having gone to help my sister deliver one of her rotties first litter,shed been scanned for 5,we finished off after she delivered her 14th,that was 2 weeks ago now, i still keep walking aroung saying FOURTEEN!!! out loud, its like a flock of sheep, and she'll have to let them go for a bit less as she got up and their tails had all dropped off!!!!so how many and of what breed has anyone had with huge litters and did they all come on ok,ui expected she might lose a couple but theyre little stonkers

Hi Dizzy

Wow what a litter.

We must have been whelping pups at the same time I had a litter of Border Terrier 2 weeks ago today and that for a BT was a big litter she had 8, they are all doing well.

What a shock for you to wake up and see that their tails had all dropped off. LOL

Best Wishes

Daz

I was in attendance when the first bracchi litter was born in the UK. That was 13 puppies, but two puppies didn't make it :-( Luckily for the bitch, her kennel mate had recently had small litter of spinone so 4 pup's were reared by the spin :-) It was a July litter so had the benefit of summer days and an outside pen. I don't envy your winter litter!

Leigh

Oh no more vicitms of the 'Tail Fairies'!!!!!!! She must be devastated. Did they leave £1 per tail like the tooth fairies do?????

No I bet you'll find they took your Credit Card too! You'll be missing around £114 :D

I don't want to appear dense but do you mean that the tails literally dropped off, in the way that leaves drop off the trees in Winter???

If this is what you mean, why did that happen???

I'm very confused now.

Fiona

what breed have you, i wouldn't worry about it happening to your pups, its only common in certain breeds- im sure its never happened in your breed at all,

I don't know much about dogs in general only some specific breeds and virtually nothing about Rotties. I was really shocked when I read what you'd said - I'd NEVER heard of it happening.

Why does it happen? What is left of the tail? Is it a similar 'look' to a docked tail? Does it affect the general health of the puppy?

Sorry for all the questions but I'm really curious now :D

Fiona - waiting for a Toller puppy

I think you'll find, Fiona. that the puppies have been docked, probably banded (hopefully legally).

yes , its a VERY similar look to a docked tail, and just like a well docked tail has no ill effect at all on the dog!it cant be damaged, jammed, run over or shut in a door either

I pity any dog that has to suffer injuries by being run over, shut in doors etc smacks of poor husbandry that. Glad none of my fully tailed lot have ever had to suffer inconsiderate humans.

and so say all of us!, but having 14 to watch at once isnt going to be too easy,its not your normal sized litter, hopefully they'll get through ok,

i think we've got a touch off track, as often happens when tails are mentioned- who asmongst you have had really large litters. how did you cope ,any tips ,as its a winter litter theyre all indoors, ive suggested hiring gas masks for potential owners so they can spend longer veiwing them, any other ideas

Well i had a litter of 8 from a tiny jack russell {I mean tiny} and even with only 6 with teats they were all fine but at 6 weeks not nice climbing in the puppy pen to change paper with 8 ankle bitters!!!!!!!!!!!

well then Dizzy fourteen is a very big litter, How are they split (dogs-bitches)?.
We had a litter of fifteen Weimaraners 4 years ago, we only lost one but that was expected as he was markedly smaller than the others but try as we might we had to let him go the first night.The reason I askabout the split is so that to ensure they are all feeding ok we used to remove seven bitches to leave the seven dogs to feed and then swap them over. Next time we would reverse that and remove the seven dogs first. Sounds like hard work I know but is worth it.

A number of giant breeds regularly have in excess of twelve or thirteen and fifteens are not uncommon.and they seem to cope ok.
there is a school of thought about culling a litter to a 'NORMAL' size but what is normal and how do you decide which ones to KILL!!? I just couldn't do it.(Nature has it's own way of culling through natural wastage and who am I to second guess her?)
We did however wean them a little earlier than normal as the bitch was finding it hard to keep them topped up, so we started to wean at 2.5-3 weeks to help her a little.
Pedigree Advance Weaning Porridge was introduced and they took to it like a duck to water, it contains a pre-biotic so means the puppies don't get upset with the transfer to 'proper' food and is really easy to use. We have tried a number of products over the years and never found anything that even comes close to this.
Once they are over the weaning the real hard work started, You know the SH*T shovelling began.

until now all that theyve done about topping up is that they take a bottle in every so often and top up the not so porky ones, theyre thriving though, i agree with the pedigree puppy porridge,,ive used it a few times with excellent results, ive given a contact number out on the board before as a few where keen to give it a try and didn't know how to find it, i think i put up email addresses of pedigree chum area reps,i've got mine on order already as ive got pups due the 16th, no more then a well rounded 6 i hope,
i agree on the culling issue too, how do you know which ones you would let go, there was a couple behind in my sisters litter but you'd be hard pressed to spot them now, i think what will be will be and we can only try our best while we're responsible for the care of them

Years ago, we had a Rottie that gave birth to 12 pups but 2 didn't survive. The rest of the litter all got their fair share of milk & grew into healthy big boned adults. (I think the mother was relieved when they were weened though :))

i wonder if big litters tend to run in certain lines, what did your rotties have in their pedigree

Their Sire was Madason The Graduate & their Dam was Helreve Lady Emma. There's a few German names in the pedigree (I have a copy of the dog that we kept in front of me) but the affixes 'Blackforest' & 'Chesara' appear quite often. Have you ever heard of them 'coz they mean nothing to me, but then it was 16 years ago.

blackforrest is mary macphails affix, ahe writes the breed notes in the dog press,the chesara kennels where judy and larry elsdon, probably the most influential kennels of the day, and behind a lot of the top winners of that time,with several of there males being top stud dogs in the breed- chesara dark charles- caprido strolling player from chesara, also caprido minstrell of potterspride which was owned by vi slade ,he also was an infuential sire,
my sisters pedigree has a lot of chesara in it too so perhaps thats the connection to the big litters
out of interest who was helveres lady emmas sire and dam

forgot to mention chesara achilles, i think he was a top producer too,

Were the Chesara kennels on the A505 between Baldock and Royston in Herts?

i think they where down that way but couldnt say for sure, i think that peter radleys intasari kennel was near or at royston,
is have to find really old catalogues etc to be sure of addresses,

Helreve Lady Emma's sire was Blackforest Meister Maik CDex UDex, & her dam was Helreve Starwort.