Do your setter girls come in season together?

[Susan Stone]

A friend of mine who has always owned two to four Irish Setter bitches at one time mentioned the fact that according to the books the bitches should come in season more or less together... neither hers nor mine stick to what is written! They end up spacing themselves nicely around the year... driving the boys in the neighborhood crazy ;-)) Do yours stick to the book?

[Kristina Brannlund Westin]

Hi Susan!

When my older bitch have been in season, her daughter use to do too, but not always. Have heard that it is some kind of hormon in their urin who makes other bitches to come in season.

[Laura Kolbach]

And I heard that whenever the younger one(s) get into season, also the old one gets into season, because of the dominance (see wolves, only the alfa can have pups, etc).

I wish my girls would do it together. Would be much easier to avoid dogs in 3 weeks instead of 6... But nope. They do it at different times. Maybe they still need time to synchronize :-))))))))))

[Marta Galuszka]

I totally agree with you Laura - it would be much easier :-) Unfortunatelly my girls don't "co-operate" too;-) Hope some day they will:-)

[Pauliina Artiola]

For the first time in almost 6 years my bitches -all the three of them in the house - had their season at the same time.
All of them changed their normal "schedule" and started their seasons within 2 days. It`ll be interesting to see if it happens again in spring....

[Laura Kolbach]

tell us the secret :-)))

[Pauliina Artiola]

;))) I wish I could....

I was just wondering all the mess on their sheets. Didn`t expect Pulmu to be in her season just yet and Ami was already "late". And Nala followed their lead...

Would be so easy and nice that they`d do this more often ;))

[Susan Stone]

Pauliina, it sounds like you are the lucky one this time round! The rest of us seem to have bitches who do their own thing...
Mine don't really stick to the habits of wolves in this respect. Although nature still has her say: I believe the peak time for bitches coming in season is probably around Feb - April and Sept - Nov, with the proverbial exceptions to the rule...

Then there are those bitches who just won't come in season when you are wanting to mate her... The recommendation there is to put her with a bitch in season to speed things up - maybe it works, but on the other hand maybe she would have come in anyway...

One thing is definitely true: just before a bitch comes in season she can be really 'bitchy' to the others and games easily turn rough. The ones who is boss certainly makes sure this is respected...

[Katariina Roiha]

My girls come to season together! In the summer (june,july) and in the winter(december or january) And I have two bitches, mom and daughter. It is a blessing because we have 3 maledogs in the house too...

[Georgianne Carney]

My three girls come into heat 4 days apart of each other ,starting with oldest to youngest. I have the heat cycle done within one month for all of them. It makes my boys a little easier to deal with....:):)
Georgianne

[Henk ten Klooster]

Interesting topic. I know of one good book on this topic written by professor Naaktgeboren (Nakedborn) dealing with birth as well. Here season is mostly close to eachother, exception being young ones (first and second season).

As for wolves, I recall a few setters only one season a year, most from working lines. So like wolves. Hormones seem not to play a big role when out working - they forget about it, not afterwards:-) Preydrive is more intense. Talking about prey. Hormones play a big role in hares, one of my setters was beaten up by a "hormones hare" out training once in Poland.

[ursula wilby]

Most of my bitches actually only come in to season once a year...or almost. (That seems to throw Henks idea about working hard and "forgetting") Mine are about 10 - 11 months apart and yes they tend to start at the same time unless one gets mated and then it will change after the litter.
But they will try to combine their cycle again.
A friend of mine went to boarding school in England and swears that at the end of term most girls had their periods at the same time.
Although not at the beginning of term.
Off the subjec again...

[Susan Stone]

So it looks as if the books are right after all.

It seems possible that the likelyhood of synchronized seasons may have something to do with the family relationship, ie mother - daughter - grandaughter are more likely to be similar than unrelated bitches. What do you think?
The spacing of the seasons certainly seems to run in the family. From my C-litter the bitches have quite long intervals of around 10 months just like their mother. The girls from my 'B'-litter (unrelated to 'C') had intervals of 5.5 - 6.5 months - a real nuisance! These bitches also tended to have extreme false pregnancies.

As Henk comments I have also noticed how much keener the bitches are at work in the days before and during the first week of being in season. This changes dramatically during the last week... and they are then quite calm for the following 2 months during the time of would-be-pregnancy - this I believe is due to the higher level of progesterone for the 63 days following ovulation.

I read once that racing greyhounds (bitches) were removed from racing for 100 days from the first day of their season. Don't know if this is true, but it makes sense to me.

I'm not sure about the girls in boarding school - but if true it would proove once again that 'Hormones rule the World'.