Question about behavior...

[TheSkeptic]

A momma dog with large litter was put down along with all the pups -- age about 8 weeks. The reason being that the puppies started attacking each other. Four were badly torn up before the shelter workers could get in and separate them. THe mother was put down because she was so disconsolate after the pups were gone and because she was deemed un-adoptable. They were just ordinary old hound mut dogs. They were in a large pen with lots of room and plenty of food. Has anyone heard of something like this happening with dogs before? I have heard of cases in the wild when food was low of siblings killing each other until only enough were left to survive the food shortage.

[E's]

I may not be using the proper terminology (not being a geneticist) but it is my layman's understanding that situations such as the one you describe arise when something has gone badly wrong in a litter's genetic makeup, and that what happened was Nature's attempt to correct this error...

In felines - lions or ordinary barn cats - males will sometimes kill the cubs/kittens. This is thought to be a behavioral urge resulting from over population and/or too much inbreeding in a given community of animals... as in a pride distant from other prides, or on an isolated farmstead. My daughter and I had the latter happen in our horse barn one time in Nebraska. Many years before that, in my San Antonio neighborhood, there was a tribe of feral or semi-feral six-toed cats... "Quirk" my black tom cat - who was not six-toed - took up with a six-toed tortoiseshell we called "Goldie" who lived under my house. She killed her kittens soon after they were born... at least, that's what we thought at the time, and what I have thought until this very moment, nearly 60 years later... but I do recall knowledgable people at the time saying, well, there was probably something wrong with those kittens...

I will be interested to see thoughts/sites on this topic. Yet knowing how bad you must feel when a whole canine family is lost, I also offer condolences.

Dot B
Lakeview, Orleans Parish

[Beth Va]

That is very sad Skeptic. I am so sorry. I agree with E's I think she is right.

[TheSkeptic]

Interesting and thanks.

I had heard of male lions killing cubs when they take over a pride from another male. (The females come into heat sooner and he has a better chance of passing on his genetic material.) I have never heard of a male lion killing his own cubs though. Wierd.

[jason]

I have never heard of a male lion killing his own cubs though.

i have not either, alligators/crocs are a different story of course.

the rest of this is off topic, im sorry to hear of the pups/mom as well..i wonder if poisoining played a role while mom was pregnant.

the strangest thing i have ever seen/heard of was a documentary on the tv. can't remember where it was (probably africa somewhere) but the rainfall was unusually late for a large area that normally has long periods of dry time. many animals (crocs, lions, tigers, hippos, elaphants, etc) where dying. a scene was captured on film of three near-to-death animals all sharing a rotten carcass....a male lion, a 12-15 foot croc and a hippo all eating together on a rotten dead animal, i think it was a small elaphant....was a bit surreal given each of the three would normally be attacking each other for food but were clearly too exhausted to care about even sharing the meal. later, they all were seen drinking from the same pool of thick mud...not once did they show sign aggression towards each other. wish i had taped it, seemed rather remarkable.