Nothing funny in here folks, just an honest question about canine reproduction. Human females menstruate after ovulation (provided impregnation hasn’t occurred and everything else is working fine). Now, the way I understand it, dog females bleed throughout their period of being in heat, and the blood is in fact one of the things that attract male dogs. This doesn’t make sense. What is causing the bleeding, if it occurs before or during ovulation, as would have to be the case? Where does the unfertilised egg of a female dog go, if not out with the blood? Are the reproductive systems of dogs and mammals so different?
I didn’t know bitches bled while they were in heat <shrugs>
I don’t have a cite for you, but when dogs go into heat, they are supposed to be fertile on the 14th day after they begin bleeding, just like humans. Some dogs are still bleeding at the 14 day mark, others only bleed for the first few days, like humans. As they get older, they bleed less and less. I bred my dog a couple of times and that was the case with her - she usually only bled for a day or two. But rather than following a lack of impregnation with another “period” after 14 days like humans, dogs wait 5 or 6 months before starting the process over again. Asking where the egg goes is just like asking where a human egg goes. The time frames are the same - 14 days from the beginning of bleeding (on average). The loss of uterine lining has nothing to do with expulsion of the egg. It has everything to do with hormones - in the case of humans, that hormone is progesterone. I don’t know if dogs have progesterone itself or something similar. I think the human egg is actually in the uterine area about a week after ovulation (not the whole two weeks between ovulation and menstration), but it “died” about 24 hours after release. The purpose of menstruation is not to expel an unused egg but to build a brand new uterine lining that is full of nutrients, soft and receptive instead of old and thick and hard to penetrate for a newly fertilized egg.
I don’t know that the blood attracts the males so much as pheremones in their urine… because my male dog was a mess for several weeks before the female was truly fertile, usually a couple of weeks before she would start bleeding. He was always our warning that her time was coming, until we had to neuter him.