Here’s a first for this blog. I’ve posted pictures of puppies within a minute of being born (see the post Lucille's Puppies are Born), but we’ve never had pictures of the puppies before they were born…until now.
We wanted to know how many puppies Gertie was going to have and also to get some idea how far along they were. This morning Harriett took Gertie to Dr. Rebecca Buraglio for xrays of her abdomen. Dr. Buraglio found six puppies. I’d like to thank Dr. Buraglio for giving me permission to post these photos. Please note that Gertie was not comfortable lying on her side so these views are not optimal, but they give us the information we were after.
I have outlined the puppies’ heads in the photo above. Here’s a close up of one of the skeletons. You can see the skulls, spines, and ribs of a few other pups right above as well as to the right of the one I circled.
The normal gestation time for puppies is 63 days, but the pups may be delivered between 58 and 68 in a normal pregnancy. Dr. Buraglio told Harriett that the calcification of the skeletons takes place at about the 45 day point, so based on how well they show up on these films, Gertie is pretty far along in her pregnancy. We may have puppies within a week.
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