Why are bulldogs often born by Cesarean section?
As a breed, they have large heads and small hips and therefore small birth canals. Puppies can easily get stuck in the birth canal. This makes whelping much more difficult on the bitch, and can possibly cause respiratory distress. In this situation, there is a chance of losing both the bitch and any puppies that are stuck. Additionally, bulldog bitches, due to their high tolerance for pain, often ignore nature’s signals to “push” the puppies out. Any dog can take a long time to deliver an entire litter of puppies. An hour or more between pups is not unusual, and if the litter is large, the delivery time can last 8 or more hours. Bulldogs will just forget it, and go to sleep. Secondly, Bulldogs have a higher than normal record of producing “Anasarca” puppies. These are fetuses that do not drain fluid in a normal manner, and end up as water-filled puppies, often weighing two to three times what a normal pup weighs. They are so large that they will not fit through the pelvic opening in th
