine with that. Got picture showing 4 gestational sacks.

My concern is as she is only 33 days (scan showed 31 which would be correct from mating to fertilisation) this last two days she has really started to show. No waist any more, very rounded tummy starting to sag, teats very swollen. She is small/toy breed first litter, and considering that until 5 days ago she had virtually not eaten for 2 weeks because of morning sickness and had lost weight. She has now put that weight back on and gained 300 grms despite only eating her usual amount.

What is the possibility that she may be having considerably more that the 4 seen? I wouldn't have expected her to show so early. I swear that one of the sacks that looked much larger that the others was superimposed and there was one behind. I know that numbers are only a gestimate but in a breed that average is 4 -6 puppies, she came from a litter of 9.

I wouldn't take the scan as gospel.  They are great for confirming pregnancy, and seeng if there's a few, but take the number as a rough guide.

Thanks Wendy for your reply. I wouldn't worry so much if she wasn't showing so early. She is only 5 weeks plus 2 and she is quite big and 'waddling' along. My concern is that the scanner wasn't at all confident, and if he is only confident on 2 puppies, then she may have puppies too big to pass. His best guess is 2 - 5.

I called Keith O'shea to see if he would re-scan her - which he happily would, but said at this stage, even he couldn't give numbers and suggested an x ray if I was concerned.

I too have small dogs and really don't find a huge correlation between the bitches size and their puppy number.
I've has some so HUGE at six week I was worried yet went onto have my average litter number 4 ... And other who've had nine but look no bigger.

Their fluids can often take up much of the space and each bitch is different.

Agree I have had a bitch larger with a litter of 4 than another with a litter of 9.

Other end of the scale - I've recently had a negative scan, negative palpation, no weight gain or udder, and a 'surprise' litter of three lovely puppies born on my bed!!!

They do hide away somewhere......

Jo

Once again, much as it seems to be best practice these days (forgive me, I've been round the block a few times!) scanning isn't accurate and for sure, only means there's a pregnancy at the time of the scan.  Not that the bitch will carry to term.   Rather than put her through all this, unless there's a need (unplanned pregnancy), why not assume she's pregnant and wait.   By 7 weeks, increased girth aside, you'll see puppies moving around.  Further re need to know how many (and again scans are not accurate), provided you are either experienced enough to know, or if not, you take her to your vet after you think she's finished whelping to be checked and given a shot to clear out any retained birthing material (and if necessary to be x-rayed) again I don't believe a scan is necessary.   The puppies should be examined by your vet for abnormalities you may have missed, at the same time.

Thank you MamaBas. The pregnancy was planned, and although (from your previous posts) I understand that you don't approve of scans, I agreed to the scan as part of the stud dog terms/contract - handling fee 1/5th and the remainder 4/5ths after scan between 33/35 days should the bitch be in whelp. Bitch not in whelp, no further fee payable.

Had I not had the scan I would assume that she is carrying a normal litter 4 -6 puppies from her size alone. She has grown considerably since the scan on Monday. I walked her early morning on Monday runninging into a fellow dog walker. When I met same dog walker yesterday, she said, wow, your girl has grown since I last saw her. This lady is not aware of my girls pregnancy so it is quite noticable even through her long coat.

As I have stated previously, my main concern is having a couple of pups too large to pass normally and also, overfeeding her at this time as she is now demanding food several times a day although she is eating very little more that her normal amount (30 grms more per day - raw) she can only manage a small amount at each meal. Last week she still weighed her pre breeding weight 6.8 kg and this  week (today) she weighs 7.8 kg. She has gained a kilo in one week. She is obviously utilising the whole of the food as she is only passing one small poo per day where normally she would go twice, both times larger poo's (sorry if being a bit graphic). With almost 4 weeks to go, she is going to be like the size of a house if this trend continues.

I will see next week what the vets opinion is as unfortunately two of her nipples are inverted. Fourth ones up on both sides. She had bitten one and caused it to be infected and although it looks clean, it is still swollen. Vet wouldn't give antibiotics in case she was pregnant. Don't want to add mastitis to the mix!

> and a 'surprise' litter of three lovely puppies born on my bed!!!

:-)  :-)   I love it!  What a super surprise.  I'd have been grinning from ear to ear.

The pregnancy was planned, and although (from your previous posts) I understand that you don't approve of scans, I agreed to the scan as part of the stud dog terms/contract - handling fee 1/5th and the remainder 4/5ths after scan between 33/35 days should the bitch be in whelp. Bitch not in whelp, no further fee payable.

Lol.   You are not wrong - it's not so much that I don't approve of scanning (each to their own) however, but more that I don't do 'lining the pockets of vets' perhaps unnecessarily.

If that's a condition of the stud agreement (not one I've heard of, but then I take a stud fee up front, at the point of service with a 'repeat if no, or just 2 resulting puppies' or if an unproven male, no fee until puppies were on the ground) then you don't have much choice!!    Everybody seems to have an individual view of all this.

If you are worried re overly large puppies, x-ray close to her due date might be worth considering, and far more accurate?

ps   It's up to you but do be careful about weight gain.   The puppies will take what they need regardless.  She may look like two planks stuck together on whelping but again I tend to prefer to up the feed once I know how many puppies are being catered for!  What she needs is good quality food through the pregnancy, not necessarily more food.  My opinion.

MammaBas, she is on good quality food - always has been, and as previously stated, is being given very little more. Ration has increased from 220 to 250, so unless I cut her food right back, she is utitlising her food well and not gaining weight on the small extra.

My vet didn't do the scan, but even if he did, I wouldn't consider that I would be 'lining his pockets' in my case as I use a not for profit vet. They never take a consult fee - only charge for meds etc. My last visit to sort out nipple infection cost me £2.00!!!

I will consider an xray, but again, I have heard that they are also not necessarily accurate. Don't know if it was on here that I read of the incident of a dog being xrayed prior to delivery and the vet saying that the dog was having three puppies. After the first one arrived, no further puppy so concerned owner and of course the vet, went ahead and did a C section to find NO further puppies! Vet said, sorry, it must have been bowel showing on Xray!!

Anyway, time alone will tell.

>Ration has increased from 220 to 250,

Wow interesting, your dogs eat a lot my 20kg medium breed eat between 170g - 200g, with growing youngsters rarely up to 250g.

I increase my lots food in pregnancy a little each week from 6 weeks in whelp so that by whelping they are on half as much again as for maintenance.

Once pups are born they are on 4 times normal rations or more if large litter (over 6).

Hi Barbara,

Are your dogs fed raw or kibble? Raw fed is usually 2 or 3% of body weight as a guideline. She is a highly active dog.

Small/toys need more than larger breeds. On a normal day (pre pregnancy) she is fed twice a day, but there are days when she doesn't want brekki,  so over the week she probably gets aroung 200 gm or so.

I have a male of same weight who only eats around 150 gms max. All dogs are different.

Duh!!! of course :)

I feed kibble these days.  With 6 storage and cost were the issue with raw.

When I fed raw they got about 400g to a pound

she is on good quality food - always has been,

Good. 

As for vet costs - boy where did you find that vet!!!  I want some.

X-ray would at least warn you of oversized puppies so you could decide whether a Section is needed before she got into trouble?   If I had a vet who couldn't tell the difference between a puppy and the bowel I'd be well under-impressed.   What I'd have expected in that case, is the x-ray only being needed if one puppy arrived and after a shot to get things moving again, nothing more happened.   THEN the bitch would be x-rayed to see if she was empty or not and the need for a Section, known.  But stories get twisted so perhaps this wasn't quite as it was reported.

MammaBas; www.animaltrust.org.uk/ - Not for profit vets.

Also, the beauty of this practice is that they are open 7 days a week, 8.30 till 6.15 and they run a 24 hour practice. They are always on time with appointments and the waiting room is never full of other pets.

Out of hours consult fee is £50, which I think is fair enough.

On the issue of possible xray: Is sedation of the bitch necessary? My girl is extremely co-operative in any case and happy to remain stock still in any position she is put until released, then every one gets a kiss LOL.

Shame, Bit far from Bristol ;)

Re sedation, out in Canada I was always with mine who needed to be x-rayed for something like this, wearing a lead apron so no, if this was needed they weren't knocked out.   I've not needed to have this done (for this reason) back here in the UK but for sure, they don't seem to let ANYBODY in the same room as where x-ray is done.   So I suppose sedation would be needed???

As for that practice - I'll take a look at the website, but me thinks I'd be way out of any area to access that.   Pity!!   Our local vets do have an arrangement with the PDSA but I don't qualify re Benefits!!

Edit - I'm moving up north!!!    Obviously there's no such organisation on the N.Cornwall coast - and the local vets know that = kerching!

Around £32 for a consult here. 

Luckily mine have rarely needed the vet. 

Most recent visit requiring a GA for a 14 1/2 year old to remove an abscessed tooth and a large sebaceous cyst on her back (6 inch incision), was £356.  I consider my vet fairly reasonable cost wise.

I would not have had the cyst removed (it wasn't bothering her so cosmetic really), if she had not needed to go under for the tooth.

Where I originally came from in Lincolnshire - rural vet, you were not excluded. I have remained in the room and helped vet give sedation and stayed for the whole procedure - repairing ripped foot. Vet extremely grateful for the help. His way of thinking - unlike some vets is that the pet is more relaxed with the owner there.

This is how my Canadian-vet was Boo, he actually liked having his owners there ...... I was in on a C.Section once although when she dropped very low (grey gums, the lot) I was advised to leave the room while they stabilized her.  That was scary.  She and her puppies all survived however!   After being used to that, it was another 'culture shock' when on returning to the UK, the first time mine had to be treated, it was hand them in and door shut (with me the wrong side!!).

My vet is a gem and would never shut me out of the OR. I have watched many procedures like this including spay's and C-sect's.
A vet who understands and respects you as an owner and appreciates that having the owner there can be helpful with a dog as it makes them less stressed is worth a lot.
I think it is a two sided coin and if you respect your vet and accept that they have to make a living, then you will get respect back. I often hear moans on CD about cost of treatments etc.. and my vet is no different, they are not the cheapest nor the most expensive, but they are very very understanding of my wishes and accommodate me happily. That makes the bills much easier to swallow.
I would never expect to be shut out during scans, C-sects, or anything else. X-rays are somewhat different. I have never had a bitch x-rayed while in whelp so have no idea if they would sedate, but everyone leaves the room during other x-rays if only for the few seconds it takes. However I am always there during sedation and recovery and during placement of the dog, I also get to look at the x-rays immediately with the vet while the dog wakes up .
Not all the vets in the practice are quite so happy to have me there, but they do as the newer ones joined the practise after I did (so to speak) and they accept that it is how it has always been. The 3 vets I use most are the partners and they are all great, the vet I use 99% of the time has become a friend now. !!
The practice also does all its own out of hours cover so another huge + for me.
I am more than happy to pay a little extra for the service as the benefits far outweigh the costs.
Aileen

PS I always scan my girls at 4 weeks and my vet and I have bets on numbers ;-) We both know the scans are just a conformation and not a counting exercise. When she was expecting a few years ago the standing joke was should we scan her and see how many "pups" she was carrying !!!

My dog went for her pregnancy scan yesturday, she is now 32 days into her pregnancy! The scan only showed one puppy, you can see this puppy at all angles but there are other pockets around, i am just wondering could the puppy be big and just blocking the other puppies?

You must be quite relieved  there is only one in the middle of the lockdown. although you mated her knowing there was a pandemic.

We have a male here and my girl had a silent heat, this has happened before so we didn’t know she was on heat! The pregnancy was not planned at all! I am just wondering how common it is for a singleton puppy to show up and there are more puppies since with everything going on it may be really hard to get the things needed

So you saw them tied/mating & did nothing despite this being an unplanned litter & the world in the midst of a pandemic !

In small breed single puppies are far from uncommon.

Not sure what things you may need that won't be available online.

Perhaps it would have been wiser to have had your bitch given Alizin(& in fact can still be given as you know she is within the 42 day period)

Did she have a litter on the previous silent season ? Perhaps you should have her spayef to prevent thid happening again

For jeeze' sake people, stop being so judgemental.  The world was a very different place, 32 days ago!  No one saw this coming, there was no imminent pandemic in the UK and no one could have predicted where we are at.  If you see litters being bred right now, feel free to get your judgemental guns out, but till then...

It's very possible that there are more pups but equally there could just be one.  Singletons often don't produce enough hormones to trigger labour, and the bitch is more likely to need a c-section.  Work out the due date as accurately as you can (you will have a big whelping window unless you did progesterone timing, which it sounds like you didn't) and seek help from the vet if you think things are not progressing as they should.  There will be no obvious signs of inertia, she will appear to be well - which is part of the problem.

We didn’t have a clue that they had mated since we didn’t know she was on heat, they sleep together in the kitchen cause they are bestest of friends! Her estimated due date is actually on my birthday - the 13th may. The other silent heat she did not have a litter because we caught it a the day after she started, we were very lucky!

After this litter we are getting her spayed to prevent this from happening, this is her first litter, the reason i asked was because we are very scared to lose her since her mom was lost from having a singleton puppy! We are very anxious and we are hoping there is more puppies, yes people may think that’s bad with corona virus going on but we have everything here for the birth since my moms friends dog give birth and we had everything before lockdown began since we knew it would have been hard to get everything!

We are now taking her for another scan as a precaution on wednesday and then taking her for another scan a couple of days before the birth to make sure that she can give birth and if not we are already calling up vets for maybe emergency c sections

I'm really sorry, and please don't take this as being judgmental, but if you lost her mum in the same situation, why chance allowing it to happen again?  They may be the best of friends, but why risk losing one of them just to let them be together.  The best thing to have done, and there still might be time, is to get the Alizin injection so that she doesn't have to go through whelping at all, or a possible emergency c-section, and have her spayed.  If this were my bitch it's what I would do.

So you saw them tied/mating & did nothing despite this being an unplanned litter & the world in the midst of a pandemic !

The OP said 32 days ago. I mated a bitch 28 days ago. That was exactly a week before lockdown with none of us knowing that would happen. Had my bitch been ready a week later, there would have been no mating.

Perhaps it would have been wiser to have had your bitch given Alizin(& in fact can still be given as you know she is within the 42 day period)

Vets will not be giving Alizin now as it's not an emergency treatment.

I'm afraid I'd argue that one with my vets.  To me. avoiding an unplanned litter is an emergency.

The BVA has clarified that emergency = immediate threat to life. The type of problem you would normally see an out of hours vet for if it happened when your normal vet was closed.

Having had a bitch struggle with a litter that was planned, with an unplanned possible singleton litter from a breed that isn't well known for self whelping, I would argue this needs different treatment than 'normal'.

Hi my bitch got scanned few weeks ago he couldn’t see nothing said come back in two weeks so we did he said he could see very small sacs and confined pregnancy said he would rescan her in couple days so he come back re scanned couldn’t find nothing at all and apologised just very stuck in what to believe and just confused how he would of seen something then got it wrong any advice would be Brillant thank you

Actually most vets would consider preventing an unplanned litter from a breed known for whelping difficulties(eg C sections needed)an emergency, especially if the bitch's mother had problemd & sadly died.

My dog went for her pregnancy scan yesturday, she is a ........and is now 32 days into her pregnancy

Indicates that day of the mating was known & Alizin could have been used 20 days sgo.

We don’t own the mother, my mothers friends cousin owns her and she was the last one left and no one was wanting her so we had her.

She’s got a condition where her heats show up at random times and they are not regular so even though we keep a calendar and dates we never know when she is coming into season so it’s really like a guessing game between us!

Our vet is not doing Alizin with everything that is going on right now, so that’s out of the picture. We have rung other vets, the furthest one away is 3 and a half hours and we are in lockdown so there’s no way we could get there

The reason i came here in the first place was to ask how common is it for a vet to only see one singleton puppy and there to be more?

Surprised your vet is doing ultrasounds for pregnancy as it's not an emergency under the RCVS advice.

Surprised that your vet doesn't treat "misalignment" treatment as an emergency, but treats an ultrasound for pregnancy as emergency treatment. An ultrasound isn't a treatment in real terms of course.

Few vets/vet nurses are ultrasound"experts". Sheep scanners probably do more scans in one working week than most vets/vet nurses do in a year & many of the "lay scanners" scan other animals.

Many veterinary practices will only give a pregnant or not pregnant result & not go into numbers. The ultrasound is really a guide to pregnancy at the time it is done & bitches can reabsorb puppies until quite late into pregancy.

Depending on the expertise of the scanner, litters are often scanned larger than than are eventually born & vica versa.

Hi. My girl had an ultrasound and said there were 7. The week she was due had a few problems took her for another said could see 4. 2 days later she self whelped 11 so they do get it very wrong. Good luck

> The reason i came here in the first place was to ask how common is it for a vet to only see one singleton puppy and there to be more?

Regardless of who does the scan, it's not reliable and would only confirm or not, a pregnancy and only at the time of the scan.   So unless you have a need to know whether your bitch is pregnant and appreciate she may not carry to term, I'd save your money and avoid unduly stressing mum at a time when she should be living a quiet life!

If you co-own her, then you do own her - shared!

It depends on the skill of the person doing the ultrasound. Vets & vets nurses don't do nearly as many as sheep scanners, in fact a sheep scanner can do more scans in one day than a vet/nurse do in a year.

However no ultrasound can be 100% accurate especially if the bitch is has a long ribcage & is carrying a large number of puppies. Ultrasound in animals that have multiple offspring should be used as a pregnancy diagnostic rather than a number counting tool. Can be useful if only a single pup is a possibility, especially breeds kniwn to have whelping issues.

If the iltrasound shows puppies & your bitch has puppies, then the ultrasound isn't wrong

just letting people know the puppy didn’t survive. She did indeed have one puppy, a little girl!