I would be more concerned about the effects on your bitch of whelping puppies at such a young age. I have a girl at home of that same age and she is nowhere near being mature enough to mother a litter, such a baby still herself and she deserves her puppyhood. I train for competitive obedience and agility and there is a world of difference between a 10 month old and a 2 year old. That aside, I do xray my bitches prior to whelping but I try to do it as close to their due date as I can because I want that "last minute" info re; size and position and also a head count since I am not comfortable palpating my bitches to see whether they are done whelping. My first litter I did not x ray which was unfortunate as I lost a puppy that I probably would not have lost had I known there was a potential problem ahead of time. Since then I do xray and have not had any adverse effects, my puppies are actually very good learners (these dogs do agility, obed, and rally) and due to the early neuro stim exercises and other things I introduce early on I see a remarkable increase in their abilities over the dogs I have gotten from my own breeder, who does not x ray at all. Totally unscientific but those are my observations, I used to do an ultrasound to verify pregnancy but I have gotten more patient recently lol and don't use it anymore. |