Female dog in heat and what to do?

Our question this week was:

We just recently bought a female Airedale. She is going on 6 months old and I'm concerned about her going into heat. I've never owned a female dog before so don't know what to do at all. We plan on breeding her when she's 2 years old as the person we bought her from said that we should allow her to "mature" before her first litter. Is there a book or site I could read about raising a female and breeding, etc.

Thanks,

Ron C. - Arvada, CO


Answer

Hi – thanks for your email. I appreciate that you are being a responsible dog owner and wanting to learn about breeding early on.

You are right on about her potentially coming into heat. Many dogs have their first heat cycle sometime between 6 months and 1 year of age.

As far as resources, I can direct you to the free content on Petplace, which I think may answer many of your questions.