It may shock you when you suddenly acknowledge an incident where a mother dog kills or eats her puppies. You cannot tell specifically why do dogs kill their puppies because it is a common scenario in the animal world.
Some mother dogs used to kill their puppies due to stress, anxiety and feeling insecure. When they think the environment or house they used to live in is unsafe for their inborn, they kill or eat their infants to keep them safe. Generally, it indicates the dog is unsuitable for nurturing or raising its young.
Inspecting what is the actual reason behind this is unpredictable. But when it happens to your dogs, some precautions or care may help to control their behavior.
Why Do Dogs Kill Their Puppies – 7 Possible Reasons
If your dog used to kill its inborn continuously after giving birth, learn the following reasons to stop her from doing it again. The causes of mother dogs kill their puppies depend on many things likewise:
1. Your Dog Isn’t Ready to Be a mom
Dogs naturally take 18 months to grow and become sexually mature fully. According to some professional veterinary experts, giant breeds might only come into heat once they’re aged between 18 months to 2 years. But some species can be grown or mature enough before this particular age.
If the dog becomes pregnant before that period, it might not prepare to be a mom. It is not unusual for them to behave unnaturally, like eating or harming their newborn puppies.
2. Diseases Or Sickness
Disease or sickness is the common reason detected by many researchers that lead the mother dog to react inhumanly. The dogs feel disturbed when they feel pain in their teeth, breast, or any part of their bodies. Whether the dog has a severe infectious disease that insists it behaves abnormally.
In other cases, sometimes, the newborn puppy could be born with monstrosity or deformity. The mother dog kills the infants to free them from suffering wounds or handicaps.
3. Lacking Maternal Presence
Some dogs usually harm their kids for lack of instinct or presence. They sometimes don’t know how to care for their puppies and how to nurture them.
The reason for this varies and often happens when the dog has no proper accountancy of socialization or maternity birth. But some of the dogs just kill their infants for negligence.
4. Fear or Anger
Mother dog used to kill the little furballs when it felt threatened and out of fear or aggression. The reaction of their anger results in brutal and cruel rushes over the puppies. In addition, a newborn puppy seems to be her enemy or new competitor in this survival world.
They continually feel threatened by the birth of new dogs. This sort of complication may happen to the dog if they suffer from psychological complexities.
5. Save Up Their Instinct
It is very critical to analyze animal behavior. Nothing is abnormal or inhuman in the animal world. Animals maintain the Darwinism theory strictly known to all alike “survival for the fittest.”
For instance, a jungle must have one king. But when there are two, each one will fall for a fight to preserve their existence.
Unlike a lion of the jungle used to kill his competitor, dogs can also act like this. They sometimes kill their infants when there are no sufficient resources available.
They can kill them if they think those little puppies implanted a share of food, shelter and other resources. Furthermore, they become desperate to save their instinct, leading the dog to accomplish the puppies.
6. Puppies May Sick
Sometimes the puppies are sick or behave abnormally. Dogs will purposefully kill that kind of infant. They do this intentionally to put more attention towards the healthier one.
7. Accidental Issues
Dogs might kill her puppies accidentally. It does not happen intentionally but unconsciously. Puppies are too sensitive while they are born. At that point, while the dog brings the puppy in their mouth to keep them in a safe place, they might be injured by their teeth.
Or, sometimes, they may lose their lives by falling down a shaft while being bought by the mother dog abruptly. Anything can happen to the puppy that isn’t described in words because of the incidents caused by accidents.
These are all responsible things or probably lead the mother dog to become cruel. If the dog suddenly eats her infants, inspect the cause cautiously.
How to Deal with Inconvenience or Bring Change in Mother Behavior?
Dealing with the mother dog’s abnormal behavior like this might not be accessible if the incident happened to anyone for the first time. You can stop the dogs from eating their infants by following some strategies. Herein are some possible ways that may work in these affairs, including:
● Keeps the Pups Away
Keep the pups away from their mother after delivery. Observe the dog to inspect how it reacts. Give the puppies back to their mother after 24 hours while you’re sure enough that the dog isn’t harmful.
Besides, look after the pups while the dog is feeding them. This will prevent the dogs from killing their infants.
● Ensure the Puppies Are Healthy
Observe the health of the puppies for some days. Ensure that they’re free from maternal infections or diseases. If the pups are too sick from their birth, chances are that their mother might kill them. It is not always true, however.
● Trained The Dog
Train your dog and teach it to understand maternal affairs in its language. You can show how to cuddle the pups by keeping them on hand. You can tell the dog that the puppies are part of her breed, so she shouldn’t behave roughly.
Keep the pups beside the dog’s bed for 2–4 days with close observation. It can only be used for the maternal phase of life and accept the changes.
● Go to Vet
If your dog suddenly starts eating its infants, which you have not noticed, go to the vet. Possibly, your dog is undergoing severe difficulties. Maybe it is disturbed by the injuries, pain or anything else. The vet can give you the right solutions. Doing such things can also stop the dog from eating up the pups.
● Keep It Calm During Aggression
If the dog is aggressive towards its litter pups, keep them aside immediately. If your dog is too excited, give him food or cuddles to help the dog to calm down. Take it to any nearby veterinary clinic to minimize its aggression if possible. Many kinds of aggression-reducing medications, such as Adaptil (dog calming tool/ diffuser) and others, are available for the dog.
5 Common Symptoms That Visible in Brutal Mother Dog
A mother dog usually loves spending 90% of her time with their pups. Her inactivity may indicate that she would harm the infants if she hadn’t spent time with them. Besides, some common signs give you clear hints that the dog will kill the pups. You may find some symptoms likewise:
- Breathing abruptly
- Can’t tolerate the presence of its pups
- Try to bite the pups in anger
- React so ferociously when you bring its inborn puppies to its (mother dog)
- The dogs sometimes started barking loudly, which seemed very offensive
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
How to Know That the Dog Reacts Unnatural to Its Pups?
One of the common signs that the dog reacts unnaturally to its pups is that it suddenly starts barking. It didn’t even tolerate the presence of the puppies and tried to harm them.
Why Do Dogs Start to Harm Their Puppies?
It sometimes happens while the dog is extremely stressed about something. Excessive stress or feeling threatened by too noisy environments leads the dog to harm their infants.
What led a Dog to Kill the Litter of Puppies?
This inconvenience is due to many factors. Mother dog may tend to kill the litter of puppies when it has a lack of maternity. It may also happen when the mother lacks milk production, is low weight or is injured by defective incidents.
Do Father Dogs Love Their Inborn Pups?
Yes, if the male dogs have no difficulties like the canines, like trauma, anxiety, stress or lack of socialization, they can be the best friend of the pups. Meanwhile, father dogs often play with their infants and cuddle, which signifies a lovely father-son relationship.
What to Do If the Dogs Used to Eat Their Pups Continuously?
Without delaying much, you should take the dog to any nearby vet to learn why this happened. The vet will then inspect the problem and advise proper medication to treat the dog.
Final Wrap
Puppies are the cutest creatures that require maternity care to grow up properly. The premature death of the pups’ act by the mother dog is pathetic and unexpected. To reduce this kind of heinous act, it’s a firm duty to everyone to find out why do dogs kill their puppies.
Then, move to the solution to stop it from doing similar things repeatedly. Sometimes, young mother dogs living in noisy places kill their breeds for lack of maturity. But with time, the maturity of the dam increases, and it stops killing or eating the puppies after giving birth.
Besides, replace the puppy’s bed and litter in a calm, quiet environment. It might be helpful for the new mother dog to feel safe living with the puppies.