My litter of 3 pups are now 3 weeks and two days old.My girl is an experienced mum and I have bred several litters previously.One of this litter is up and about yet the other two are crawling and dragging their back legs behind them. I am concerned they may have 'swimming puppy' syndrome.I have tried to encourage them to stand and walk,using a firm surface and taking them on to the carpet but they just stay where they are put.I have looked at their legs and they appear to be the correct conformation but bend backwards 'frog like' when they drag them. I am praying that they will become stronger and correct themselves over the next couple of weeks and I am obviously monitoring this regularly.My normal vet has taken a 'sabbatical' and gone to Australia for 6 months and I honestly don't rate his very young locum so don't feel that she will be experienced enough to make a judgement at this stage.I am worried that they may be permanently deformed but don't want to jump the gun and do anything serious at this stage.Does anyone have experience or ideas of this 'abnormality' as I don't want to let them suffer or conversely give up on them if they have a good chance of righting themselves.This is having an impact on their weaning as they are not able to stand up and feed themselves and despite great efforts they simply want to suckle from their mum.Any advice would be greatly appreciated as the consequences of this is potentially heartbreaking. Thank you in advance.

Do they have any sensation in their back legs? That's the first thing you need to find out. I still think a trip to the vets could help. It may be an infection which will only get worse in time if not treated.
Becky

There is quite a lot on previous threads if you do a search on swimmers :)

Daisy

Only just read this thread as I have been without my internet for 10 days. I had a swimmer in a litter last year. I put him in a largish cardboard box with eggbox foam on the floor. He is now a happy normal young dog with no lasting ill effects.

It does not sound like these pups are swimmers, since you say they are crawling and dragging their hind legs...... swimmers usually cannot stand on their front legs..and are quite flat chested, making this more difficult, if not impossible.....

I would hazard a guess, that because it is a small litter of just 3 pups... that the pups are quite heavy because the milk bar is permanently in happy hour :D ,  and are able to lift themselves up into a sitting position but are too heavy to get the rrear ends up off the floor :) 

See this quite often in Lab litters of only 2 or 3 pups... by six weeks once they have found their feet, they are fine.... 

In a breed specific forum that I belong to a puppy owner came on the Blog and described her 10month old, I'd never heard of it before but it was diagnosed as Swimmer Puppy Syndrome,but because they were late getting the diagnosis there was nothing that could be done.

What I did learn is to make sure the pups lie on their sides to feed not on their abdomen/chest.  The puppy we later found had been bought from a puppy dealer at 5 months old who did not notice the problem and shipped the pup to his new owners without them seeing anymore than pics before. The last I heard this pup is in constant pain and on analgesia and anti inflammatories and the vet mentioned the next option was to PTS and relieve the suffering. Needless to say the breeder wanted nothing to do with the vet bills or taking responsibility for the pups condition. This breeder has now been stopped from selling pups and is waiting to go to court on several counts. None of this happened in the UK.

I hope yoo get the correct treatment soon as it can bring about a very good out come whilst the bones are still soft and pliable. There are some articles on the internet which are very informative

Rhona