Jessie, a two-year-old Rottweiler, absolutely stunned her owners when she gave birth to one of the largest litters of puppies ever born in Britain — 15 puppies.
Eleanor Usher, and her husband, Ian, were excited when they found out their dog, Jessie, was pregnant. They were expecting her to have about seven puppies — the “normal” and average amount in a litter for a dog.
‘We hadn’t had an ultrasound, because it’s so expensive and I’d been told to expect something between six and eight babies,” Usher told the Metro.
“Jessie had already given birth to one puppy under the stairs and another in her bed, without us even knowing.”
After the third, fourth, and fifth puppies were born, Usher assumed that Jessie was done giving birth — she couldn’t have been more wrong.
“After the sixth puppy, I was saying, ‘That’s a good girl, you can stop now, you don’t have to do any more’. But they just kept coming and coming.
“We didn’t even need to do anything to assist her, they were all just coming out without any need for help. She made it so easy for us.
“We just thought, ‘Oh my God, when is she going to stop?'”
After seven hours of labor — the exhausted Rottweiler gave birth to the fifteenth puppy.
Usher and her husbands started looking up records of the number of puppies in a litter. In the United Kingdom, the highest number was 18 with the second being 13. At this rate, she already beat out the second highest, and they were fearful that she’d beat the record holder.
“The way that Jessie was going, and the speed at which they were coming out of her, we were fearing that it would get as high as 20. Thankfully it was all over by about 8.00am.”
When it comes to feeding 15 hungry puppies, Usher bought formula to help, but Jessie is a very protective mom, and she wants to do everything herself.
“I bought a load of formula so that I could feed the puppies, but I’ve not been able to so far because Jessie has been so protective of them. She’s got that natural motherly instinct.”
Not only is Jessie a wonderful and doting mother, she still takes care of their family’s seven-year-old cat named Mini. She is such a special and compassionate dog.
The family named the biggest dog ‘Walter’ and the smallest pup ‘Daisy.’ They haven’t named the others as they all look so similar. Usher is still deciding what to do with all of these puppies.
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