Hypothetical Breeding Question

[StillandSilent]

This is a question about the responsibility of owning an intact male. Say you have an intact male who is a show dog or a show prospect. One day when you are not paying the strictest attention, he jumps the fence. By the time you find him, he has mated with the neighbors mutt. What responsibility do you have for the resulting litter? Does it matter if she was running loose or if he jumped into her yard? Do you pay for 1/2 of everything, including all the vet care? Do you have responsibility to find every or any puppy a home?
I took a call at work about a similar situation, so I am very curious about what your opinions are about this.

 

[SummerRiot]

I would wonder in the first place WHY someone has an intact mutt bitch..

THEn I would try and pursuade that person to get their bitch Emergency spayed and I would offer maybe half of what it would cost - ME also speaking WITH the vet directly.

I would find it embarassing if Riot had sired a mutt litter. I definately wouldn't want them on the ground.

BUT IF by chance these people have refused a spay. I would not offer money to help with the puppies. I would offer my time. But if they refused to spay a mutt bitch I wouldn't help them any further financially.

 

[MomOf7]

Question...
Was the female in question in an enclosed space or let to run loose?
I would pay for half the cost of the medication they give for dogs that is like the day after pill. Or to have a spay done. This is IF the female is not being used as a working/show dog and isnt apart of a breeding program by a responsible breeder.
Maybe I am wrong here?
And I am with Jenn here on making sure I keep in close contact with the vet and the owner. I am not going to fork out cash to the person but directly to the vet office at the time of the spay or procedure

 

[PoodleMommy]

the males family is at fault as much if not more then the females.

Why should the male be allowed to run free intact, just because he is a show prospect. If you are going to have an intact dog, keep control of it at ALL times.


Show dogs are no better then any other dogs... sorry.

this applies only if the female in question is in her own yard... if she is running free too, it is 50/50 for sure.

Elissa

 

[SummerRiot]

IF the mutt bitch was in her own yard - then yeah it would be the males fault for jumping a gate or a fence to get to her.

IF she was running loose.. then its both of the owners fault.

That is something that really gets me.. I wish Riot was a bitch sometimes lol They are SOOo much easier to deal with!!
I always keep an eye on Riot and always have to know where he is. Having an intact bitch in the house with him is just horrible when she comes into season! lol

 

[Spiritus]

First of all, I do agree that the bitch should be spayed immediately BUT....

They had her contained in their yard. She did NOT go out of her yard to be bred, the boy jumped the fence. If someone owns an intact male show dog and has neighbour dogs, it is just as much the responsibility of the stud owner to ensure their dog does not get to intact bitches without a planned "date" as it is the responsibility of the bitch owner to ensure she doesn't get bred. They left their bitch outside unattended, the stud owner left their dog outside unattended. I'd say both parties are responsible for the coming puppies.

 

[RD]

If MY dog got out of my yard and mated with someone else's bitch, I would pay for an emergency spay or abortion of the litter. If the bitch was running loose too, I'd pay half.

If the person did NOT want to spay/abort and instead wanted to keep the puppies against my urging, the only assistance I would provide would be finding responsible homes for the pups, and spay/neutering them. I'm not even sure if that's something I *should* do since I was not the one who wanted to see the puppies born anyway, but I'd feel obligated to at least make sure that those mixed breed puppies from my dog would never be bred.

 

[Whisper]

If it were my dog that got loose and jumped the fence of a female in heat I would feel obligated to pay for the emergency spay or abortion. Yes, they should have their female mutt spayed but she technically wasn't doing anything wrong IF she was in a fence. (Just my wording, I know the dog isn't wrong.)
If she was loose I'd try to do 50/50. I'm not sure what I would do if they wanted to keep the litter. I guess ultimately it would be their dog and their choice but I would do what I could to educate them and help them with what I could. That could mean trying to get them to abort/spay or leading them to people, sites, and books that could teach them about whelping and how to do it properly.
To answer your question, yes, I think it matters if she was loose or contained.
I think I just saw a very similar case on a court show.
Whether the dog is a show dog prospect or not, he needs to be contained as well.

 

[bubbatd]

Personally I feel if the bitch was free to roam and in heat it's the owner's problem cost wise . If they choose to let " Sweetsy " have her litter , I'd try to help place puppies . If both dogs were in their own yards .... it's 50-50 . No female should be out alone when in heat , so 1/2 of the responsiblity is the female's owner . Unless the male has jumped the fence before , he did only because the female was in heat .

 

[Spiritus]

Everyone is saying that the bitch should be spayed, and yes, as responsible owners, we KNOW the bitch should be spayed.... BUT, what if the male was a show dog Rottie and the bitch was a show dog Golden? Would your answer change?

 

[Miakoda]

This is a question about the responsibility of owning an intact male. Say you have an intact male who is a show dog or a show prospect. One day when you are not paying the strictest attention, he jumps the fence. By the time you find him, he has mated with the neighbors mutt. What responsibility do you have for the resulting litter? Does it matter if she was running loose or if he jumped into her yard? Do you pay for 1/2 of everything, including all the vet care? Do you have responsibility to find every or any puppy a home?
I took a call at work about a similar situation, so I am very curious about what your opinions are about this.

The owner of the fence jumper should pay all costs IMO. Although I'm not a fan of having intact mutts, they have every right to keep their dog intact as do the owners of the showdog. Hopefully, the fence jumper's owner can convince the other owners to do a spay/abort on their pup with ALL expenses paid by the jumper's owner.

By trying to place blame on the mutt's owners, they are skirting their own responsiblity to keep their dog properly restrained/confined.

 

[Miakoda]

Everyone is saying that the bitch should be spayed, and yes, as responsible owners, we KNOW the bitch should be spayed.... BUT, what if the male was a show dog Rottie and the bitch was a show dog Golden? Would your answer change?

The spay is up to the bitch's owner. However, if she is an active show dog & they don't want to spay her for those reasons, then I STILL hold the male dog's owners accountable as the bitch's owner kept their dog properly confinced & the male dog's owners did not. They should have to pay.

How much is a confusing issue. I wouldn't say that it's right for them to not want to pay b/c the bitch's owners want to keep her intact as there again, they shouldn't have to forgo their dog's show career b/c another showdog's owner was too careless to keep his dog contained. I would say that that person should pay all REASONABLE vet costs (there's no need for the bitch's owner to take her to the vet every week just to rack up a debt against the other dog's owner) for the bitch while pregnant & for the pups PROVIDED the bitch's owner doesn't try to sell the pups to make a profit himself off of the incident.

 

[RD]

Everyone is saying that the bitch should be spayed, and yes, as responsible owners, we KNOW the bitch should be spayed.... BUT, what if the male was a show dog Rottie and the bitch was a show dog Golden? Would your answer change?

No. The option for a spay would still be open. I would be just as willing to pay to abort the litter, as I would be to spay the dog - in any situation. I know the owners of a show dog would not opt for a spay, and most likely they would not let her have the puppies because that would be at least 4 months she'd be out of the ring, and who knows how many more months it would take for her to regrow her coat . . . If they dont want to spay, whether the dog is a mutt or show dog, that's fine with me - my concern is not someone else's intact dog, but the puppies from MY dog. If I could convince them to spay a mixed breed along the way, great. But it's not my goal.

 

[Spiritus]

I just posted it this way, as if both parents were show dogs, because it almost sounded condescending to the "mutt" - as if the show dog had higher value than the mixed breed. Most people with mixes LOVE their dogs just as much as people with purebreds, and just as much as those of us who show.. People do have the right to keep dogs intact. Some people have religious beliefs about it.

If one of my bitches got away when in standing heat and was bred, likely a spay would not be a feasible solution to me, nor would aborting the litter, as there are far too many fertility risks involved. The bitch would have her puppies, they would be raised in the kitchen like all my puppies, and they would be placed - early spay/neuter if I could find a vet to do it (hard to find around here), but if I couldn't find a vet to do the early spay/neuter, then they would be placed on a strict spay/neuter contract. So I loose a year of showing. So I loose the timing of a possible planned litter - at least the bitch would still be available to whelp another litter, planned, with the "correct" breed of dog.....

 

[Mordy]

as the bitch's owner kept their dog properly confinced.

I disagree. If the female had been properly confined, the male wouldn't have gotten to her. Obviously the fence was not high enough. (I'm speaking as someone who has owned intact dogs, both male and female, exclusively for 22 years - my current dog is my first altered one.)

If I were the owner of the male, I'd pay the cost of an abortion or half of the cost of a spay, but the owner of the bitch wouldn't see a red cent from me if they decided to let her have the litter. There are already enough unwanted pets out there, no need to add another litter to it.

 

[Julie]

In my county it is against the law for a bitch in heat to be outside.
They have to be contained in an enclosed building.....not a pen or tied outside. An enclosed shed or in the home.
Now that is how the Dog warden explained it to me several years ago.
And you can be issued a ticket and be fined.
Although they really don't enforce it unless there are problem cases.

My opinion is both owners are equally at fault. But I would offer to pay for a spay for the female and would hope the other dog owner would accept.

 

[RedyreRottweilers]

This is a question about the responsibility of owning an intact male. Say you have an intact male who is a show dog or a show prospect. One day when you are not paying the strictest attention, he jumps the fence. By the time you find him, he has mated with the neighbors mutt. What responsibility do you have for the resulting litter? Does it matter if she was running loose or if he jumped into her yard? Do you pay for 1/2 of everything, including all the vet care? Do you have responsibility to find every or any puppy a home?
I took a call at work about a similar situation, so I am very curious about what your opinions are about this.

IMO the responsibility for stewarding an intact in-season bitch rests with the owner.

I would say the owner of the dog in question has zero liability.

If I allow my bitch to be accidentally bred when she is in season, I have NO ONE to blame but myself.

It's ludicrous, IMO, to think the owner of the male dog should be liable.

 

[FoxyWench]

personally i think its a 50/50 case.

one should NEVER leave a female in heat unsupervised outside, however the owners of the intact male also have a responsibility to keep their dog undercontrol and confined just as much as the owners of the female!

thats like saying "my agressive dog cleared the fence and attacked a wandering dog, whos fault is it?!" obviously the owners of the wandering dog are at fault for allowing their dog loose off their property, but its also the owner of the agressive dogs fault too for not keeping the dog properly confined!
had it been a person walking the dog and the agressive dog attacked theres be no question that the owner of the agressive dog is at fault for not properly confining.

its the same with intact dogs!!!
If you cant properly confine your dog, your responsible for its actions.

 

[whatszmatter]

if you have a bitch in season, you are 2 feet away at all times when its not locked securely away in your home. If you are outside, you're right there until she's out of season, that's just how it is. dogs can mate thru fences and in any other way that's not even imaginable to us and that's the only way to keep unwanted pups from happening, so to me whether the bitch was in her yard, running free wherever, the owners are still partly responsible.

I've seen stud dogs climb their fences get on top of the kennel roof and jump from their over the yard fence when they smell a bitch in season in the neighborhood so it doens't always have to be a case of people letting their dogs run free.

Now back to the situation, i would pay for the entire emergency spay and be done with it. If they didn't want to, I'd pay for half the costs, unless of course these were they type of people that then planned on selling the pups from their litter from a "titled" stud dog, then I'd sue them, but that's a different story.

 

[Miakoda]

I disagree. If the female had been properly confined, the male wouldn't have gotten to her. Obviously the fence was not high enough. (I'm speaking as someone who has owned intact dogs, both male and female, exclusively for 22 years - my current dog is my first altered one.)

If I were the owner of the male, I'd pay the cost of an abortion or half of the cost of a spay, but the owner of the bitch wouldn't see a red cent from me if they decided to let her have the litter. There are already enough unwanted pets out there, no need to add another litter to it.

I agree that a bitch in heat should not be left to roam outdoors, however, their dog did NOT jump the fence to get to the male, nor was she out roaming the streets. They have every right to allow their dog to play in their own confined yard without having to worry about other people's dog jumping in the fence.

I'm speaking from experience as my oldest brothers bird dog (& competition dog), a black Lab, was out in the back yard one day when a neighbor's male chocolate lab decided to leave his house 5 houses down & come scale our 8ft privacy fence. Of course they "did the wild thang" resulting in a pregnancy for her. He was forced to pull her out of competition to have the pups, & 2 months later WE were handraising 10 pups b/c Snow had no interest in being a mom. We had NO financial help or any other kind of help from the owners of the male dog b/c they said the exact same thing you are saying. And I fail to see how us keeping a dog confined in a 8ft privacy fence makes us the wrong party & them allowing their dog to run loose & climb fences into other people's yard the right party. It makes NO sense whatsoever. No one's dog has the right to climb our fences & come onto our propery regardless of what is inside our fence. Our dogs don't go climbing the fence to get out, so obviously it's working for my dogs.

If someone who keeps their dog confined in their yard is going to be to blame for anything that happens when another dog gets into their yard, why even bother having fences in the first place?

And just in case you're wondering, I spayed/neutered all the pups & we found them great homes after a lengthy "are you right for this pup?" interview & home check. And no, we didn't charge a dime....not even to recoup the costs of well puppy checks, vaccinations, or dewormings. However, the owner of the male dog sure did make his presence demanding a pup from the litter.