question on breeding! - Page 1

whats the right time to breed your dogs? some people say its the 9th, 11th & 13th day of the female coming in heat, some say its 10th, 12th & 15th. what according to all of you is the right time to breed & assurance of the bitch conceiving a litter.

On what factors does the size of the litter depend? A breeder told me that the size of the litter depends on how many times the dog & the bitch mate during the mating days. Is it right?

I am in need of serious advise.

The right time to breed a bitch depends upon when she ovulates... it used to be said that day 11 and 13 from the first day of discharge was the time, but after having some misses I relaized that either I was counting wrong or my girls were ovulating much later than I had thought.. more like around day 16 and 18ish. This has been confirmed repeatedly by progesterone testing which I can't recommend enough.. we have never had a miss since we started doing it..... It is expensive but so is shipping and travel

If the male lives with you then, you can always breed every other day until she won't stand anymore.. nowadays travel costs are so expensive, it is a really good idea to use progesterone testing .. who can afford a miss nowadays??

Males determine the sex of puppies and females determine the number.. although the male has to have enough healthy sperm to fertilize eggs(most often NOT a problem ratio wise and it wouldn't be wise to breed to a dog with poor sperm number and quality), the female has to have enough viable eggs.

I hope this helps.. are you located somewhere where you can enlist the help of a good reproductive veterinarian??

Hi

I live in gurgaon (haryana), india. I have the sire with me but the mother is with another person nearby. I mated them on the 11th & 13th day of the bitch coming in season (2nd jan & 4rth jan). last night (5th jan) & this morning (6th jan) was to be the final mating required by the owner of the bitch. But, my dog dint mate with her at all although the bitch was willing & showing signs of mating. Is this cuz i mated my dog with another bitch on 2nd jan & 4rth jan? a probable cause that my vet told me about was the stud being exhausted. Is it right?

Thanks for the suggestion of progesterone testing. I will consult my vet about the same.

So you bred your stud to different  females on the same day?? If the answer is yes, then yeah I would guess he was tired and I would also think that would affect the number and quality of his sperm. 

You may want to give him a bit  of  a rest ( a day?) and see if it will happen again.. there are more people out there with stud dogs who know better than me. I do the girls, that's my area!!

every female is different.  There is no set day to breed her - it is when she ovulates, and every female will ovulate on her own individual timing.  If she's standing well for the male and the male is interested in her, then probably that is the right timing :)  If she's not willing to stand or the male is not interested, then probably the timing is not right.  You can count days all you want but if either dog isn't ready and willing then you won't get a breeding.  Can be anytime between 10 and 20 days from the first sign of heat.

molly

And it could possibly change from heat cycle to heat cycle.....

I have never had a GSD female stand before Day 15.  Problem with boks on the subject: Dogs can't read!

;)

SS

thanks everyone.

@DKiah, the male was bred to two bitches, once on the same day (morning & evening), but later on it was alternate day mating. After that, i tried breeding him with the 1st bitch but all the 3 times, he wasnt interested in her at all. But the 1st two times, they mated for well over 10 mins both the times.

DK  it is a bit simplistic to say that the male determines the sex of the puppies because it depends on multiple factors. While yes the male must provide the y chromosome, the sperm carrying the y factor is more fragile. It also swims faster so if the bitch has ovulated fine and dandy they get their shot. If not and they have to hang around being more fragile ( as the males of many species often are) they die off faster and the tortoise ( x factor sperm) will end up winning the race thru sheer duration.

There has also been some interesting research done with women that suggests that in fact it is the woman who determines the sex because their body determines the acidity of the reception which again affects the survivability of the y carrying sperm.  In other words the sperm does not necessarily enter a "neutral" environment where each and every sperm has an equal chance of fertilizing an egg.