Labrador Retriever Forum
I'm sure she knows for sure there were triplets. Do you have to see it yourself to believe it? Others have had them too sometimes knowing for sure also because they were born surgically. All were attached to the same placenta at the time of the C-section. I've only heard of this happening twice before but it does happen lots more. I watched 1 breeder questioned heavily, asked if she had photographs of the common occurrence in nature of identical twinning or triplets. She didn't bring a camera for an emergency C-section with her bitch.
Identical multiples can hold up the rest being born
because they're in the same sack.Congratulations on your puppies Been There 2. I'm sorry about your losses and the Emergency spay. You counted right at around 16-17 skulls. I'm glad your bitch is doing better and hope her and the remaining pups continue to heal, grow and thrive. Thank you for posting the results of your experience. This could happen to anyone.
I also appreciate the poster sharing her experience and I would like to learn from it. I can understand finding multiple puppies in one sac at a c-section but you said "I'm sure she knows for sure there were triplets." How does one know??? Can you explain this to me? Puppies come out one at a time, no? and she said the 5 were whelped "with some time in between". This is an interesting topic but there is very little written about multiples that I can find even in an advanced-repro textbook. I did find that twining in dogs is very rare though, one in a million! and it can only be confirmed with a c-section. Couldn't find anything saying triplets were possible.
What happened to the 5 whelped at home before the c-sec?
I can't comment on the original poster's experience with twins and or triplets since I was not there, but I think I am probably the person referred to as having had a litter with twins and triplets which was discussed on another forum.
I have seen photographs taken of twin puppies which does show the two umbilical cords coming from the shared placenta. While rare, this can happen.
For my bitch's second litter everything progressed normally and at first everything started fine, but with hard labor, every other puppy came out dead with no placenta. After losing two this way I took the bitch in and another dead puppy was whelped, again with no sack and no placenta.
When the vet performed an emergency C-section, and I was present in the OR, he exclaimed that now he knew what had happened since he began delivering a pair of twins. All the multiples shared a sack and a placenta, but each puppy had its own umbilical cord. Then he announced he was having difficulty with an additional set of twins, until he exclaimed that they were actually triplets!!! The puppies shared one placenta with umbilical cords coming out from the shared placenta. The smallest puppy was one of the triplets. We had no camera, but the vet, myself and four techs were all present during the surgery. We lost three puppies (all were twins) prior to surgery but all the remaining puppies delivered by C-section, including the triplets, survived. The smallest girl, the triplet, was not as developed physically as her littermates, and we were concerned about her skin, ( which was at risk of sloughing off) but she was totally caught up with her siblings by three days of age. Needless to say, she turned out to be a wonderful dog, very smart and totally fearless.
My vet had been in practice for over 40 years, dealing with many breeders of various breeds, and this was his first case of triplets.
I did not breed this bitch again.
Best of luck with your new litter!
Were there actually 15-20 puppies?
Read up above.Here ya go:
She has ten left and lost six puppies. She and the babies are doing really well for being five days early. The Vet gave me some medicine that she calls Geritol for the old dogs to help build her up from the loss of blood. She does't like it but I can see a marked improvement.
What happened was triplets. Two were born and I had to cut the cords which I am sure killed the third and it was downhill from there.
Who would have known this would happen. Thank you for all of your advice.
