Eight pups arrived by Caesarian Section at 1.30pm today, 3 1/2 hours after the first sign that the bitch was about to whelp. Seven of the pups are good sized and healthy, the eighth is small but lively. Since she recovered from the anaesthetic and went home the bitch has been acting in an apprehensive and unmaternal way. At times she wants right away from the litter, but more often she is lifting and carrying them clumsily around the whelping box. She also licks the pups excessively. She showed the similar behavior with her previous litter, where she unfortunately killed 2 pups and injured the back of another so that he had to be PTS. Does anyone advice, thoughts or suggestions re: cause / suggestions re: management before history repeats itself?

Thanks

you could keep the pups in a cage alongside her then supervise the feeding time if you feel theyre at risk--what breed are they ???

Hi Dizzy, thanks for the reply. They are IWs but the bitch isn't mine. I'm whelping her because of sad unpredicatble circumstaces though she is owned by, and will go home to her previous owner's family. The size of bitch + the size of our cage + me = doesn't fit the whelping room. :( The pups in the whelping box, her on my lilo and me in a tiny corner suits her fine, but it's cramped for me (this is a 24 hour supervision job) and she is just as probelematic with the pups when she is given them to feed & clean.

After semi wrestling with her since this afternoon, I've settled for putting her in a nearby room on her own and me and the pups in the whelping room for overnight. I'm going to hand fed 2 hourly. (The tiny pup needs hand feeding anyway because strong though she is, she can't get hold of a 'second litter' sized maternal teat.) I know mixing natural/bitch formula isn't ideal, but the room is at ~90 degrees and all the pups (including the tiny) have had a couple of good feeds of colostrum. Once the bitch was settled in a room on her own with a nice old sofa, she happily went to sleep.

I'm hoping that someone can think of a way to help the bitch to settle with the pups. Failing that, is letting the pups take the risk 24 hours a day (and it is a risk even with constant supervision), partial hand/part natural rearing, or hand rearing completely the least bad option?.

id keep putting the pups on the bitch when your able to-----but i think your right in keeping them seperate when they cant be watched-it might just be the shock of finding them there after a ceasar, she might come around. if not id mark them so you know who's who and make sure they all get a turn with the dam, ---good luck,

Hi Dizzy, they are all tagged and being weighed x2 day. I'd assume the caesar too if she hadn't been the same with the last lot and the only intervention then was one shot of oxytocin.

Thanks for the good luck :0

Firstly, it surprises me these people would take a 2nd litter from this bitch anyway given her behaviour with the first litter, but secondly, I have a litter of 11 day old pups at the moment that I am "part" rearing. The bitch had 7 pups but just hasn't got the milk supply to satisfy 7 puppies, they began crying and would feed constantly with no set patern. I started bottle feeding the 3 that failed to gain weight from around 3 days of age and this did the trick. They go back with their mum and I feed them by the whelping box and mum cleans them after :-) I have done this before with a litter of 10 and it does work, as long as you are using a good quality substitute feed (I use Lactol) and keep an eye on the pups they are usually fine. Substitute feed is much better quality these days and much closer to the bitches milk nutritionally than it used to be. I am lucky that my bitch actually wants her puppies, but removing the bitch from the litter isn't going to encourage her to "want" them...

Good luck, let us know how things go.

"These people", one of whom had 35 years experience felt that they had indentified acause for the first disturbance. They had also expected to be there to deal with things themselves if things did go amiss again. Unfortunately they were wrong on both counts.

Thank you for the good wishes. Best of luck with your own pups.

Hi Jas

Carrying puppies around is not that unusual a behaviour and you will have to continually watch her and sooth her, removing the pup from her mouth as gently as possibly and encouraging her to lie down.  You will probably find that she picks on one or two pups and HAS to have them between her front legs to constantly clean them rather than letting them feed and sleep.  Work out which her "favourites" are and try to alternate them close to her head.  This is where the owner needs to watch constantly, gets very tired and by the second or third day of 24 hour care is ready to snap the head off anyone who talks to them :)

I have found that bitches who are like this for the first few days make wonderful mothers once they settle down

I wonder if she's got low blood sugar?   You might try giving her some sweet digestive biscuits and sweetened dilute condensed milk, and see if it helps?
This unsettled behaviour can be the result of the blood sugar levels falling with all the stress of whelping/caesarian.
Also - I imagine you have ruled out eclampsia, which can have a similar effect - you will need calcium in some form.

Jo and the Casblaidd Flatcoats

Hi Jo, thanks for those suggestions which were made (in the middle of the night :) ) by a couple of other people as far afield as Canada & the US. It's wonderful how people rally round when things really go sorely wrong. She had a calcium injection post-op because of her previous behaviour, and the vet has just been out to give her another one. She's also to go on calcium gluconate as soon as the local vet chemist getis it in without Vit D (should be this pm). The vet also gave her IV dextrose and she is munching her way through a box of markies as I type.

Despite this she is even worse with the pups today, and was holding one and shaking it like a toy this morning, so she is away from them again. I'll give her a mild dose of ACP and try her back when a friend gets here later, but I can't handle her and take away a pup that she's happily shaking safely on my own. I know it's a Catch 22 - the longer away from the pups she is, the less she is going to bond, but this behaviour is way beyond anything normal. :(

The good news is that the tiny (only 8.5 oz BW) pup is still going strong, and has gained almost 2 ounces.

Thanks again,

I would not be using ACP on her Better rsecue remedy or other natural relaxant.

Have you tried getting her to relax before she goes to the puppies by something like T Touch Massage It will make her body release natural endorphins & if you continue whist she is with the puppies it could help

Thanks Moon, but afraid I'm not a fan of alternative treatments. I did however ring a friend who is a medical doctor, dog breeder & an ECCH accredited homeopathy in desperation. Her suggestion is sepia & chamomile?

Has she had ACP before? I ask because it has been implicated many times as a trigger for epilepsy.

Hi JG, yes she had it a few times in the past to allow treatment of an injury. It wasn't helping, just making her clumsy as well as difficilt so we're not using it now.

Thanks for the reply Christine. I was trying to do what you suggest yesterday, but as you'll see from the reply to JoFC, she is beyond the bounds of anything normal today. One person (another kind American with a big phone bill today) suggested trying have a maternal bitch in the whelping box to clean and cuddle while mum - physically separated if necessary gets the pups singly or in pairs to feed. The US lady said her bitch had behaved very similarly, but after a few days of this settled to be an excellent mum. I will probably try it later today (thank Heaven for a whelping box with high sides and a 'ramp' that closes) because of the Catch 22, but I'm worried that the presence of the maternal bitch might make things even worse.

Only on hour 37 without sleep, but beginning to snap already :)

Thanks again,

it might be an idea to see if anyone has a bitch that will take the pups for you, ---it doesnt seem like the dam will miss them too much,-and your going to be exhausted soon,

Zzzzzzzzzzz :D

We finally had a 'phone conference - my vets, the owners and me - and mum is going home tomorrow. I agree with you - I think she's torn between dislike/fear of tiny pups and her maternal instincts and so will be much happier right away from the litter.

The pups will stay and be hand reared here if necessary, but all possible feelers are out for fosters. Even if we don't get a suitable foster / foster(s) I think things will be easier with mum away. I've finally got all the amnion washed off the pups so they smell like puppies, not something in a clinical waste bucket, and when hubbie took mum for a short walk this evening, I took one of my own bitches in. She would have been keen to stay, lick and cuddle so I think I may have a top & tailer and puppy teacher right here. 

BTW, assuming that I do have to hand rear, do you or anyone else know anything about Esbilac? An American contact who has reared two litters successfully says she fed the first 6 hourly and the second 8 hourly with it right from Day 1. I know it's very expensive but that's a lot of extra zzzzzz's :)

How are the pups doing now?