It’s not all plain sailing
As a breeder the key is to be over prepared rather that under prepared because when things get difficult you need to be ready to act and inevitably from time to time things do, Darcys litter was an example of this….
Labour usually starts off slow and is progressive over several hours to the point of contractions and eventually the birth of a puppy then the rest arrive at intervals over a few hours in a calm fashion. In this case Darcy labour came on quickly, and contractions were there but no movement, quicky we could see the pushing was achieving very little, so a trip to the vets an internal examination to make sure no pups were stuck, all was clear and then some oxytocin to bring on contractions. This did help induce stronger contractions and a pup did get to the birth canal however it was stuck, very tight to the point it was clear this pup was not budging, absolutely stuck tight.... straight to C-section to save Darcy and her remaining pups.
We instructed the vets while she was having C-section to spay her as we felt we didn't want her to go through this again. Giving birth should be easy and if it not you need to do the right thing as a dog lover and put the welfare of the dogs first. The vets did a great job stablising Darcy and successfully delivered the remaining pups and they came home 2am Saturday morning.
Now four days in Darcy is doing absolutely fantastic, the 3 pups ( all female ) as you can imagine are thriving having all that milk to themselves. The whole process cost £2302 but worth every penny as we had a happy ending. Doing things correctly, acting fast is what made this possible. Prepare for the worst but hope for the best and you won't go far wrong..... In all years of breeding SBTs we have only required 3 C-sections and what is clear and we have learnt through experienc is if a bitch requires a C-section then she shouldn't breed again. Even now after all these years we are still learning and you learn more from difficult times than when it all goes smoothly 🐾 🥰
