'Phantom' Pregnancies.....or are they?

After reading Shaun Elliss new book he mentions that wolves have an incredible way of self regulating their own bodies, this includes the ability of a female wolf to self abort a far advanced pregnancy by absorbing it into her body if she feels the conditions are not right to have young.....

With this in mind I thought I would ask Shaun if at least some domestic dog 'phantom' pregnancies were in fact real pregnancies and the dog absorbs them into the body as the wolf does if the conditions are not right.

He replied....sure!.....depending on the breeding....ie breeds that are closer to the wolf.....like sarloos, cvd and GSD's

Interesting, but how does he explain phantom pregnancies when there has been no male dog near the bitch?

Also how can a bitch absorb a far advanced pregnancy, what do you mean by far advanced given dogs are only pregnant 63 days?

In that case of course a phantom pregnancy, but just that not all may have been...

He didnt mention in his book but as wolves have the exact same pregnancy time of 63 days I would think 3/4 of the way through at a guess....I dont think anyone knows for sure how they do it, just that its absorbed into the body somehow and nothing thrown out externally....another way of not wasting anything I would think....

I'm not trying to be picky but without scanning the bitch how can he know she was definately pregnant, given that they are wolves and living outside how can he know that the bitch did not give birth and eat the pups or abort and eat the pups?

Sorry but i find reabsorbing pups 3/4 of the way through a bit hard to believe as they would be pretty well formed. Does this happen with dogs? has there been some research in this by geneticists or scientists or is it just a theory Shaun has?

I believe (not for sure) that it widely accepted that wolves can do this....would need to investigate further...

I accept its hard to believe, but a lot of what wolves can do is also hard to believe.

I was only guessing that far advanced meant 3/4 of the way thorough....

Ok,
Let me know what proof you find, if any.

It is quite common for bitches to re-absorb pups, for instance Cariad was scanned as having 10 pups, but she only had 7, often if there is something wrong with the pup they bitch will absorb it, it also happens in horses, as their pregnancies last nearly a year it can be extremely frustrating!!!!
I have also read that often wolves will give birth to the sex 'needed' within the pack, so if it is light on females, she will have more females, also if there is a dearth of food, she will not have a big litter, probably absorbing the less viable pups I would imagine.

Yes June i was aware of reabsorbing just not in the last couple of weeks.

It is usually around 4 or 5 weeks into the pregnancy before you can have a definite scan, pregnancy lasts 9 weeks, so you are around half way through the pregnancy then, so it is quite feasable that some could be absorbed within a couple of weeks because if you think about it, Cariad had at least 10 foetus's (I saw them and counted them and near passed out ) but she actually only delivered 7, so in that short period of time she absorbed the others, so not an impossibility after all.
I say at least 10 by the way because the scannerman said there could be more but she had a very full bladder so some could be hiding

Thanks for that June

Interesting to know its a dog thing as well as a wolf thing. At least with dogs we have the benefit of scanning them to confirm a pregnancy.

When you think about it it is very clever really, I mean I know Cariad's maternal aunt has had a litter of 13, but personally I would not like that many, a lot for the mother to rear and it must leave her totally depleted, whilst 7 was nice and manageable, Cariad had lots of milk and looked after them well, I had homes lined up for the majority of them and I was able to be extremely picky about the homes they went to, same with Lona, 8 was manageable for her, she was an excellent mum and they came on really well, 13 pups is a lot to look after and also find suitable homes for, and in the wild the pressure of rearing and finding food for that many would be crushing for the mother, so if she is able to practice some form of selection (which I believe she can) so much the better for the surviving pups, they have a far better chance of making it through the first year.