Friday 4 May 2012

Stella's first heat cycle

We survived!  Our little vizsla girl has finally finished her first heat cycle.  It was pretty much a textbook 21 day cycle and started April 10th.  She turned ten months end of March so that is well within the expected time frame for a first season.  I had been hoping she would be a late bloomer but in hindsight the timing was actually pretty good as we weren't travelling during that time and now we should be free of that concern for the summer camping season.  We had been registered for her Canine Good Neighbour test but opted to defer that until after her heat.

This was my first time having a dog in heat.  Lucy was spayed before her first cycle but my breeder requires Stella to be a year old before spay.  I agree with this as there seems to be a lot of research now that showing the benefits of waiting.  Here are a few articles discussing the benefits of waiting. LongTermHealthEffectsOfSpayNeuterInDogs.pdf and Caninesports.com/SpayNeuter.html.   Natural hormones are important in the process of growth and the closing of the growth plates.  Dogs spayed or neutered after the close of the growth plates have a lower incidence of hip displaysia and other musculoskelatal problems.  There are lots of other factors to consider including higher incidences of some forms of cancer.  Of course there are probably just as much other information out there showing health benefits of early spay but this information makes sense for me.  I will spay Stella as I have zero plans to breed and I know this is not something I want to deal with all the time but am still weighing options as to when that would be.

I suspected she was coming into heat for a little while before she actually did.  Her vulva was swelling and she was spending more time cleaning that area.  Riley was the true barometer of the fact that she had actually come into heat.  The wednesday that we count as day one he was VERY interested in smelling her first thing in the morning.  That night was when we noticed the first blood drops and by the next evening she had regular discharge.   We had panties (with panty-liners) for her to wear in the house and she was mostly tolerant of them although often pushed them aside to clean herself.  I didn't make her wear the panties when we were out walking or if she was crated.  If she was upstairs with me in my office I also left them off as there is no carpet and I had the couch and her bed covered.  I think it was good to allow fresh air to those places when cover up wasn't absolutely necessary.

There were minor changes in her temperment.  She was less cuddlier than normal, had a harder time focusing, more subdued than normal and was very tired especially when she moved into standing heat.  She was also super hungry for the days leading up to her heat and for about the first week.  The biggest problem we had was dealing with Riley who was very enamored with her.   Riley is neutered so is unable to make her pregnant but supposedly is still able to "do the deed".   He wasn't bad for the first 4-5 days but got progressively more "pain-in-the-butt" as the days progressed.  I don't know if Stella was being flirty in those early days or if she was just enjoying that Riley was so happy to "play" with her.

I wasn't really sure if I had noticed the actual first day of her heat so I began leash restrictions probably around day six.  I also chose trails where I avoided the dog-walker groups we often see on our regular route.   I was worried that I had missed the first signs and wouldn't recognize the discharge changes so wouldn't know if she was in "standing heat".  When she really did reach standing heat I noticed the change in discharge colour that the information talks about but for her it actually always still retained quite a pinkish tinge but was different from the initial darker red discharge.  She also began marking a ton on our walks which is unusual for her.  Riley's attention went into overdrive and that was made worse with her bugging him.  I'm surprised her ears aren't all chapped because he constantly licked them and her head as he tried to seduce her. We got lots of work on our down-stays on dog beds across the room from each other!  We also took one dog with us whenever possible to give us all peace.   The saving grace in this time was that Stella was sleepy and content to hang out upstairs in my office with me while I worked through income tax long evenings.  I actually felt quite bad for poor Riley because for a while it seemed like he was told to leave her alone at all the time or placed in a down stay.  It was biology talking loudly and sometimes it was darn frustrating for all of us!

There was again the noticeable change around day 17-18 in discharge back to a darker colour for another 2-3 days as she came out of standing heat.  I had noticed her vulva began shrinking before that and it continues to return to a more normal size.  I noticed today (day 22?) that her nipples have also begun to reduce in size again although I hear they will never go back to where they were prior to the first heat.  Riley continued to be very interested in her right up to almost the end.  Yesterday I finally noticed a shift back to their normal dynamic.     It helped that she deflected his advances very well these past few days and turned them more into play.  I never saw her show her teeth to him at all through the whole thing but a dog was getting more personal with her than she wanted yesterday and she was fine appropriately showing her teeth in that instance.    I will continue to walk on the less populated trails for the next few days and hopefully by next week all will be normal. 

With regards to temperment changes I was very happy to see the return of our bouncy, happy little vizsla at around day 18.  Her energy is back to normal levels, she constantly has a toy or sock etc stuffed in her mouth and is also back loving her regular snuggle sessions.   I learned a lot but they are lessons I am happy to not be dealing with every day!

*** Update July 1, 2012 - Please see follow up post to Stella's first heat cycle. ***

8 comments:

  1. Thank you for posting this! Our Elsie (Stella's litter mate) just started her first heat. We noticed that her vulva began to swell at the beginning of April and have been waiting for the rest ever since. "The rest" came about Sunday night. She is definitely more tired and perhaps a little anxious. She has been hanging out under our bed (which she never did before). Even though I have read a bunch of articles, your post will be very helpful with our experience Elsie! Thanks again!!!!! Best wishes, Christine & Chris Maloney

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    1. I'm glad you enjoyed it. Hope everything goes well for Elsie. I saw her pics on Sylvia's blog and she is a beautiful girl!

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  2. My Tilly is just in her 1st season now. I think she started yesterday, but last week there was some light red blood on my bed but as my partner had had an emergency tooth removal i thought the blood was from him, now im not so sure... Was Stellas blood dark red straight away, or did it start light then go dark, then to straw coloured, then dark again? Im confused as to whether she is in her 1st week or 2nd week. Oh and thankyou for writing this it was very informative.

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    1. Ooops, so sorry I didn't notice this comment until now. I'm sure you figured things out by now but to answer I believe the blood was fairly bright red the first day or so and then darkened after that.

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  3. Can I ask what have you decided on when to spay your lab? We have a 5 month old black lab female. After reading all the studies, we are leaning toward waiting until after the 1st heat cycle to spay (but before the 2nd cycle). The risk of developing breast cancer is lower than the risks of other things happening if we spay at six months. But we still are uncertain of what is best. What did you decide?

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    1. My female is actually a vizsla. She is now 2.5 and I have not spayed yet but that is also to do with the fact that we have been showing conformation which requires her to be intact. I would definately not spay until after at least one heat cycle and possibly two depending on the age the first one starts. Ideally I would wait until they had finished growing. My lab is a very big dog so I really wished I had to wait to neuter him until he was around two years old but with a smaller lab I would probably wait a minimum of one year but preferably more to 1.5 years old.

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    2. Oops, more to add. The risk of mammory cancer is pretty minimal when compared to the increased risks for structural problems and blown knees etc. that occurs with early spay.

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    3. Our beautiful 10 month old black lab is just coming out of her first season. Our vet recommended spaying before her season but this contradicted what we were advised with our first dog, which was to let her have 1 season ( she lived till she was 18 and was a lovely girl) so we decided to wait. i think it makes sense to let them mature. Our dog trainer described it as giving a girl an hysterectomy before she starts her periods, and she says it can cause problems for them . Its only a short time to wait and she has gone through her season really well, she has a lovely temperament and we didn't want to spoil that by spaying her too soon. By the way i think Vizlas are lovely dogs.

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