Neapolitan Mastiff Information & Photo Gallery: Detecting Pregnancy in your neapolitan mastiff female

Detecting Pregnancy in your neapolitan mastiff female

Detecting Pregnancyin your mastino napoletano female

Now we come again to that constantly reiterated conundrum; is the bitch pregnant or not? This is, without doubt, the question most frequently asked in the world of dog breeding, and I have to admit that even after many years of experience it remains a most difficult question to answer.
Once we owned a very valuable brood bitch, recently imported, and she had missed twice for her previous owner. Was she going to miss yet again? We had reached the sixty-second day of pregnancy, and our experienced bred adviser came to see us. He had seen the bitch soon after her arrival, long before she was mated, and he stated quite definitely: "This bitch is not in whelp"! Rather hesitantly, I contradicted him, and his reply was: "If she has any puppies, my name is Willie"! The very next day she bore five healthy puppies and "Fred" had become "Willie". Even veterinarians can experience difficulty in palpating the abdomen of these strong, particularly muscular bitches.

X-Ray Diagnosis

If the breeder is either unwilling or unable to wait, there is always the option of finding out whether the bitch is in whelp or not by means of an x-ray. One objection to this is that the creatures of our earth are exposed to quite enough radioactivity already, without subjecting them unnecessarily, to yet another dose. An X-Ray is, however, a necessity if there is a question of a one puppy litter. Most single-puppy births take place these days via Cesarean Section, and it is essential, in these cases, to establish by means of an X-Ray how the puppy is positioned.
There are usually a number of personal reasons why it is considered necessary to discover whether the bitch is in whelp or not. The arrival of a litter of puppies makes it essential for the breeder to be able to allocate the time. If, after five to six weeks, he has come to the conclusion that the bitch has missed, it is understandable that he or she would like to make certain in order to be able to plan for the coming weeks. As regards radioactivity, there is no doubt at all that modern X-ray units give off only very little radiation, and the results show, with great reliability, whether or not our bitch is in whelp.
The skeleton of the fetus-a precondition for an X-ray diagnosis- is formed between the 40th and 55th day of pregnancy. The skeletal formation of the fetuses is recognizable as a white shadow. At the earlier stage around the 45th day, it is not possible, via an X-ray, to determine the actual number of puppies in a litter, but it is possible to ascertain whether the bitch is pregnant or not. By the 55th day, the expert is usually able to distinguish the number of fetal skeletons; the layman can at least see the heads and the skeletal bones.
An X-ray taken on the 60th day will show considerable detail. In a bitch carrying a large litter the overloaded uterine horns take up practically the entire abdominal cavity, and will press on the other organs. In contrast, an X-ray for a single puppy taken in late pregnancy will show an excessively large puppy, with an entire skeleton which is clearly visible to the layman. For the veterinarian, the x-ray indicates the inevitability of a Cesarean Section.
Looking at these four cases, it is clear to see just what radiography can achieve. Today, radiography has become an essential part of every small animal clinic's equipment. I recall a four year old bitch who had been mated fifty-nine days previously, and from her outward appearance, there was absolutely no sign at all of an approaching birth. Our veterinarian had gone away for a well-earned holiday, but it had been decided to let him X-ray her beforehand, just in case. The bitch was X-rayed, and the veterinarian shrugged his shoulders sadly - there were no puppies.
On the 65th day of pregnancy, our bitch appeared to be perfectly happy and comfortable. Suddenly she began to pant. It could not possible be true! She went on panting for an hour, for two hours. The first sign of a birth is often indicated by the bitch's continuous panting. Why should our bitch pant this much if she had no puppies? We called our veterinarian's assistant from her bed in the middle of the night, and when she arrived, we all sat around the panting bitch, quite unable to find an explanation for her behavior. Perhaps just one puppy? The veterinarian was quite undecided: "Just imagine, my boss X-rayed this bitch himself! If I take her into the surgery, open her up, and there is nothing there, he will kill me!" she said. An hour after midnight, our bitch lay down and went to sleep. We gave the all clear; it was obviously a false alarm.
The next evening at around 7 p.m., the whole scenario began just as before. Again, we all collected around the bitch, trying to decide what had best be done. By this time, I felt I simply had to know what was happening. We phoned up a veterinary friend, who usually looked after our horse. He was tracked down at a party at the riding stables, and he arrived an hour later together with a noisy crowd of friends, just a little bit worse for wear. He bent over our bitch. He felt her abdomen, palpated her and declared: " There are two in there. Do you want me to get them out?" We thanked him, but decided to manage without his services. We packed our bitch into the car, and drove, with the veterinary assistant, to the clinic. Two healthy puppies were born via Cesarean Section, one of which went on to become a German Federal Winner! And these two had remained mysteriously hidden from the X-ray's all-seeing eye!
This story illustrates a basic principle. Humans are not infallible -neither is our technical equipment. The probability of something of this kind happening is actually less than one percent. Yet, even if a diagnosis is quite positive, the unexpected must always be reckoned with, and despite a definite diagnosis - "No puppies" The owner should remember to keep on studying his bitches behavior.
In 1986, a breeder described a similar incident to me. Six puppies had been born, and the bitch lay down, stretched out, and relaxed. The veterinarian present examined her, and said that all the puppies had arrived. Another breeder, who happened to be there, had such serious doubts that she insisted on having the bitch X-rayed. The result there was no evidence of unborn puppies! Nobody knows where they came from, but two days later the bitch developed a raging temperature, and two dead puppies were taken from her by cesarean Section. This happened two days after an otherwise normal birth.
A considerable amount of practical experience is needed to make an accurate X-ray diagnosis and also remember that , in the operation of highly sophisticated radiographic units, mistakes are easily made.

Palpation

This is a method of feeling the bitch's abdomen to detect the embryos in the uterine "string of beads". By means of palpation, the experienced veterinarian is able to locate puppies. The textbooks tell us that by means of palpating the abdomen, between the 18th and 21st day of the pregnancy, it is possible to detect the embryos. It is also stressed that this kind of diagnosis is possible between the 24th and 32nd day but it becomes more difficult owing to the increasing girth of the bitch. In the literature on this subject, it is always pointed out that a great deal of knowledge and experience is required for palpation. Naaktgeboren expresses an urgent warning: "Let the layman be well advised not to feel around for the fetuses. It is better to wait for a couple of months in patience than by inexpert palpation to cause irreparable damage either to the embryos or to the bitch herself!" In other words, the breeder and the layman should keep their hands off the abdomen of the pregnant bitch! In connection with the method of ultrasound diagnosis, I shall be describing the astonishing results that can be achieved by expert palpation.

Visible Signs

Kicking movements of the expected puppies are discerned by many breeders. Is this really evidence of a pregnancy? In the case of a large litter, the careful observer will be right. From the eight week onward, with a little patience and the palm of the hand laid carefully on the bitches abdomen, little twitching movements of the puppies may be felt. However, in my experience, there are a great many breeders with a powerful imagination! It is no exaggeration to say that, in my advisory capacity to many breeders, I could list at least ten who swore that they had felt these tiny kicking movements. This was not perjury, since there is a lot of movement going on inside a bitch, and human beings have a very great sense of imagination especially if something is desired very much. The fact is that in none of the above mentioned ten cases did a bitch have one single puppy. We can therefore discard diagnosis entirely by means of kicking movements.

Ultrasound

There is one reliable method of early diagnosis. We are indebted for this method, on the one hand, to the expertise of the practitioners in palpation and , on the other, to the bat. This little creature is the heraldic animal of ultrasonic diagnosis, a science that has brought about immense changes in the medical world in recent years.
As has already been stated, palpation carried out by laymen or inexperienced veterinarians does little toward diagnosing pregnancy in dogs. The matter looks quite different in the hands of a specially trained expert. This gives us an interesting parallel to the subject of semen extraction and artificial insemination already dealt with.
A very interesting treatise, once again from the Dutch University of Utrecht (published in October 1985), deals with the results of pregnancy tests carried out with palpation and with the ultrasonic system. The results are astonishing!
In 1983, 116 bitches of forty-two different breeds were examined by palpation. The majority of the examinations were carried out between the 25th and the 35th day after mating (i.e. after four weeks of pregnancy). In this research program, existing pregnancies were diagnosed with and accuracy of 94.6%, and the absence of a pregnancy with 82.8% accuracy. The test method adopted is to stand the bitch on a table and to palpate her abdomen with both hands at the same time. One hand is laid flat on the abdominal wall and the other is pressed gently inward. The fetuses are perceptible as tiny rounded or oval bulges.
Why should the negative diagnoses be less accurate than the positive? It becomes clear from the statistics of this test program that it was frequently a question of very small litters, and that examinations took place at an early date (i.e. around the 25th day of pregnancy). It is easy to understand that the minute bead-like structures are not easy to detect. Even so , the results of this test series afford convincing evidence of the efficiency of palpation as a test method for early diagnosis of pregnancy.
A further improvement in examination techniques is to be seen in the ultrasonic examination of bitches. In this technique, sonic waves are emitted from a sonic generator on a frequency imperceptible to human beings. These sonic waves penetrate the body tissues. The individual tissues of the body are of varying density of the tissues. These reflections become visible on a screen and are then documented as a film.
Before an ultrasonic examination technique is advantageous in that the bitch does not have to be anesthetized and, in general, no sedation is necessary. A bitch with steady nerves is not in the least worried by an examination of this kind. An ultrasound examination at thirty-two days shows the embryos as black specks, an the bitches abdominal wall is marked.
Examinations of this kind are carried out on a very large scale at Utrecht: in 1983 on 135 bitches, in 1984 on 97. Ninety-seven per cent of the pregnancies were accurately diagnosed, and 89% of the diagnoses that the bitch had missed were correct. The Utrecht tests were carried out between the 25th and the 35th day of pregnancy. Between the 30th and 35th days, the accuracy of the results proved considerably greater than those arrived at between the 25th and 30th days. The most interesting thing about ultrasonic examinations is the fact that, at this early stage when an X-ray can't be used , the ultra sound method can provide us with a clear and comparatively reliable picture. It should also be remembered that an ultra sound involves no health risk at all for the bitch,and is thus an advance on the radiographic diagnosis.

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