Many dog owners asking is it safe for my dog to get pregnant after litter in short time or should the mother tale a break ??!!!
- First Back to back breeding is more healthy and safe for mother dog.
Advantages of Back to back breeding in bitches :
- Back to back breeding is actually healthier for the dog.
- New research has shown back to back is better for Mom's uterus and show that back to back is actually better as long as the female is healthy.
- Studies are now showing its better on the female to do it back to back instead of letting her body return back. They say it’s harder on her if U skip In between
So its better to do back to back than to skip season.
- Skip very fast heat : skip very first heat and breed every heat until you spay! Newer research states up to 8 is advised now. Or let’s say you have a bitch and breeding her back to back and she produces 6 puppies every time and you breed her say at 8 years old and she has 1 or 2 puppies . That’s consideration for a dramatic decrease in litter size. I took an animal genetics course before and that’s what my professor told the class
Yes! It depends on how she bounces back after a litter and if everything goes ok! Akc now that it is in nyc allows you to register a litter from a bitch up to 12! Which I think is pushing in!
- Some breeds/bitches can & some can’t. It depends on how they recover from previous litter
- Breed, age, size of last and previous litters are all things to look at. You also want to consider how long you plan to use her and weigh the risk of a pyometra.
- Back to back breeding is actually healthier for the dog.
- New research has shown back to back is better for Mom's uterus and show that back to back is actually better as long as the female is healthy.
- Studies are now showing its better on the female to do it back to back instead of letting her body return back. They say it’s harder on her if U skip In between
So its better to do back to back than to skip season.
- Skip very fast heat : skip very first heat and breed every heat until you spay! Newer research states up to 8 is advised now. Or let’s say you have a bitch and breeding her back to back and she produces 6 puppies every time and you breed her say at 8 years old and she has 1 or 2 puppies . That’s consideration for a dramatic decrease in litter size. I took an animal genetics course before and that’s what my professor told the class
Yes! It depends on how she bounces back after a litter and if everything goes ok! Akc now that it is in nyc allows you to register a litter from a bitch up to 12! Which I think is pushing in!
- Some breeds/bitches can & some can’t. It depends on how they recover from previous litter
- Breed, age, size of last and previous litters are all things to look at. You also want to consider how long you plan to use her and weigh the risk of a pyometra.
" Breeding back to back is actually better for health reasons. I had 2 females that I gave a break and both ended up with pyometra and had to have emergency spays. If you decide not to breed her I would put her on a antibiotic through her heat cycle to avoid pyometra. When I give my girls a break, that's what I do to avoid it" says Rhonda Mae Roche " dog owner "
" I believe the mum needs time to recover in between breedings. Reproduction is a demanding task. I've only once due to a pyometra and on recommendation from the vet had a back to back litter. 8 pups in the first litter and 12 in the second over about 7 months... some task for the mum who fortunately was cured for the pyometra."
said Rebecka S. Stewart dog breeder .
- Also it depends on the age and health of the bitch.A healthier mother will adapt back to back breeding easily , while weak mothers might have some complications .
- back to back IF the female bounces back quickly and just retire earlier.
back to back is okay, UNLESS the bitch has a large litter and/or litter drags her down. But normal to small litters and a healthy bitch. Back to Back....and LOTS of love and healthy foods.
First off the bitch should be health tested before you decide to go ahead with a back to back breeding. Just make sure she’s up for another litter.
- Finally as a veterinarian this is my opinion about back to back breeding :
If you consider every other extant canine species, dogs have only recently evolved to be able to produce more than one litter per year. All other canine species are seasonal breeders and breed only once a year such that pups are born during a seasonal pulse. The domestication of wolves/dogs has resulted in the loss of seasonal breeding once per year due to relaxed selection because of the direct care by humans/scavenging of human waste, but also as a result of artificial selection for increased fecundity (# litters) by humans. With this increased fecundity, certain energetic tradeoffs have also evolved. While every other canid species participates in pair-bonding and long term parental care, dogs have lost these behaviors in favor of increased reproduction selected for by humans because the lack of long term parental care or pair-bonding does not affect the survival of offspring since humans are caring for them. The take away from this is that humans have directly caused dogs to cycle twice per year.
The fact that dogs can cycle twice per year does not mean it is healthy or natural to breed them twice per year. Reproduction takes A LOT of energy of which there is only a finite amount that gets divided between things like growth, immune defense, cellular maintenance, etc. Evolution by selection is selfish in that it only favors genes that increase reproductive success. It does not matter if the gene decreases longevity of the female or causes health problems later in life, as long as the female is passing on all those genes during her reproductive years it will increase in frequency leading to an entire population of individuals that cycle far more (and much earlier) than their progenitors.
I’ve seen arguments for back-to-back mating because the bitch’s hormone levels will change regardless if she is pregnant or not. While this may be at least in part true, maintaining a pregnancy, lactation and raising young are extremely expensive to a bitch and will likely require energy to be allocated away from her own growth and maintenance. And breeding 6 times in a row and then retiring the bitch will very likely not be able to remedy the lack of her own maintenance for all those years due to her finite amount of energy being primarily allocated to reproduction.
My personal opinion – I think a back-to-back mating every now and then over a bitch’s breeding career would be fine assuming she is in excellent health. However, I think breeding a bitch every single cycle (2x per year for years) would likely be very costly in terms of her own (physical and mental) health and maintenance.
- Back to back breeding is far more beneficial that skipping a heat. When you skip, the uterus fills itself with cysts and fluis to replace the embryos that are supposed to be there. In the long run that can cause reduced litter sizes, pyo and other infections. When a c-section is involved it is best to have your vet or a reproductive specialist determine her uterine health status and her overall ability to whelp again. They’ll tell you much more than we can by evaluating her.
Disadvantages of back to back breeding :
- - If your dog had c-section then you can ask your vet for skipping heat .- If the bitch had c-section in the last litter it will be very difficult for her to accommodate and might affect her health.
- Back to back doesn’t allow you to evaluate the puppies you already have. It’s down to your moral judgement and people will always try to justify “its better for her” but if it’s your pet do you really want her going this so often? They do just fine with a 2 year gap and you can see the quality of what you’ve produced.
- A big part of it is how well she bounces back. If she’s already back to her pre pregnancy self as far as health, Weight, and energy go( along with being approved by your vet), then I wouldn’t see an issue. However, if she has not fully recovered from her pregnancy 100% I wouldn’t do it
- If you want to produce healthy puppies with a clear mindset of quality over quantity and tyou believe the worth of a breeding animal is determined by its offspring. This is why you wouldn't breed a young bitch shortly after its first litter as you want to have time to properly evaluate the progeny.
- Back to back doesn’t allow you to evaluate the puppies you already have. It’s down to your moral judgement and people will always try to justify “its better for her” but if it’s your pet do you really want her going this so often? They do just fine with a 2 year gap and you can see the quality of what you’ve produced.
- A big part of it is how well she bounces back. If she’s already back to her pre pregnancy self as far as health, Weight, and energy go( along with being approved by your vet), then I wouldn’t see an issue. However, if she has not fully recovered from her pregnancy 100% I wouldn’t do it
- If you want to produce healthy puppies with a clear mindset of quality over quantity and tyou believe the worth of a breeding animal is determined by its offspring. This is why you wouldn't breed a young bitch shortly after its first litter as you want to have time to properly evaluate the progeny.
