Quote:
|
Originally Posted by doortego Thanks, that is very interesting. I just wondered if the danger in Yorkies was partly because there seem to be so many above standard sized Yorkies that a small mom might have pups too large to deliver. I don't know if that is the case with chihuahuas. |
I think it's the case with any female dog. If the pups skulls are larger than the pelvis opening that they have to come out through you're going to have a c-section. I've learned alot from my vet here and my mentor. I have a friend with a 11 lb chi. She was from a litter of 2 and was a large pup.
My Maggie had a litter of 2. One was 6oz and the other was 8oz. It was not an easy delivery for either, the bigger puppy was harder to deliver and she was stressed.
When we started to breed Sunnie, we had moved here & my vet talked to me about wanting to have as many viable eggs fertilized as possible. The greater number of puppies the more consistent the birth weight. When she went for her checkups he monitored her progress and when he only felt 2 babies he also monitored her diet to keep them from getting too big. We did an x-ray at 60 days to check position, head size compared to the width of Sunnie's pelvis and placement. We had good results and a good delivery.
My mentor had a litter of 6 a year ago. The smallest was 2.5oz and the largest was 8oz. That same female has had a litter of 7 the year before and they were all between 3.5 & 4.5 oz.
You raise some good concerns. When there's an average litter size of 1-4 you could run a pretty good chance of having a large pup once in awhile.