Belly Button Hernias

[Jenny_930]

A friends bitch has a belly button hernia, the breeder told her about it when she bought her and said that her vet said it wouldn't be a problem should she want to breed from her later.

Later has now come and my friend took her bitch to the vet for a check up as she was hoping to breed from her next season.  The vet told her that the hernia was an inherited condition and frowned upon breeding from her as it may be passed onto her pups.

I said I would try and found out more on here and report back to her,   so has any body had this problem and have they gone on to breed from their bitch with the hernia and what was the out come??

Thanks
Jenny                    

[Jane S]

Your friend might find this article useful:http://www.showdogsupersite.com/kenlclub/b.../umbilical.html It makes the distinction between true umbilibal hernias (quite rare) & "delayed closures" (quite common) which is interesting. You won't get a black and white answer on this one - some vets believe that all umbilical hernias are hereditary & therefore the dog should never be bred from. However other vets take a much less extreme view, as do many breeders, & will take into account the size of the "hernia" etc. If v small, then in the scheme of things, this is a tiny defect which shouldn't automatically rule a dog out from being bred from - this would be my own view too, but as I say, it's not clear cut & others have different opinions                    

[Jane S]

Hi Jenny

Didn't realise this was actually your bitch with the umbilical hernia - as you can see from the replies on Champdogs, there are lot's of different opinions out there Only you can make the decision whether to breed or not from your bitch. I'm afraid I don't view vets as the font of all knowledge when it comes to breeding dogs, particularly young, newly qualified ones. Many of them are quick to leap on relatively insignificant problems but are curiously unaware of the serious problems in a breed eg FN & PRA in Cockers. I don't know whether you have heard of the geneticist, George Pagett? His approach to breeding dogs is that you should prioritise hereditary defects - definitely don't breed from anything affected by or a carrier of a serious problem but with less significant things, then it's a case of not throwing out the baby with the bathwater

Good luck with your decision                    

[LindaW]

Jane - Just wanted to say how interesting I found that Breeder Vet article on umbilical hernias!   Linda                    

[Jenny_930]

So how would I find out if the condition is inherited or just something that happened at birth?  As far as the breeder can tell me, it's not inherited as she's gone back through the pedigree checking with all previous owners and she can't say if it was caused at birth through mum tugging a bit too hard.

Like I said before, this dog has now been rehomed, but I certainly wouldn't want to come across it again, there just don't seem to be any 100% answers                      

[Jane S]

Like I said before, this dog has now been rehomed, but I certainly wouldn't want to come across it again, there just don't seem to be any 100% answers  

Yes that's the problem with so many congenital defects - it is not clear cut & often it is not known for sure whether a defect is hereditary & if it is, how it is inherited. To confuse things further, some defects can sometimes be genetic & sometimes non-genetic eg cleft palates can be genetic but they can also be caused by other things like infection, trauma etc when the pups are developing. There are lots of opinions on hernias - the article I posted a link to was written by an American vet & it made a lot of sense to me but other vets have different views as you know You will probably never be able to find out for sure whether your bitch's hernia was the true hereditary kind or not - breeding dogs often raises more questions than answers I'm afraid                    

[KellyP]

I don't have any real hard proof regarding this, but my mum's cocker bitch has a belly button hernie, but none of her littermates did, and neither did her parents - our breeder said it was just "one of those things"
HTH in some way  

K