What if she is mated by 3 different males? - Page 2

Please forgive my ignorance, but I have never been a breeder of dogs and I must ask why a breeder would allow a female to be bred to three different males. Was this intentional? If so, what is the reasoning behind it? I've heard of people breeding a female to two males if one had a very low sperm count, to insure the female would become pregnant, knowing it would be essential to do DNA testing on all the pups...but I've never heard of breeding to 3 males. I am not being combative- just want to understand why.

The issue here is the viability of canine sperm in utero. There are many, many specific references that detail how sperm can live normally up to 5-7 days, and in some situations, as long as 11. There are many factors that determine the viability of the sperm. Besides the obvious problem of knowing what sire belongs to each pup, and the problem with multiple possible fertilizations at very different times that can mean certain pups are born early, why would you want to allow this to happen? Just as sperm is viable, so are pathogenic organisms viable and the risk is in spreading disease between the dogs. It is a poor breeding practice, not to mention how hard it may be on a given female.

the chance of beagle bred to a shepherd and  all or any of them looking just  like shepherds is nil..We have people call here all the time sayting they have some mix but ''it looks just like a _______ fill in the bkank to which I respond ''it looks just like _____fill in the blank TO YOU!  but not anyone who is knowledgeable I'm paraphrasing but  I can assure no knowlegedable person would be fooled ,sometimes those type mixes result in ''lady and the tramp'' effect where individuals are phenotypically much more like one parent than the other but they certainly do not look purebred

a lot of people do surgical implants with two sires by implanting the semen in opposite horns of the uterus..its very interesting!

My understanding is that this question is theoretical.  What would happen if........

The point is knowledge for knowledge's sake.

An old friend had a situation where a stealthy, athletic male had gotten to a female who was being bred to another male.  No one knew until the puppies were born.   It was obvious that some of them were not all GSD.   It happens.  DNA was done on all puppies.  AKC was cooperative. 

Michele

Please:  forget about counting the days of breeding because you have no idea when this bitch ovulates now do you?  and if you did, you have no idea when those ovum ( eggs ) are going to mature to accept fertilization.  I won't detail the canine estrus cycle because I will make everyone here yawn. 

SO:  MUST DNA  and that is that.

 crates with good doors, bombproof kennels or lock someone up. (spay - neuter?) I can see an accident with one dog but two?   You're a brave poster.

Good luck
Nancy Rhynard
www.westwoodkennels.com

Better still--why did this happen? How are you going to register a litter of pups based on what you are saying here. Too many cooks spoil the stew.

Ron- I was asking a theoretical question.

I am receiving too many answers from too many different people so I wanted the opinion of experts.

Tara,

I am not trying to sound like a know it all so please excuse me if I come across as such.  Just trying to bring some clarification, these events are part of my occupation and so here are the facts.  Please refer this to AKC and you can do the DNA tests yourself.  Really! 

1.  your bitch ovulated we don't know when.  No matter what people say about what day of heat, etc, unless you perform a progestone test, you are taking a guess on ovulation. 
2.  3 males - semen as another poster said, yes!  can live for up to 7 days on the good guys. 
3. the eggs released for fertilization do not become fertilized immediately, they have to mature first.  So semen introduced has this even  larger window to work. 
4.  your only hope to know who produced whom is to DNA all the possible parents and puppies if you want to register the litter legitimately.   Maybe you want to do this. 

Day of birth is normal at 58 to 64 days.  Which one will work for your bitch?  We don't know, so the attempt to see who was fertilized when, again, does not work.

So here are the facts you CAN determine parentage and DNA does work. 
AKC does allow for more than one sire becaue an efficient way of producing offspring by more than one sire and a smaller # of puppies  (not 2 litters, just 1) total IS to use (usually) 2 sires. 

Good luck and hope this answers your questions
Nancy Rhynard
www.westwoodknennels.com