Can a 7 year old Lab have puppies

By Isabella Storyclaire

last updated November 18, 2024

Contributions sourced from

Labrador Retriever Breeding Age: Male and Female

What Is the Right Age for Breeding a Labrador?

Male Labradors

A male Labrador becomes fertile after six months of age and reaches his full sexual maturity once he's 12 to 15 months old.

An adult male Labrador can mate at any time. If the Labrador is healthy, he may be able to keep his fertility and be sexually active until old age.

It's pretty straightforward with male dogs. However, several other factors come into play when we try to breed a female Labrador. So let's talk about breeding female Labradors in detail.

Female Labradors

A female Labrador will have her first heat cycle after she's six months old. This is the phase in which she can get pregnant. It reoccurs around every six months until late in life. We'll talk more about the heat cycles of Labradors in the next section.

You should never breed a female Labrador during her first heat cycle. She is quite young at this point, and you don't want to impose the stress of pregnancy and lactation on her as she's still growing.

Even though she may be sexually active, she isn't completely mature physically. Mating during the first heat cycle increases the chance of pregnancy and other health-related complications.

We shouldn't breed the female Labrador until she's physically mature. Since Labradors fall into the category of large breeds, they mature around the age of 18 to 24 months, so it's best to avoid breeding until the third heat cycle or until she's around two years old.

Related article: How Many Puppies Do Labradors Usually Have? Litter Sizes Explained

Understanding Female Heat Cycles

Understanding the heat cycles of your female Labrador is essential to avoid failed breeding attempts or unplanned litter of pups.

When we say that a female Labrador goes into heat, we mean that her body is preparing itself for possible conception. It's your dog's reproductive cycle. Phrases such as heat cycle, breeding cycle, and periods, all refer to the same thing.

A Labrador stays in the heat for around three to four weeks; there's no exact number of days, though. Although your pet may stay in the heat for up to four weeks, the days when she's most fertile begin after 9-10 days into the heat cycle. This high-fertility period lasts for around five days, so you should mate the Labradors between the 10th and 14th day of the female Labrador's heat cycle.

This heat cycle is divided into four stages: proestrus, estrus, diestrus, anestrus. Let's briefly discuss each of them.

Proestrus: The female dog is getting ready for pregnancy. Male dogs will start getting attracted to her, but she won't allow breeding as of yet. This stage typically lasts for nine days. You'll see physical signs such as the swollen vulva and bloody vaginal discharge.
Estrus: At the beginning of this stage, the ovary releases eggs. The estrogen levels in your dog's body decline, while the progesterone levels go up. The female dog is fertile in this stage, ready to mate, and she will follow her bodily instincts and accept a male. This stage also lasts for around nine days.
Diestrus: This stage lasts for two to three months or until the female Labrador gives birth (if she's pregnant). She will no longer be accepting males. A bloody discharge may still be present, but it gradually stops. By the end of this stage, the hormonal levels in your dog become normal.
Anestrus: This is the final stage of the heat cycle of your female dog. There's no sexual activity during this phase.

Most female Labradors go into heat twice a year. The ovarian activity of a female dog starts to decline in the sixth year of her life. Most of them stop conceiving after they're seven years old.

Related article: What Size Whelping Box Do You Need For A Labrador?

What Happens if You Breed Labradors Too Young?

We've discussed that we should wait till the third heat cycle of a female Labrador before breeding. But what are the health concerns if a Labrador gets pregnant too early?

You need to allow your Labrador's body to grow up. If the female Labrador gets pregnant before maturing physically, it'll put extra strain on her. The physical strain of carrying extra weight is a burden on the growing joints.

Apart from that, pregnancy will suck out nutrients from your dog. Since the female Labrador is young, her immune system isn't fully developed. This means that she's more vulnerable to diseases and infections than an adult dog would be. Various bacteria can infect her reproductive tract, causing abortions, stillbirths, miscarriages, and even the death of the newborn puppies.

Your dog may even end up dying while giving birth to the puppies. Because she hasn't fully grown, her pelvic canal may not be large enough for the puppies to fit through without endangering their own lives and the life of the mother. Here, she must go through surgery, which increases the chances of health complications for her.

Since she is also not mature biologically, she is more likely to abandon her puppies than an adult mother. She may fail to care for them, which lowers their chances of survival.

Performing Health Checks Before Breeding

Both parent Labradors require long-term care to produce beautiful, strong puppies. They need to be physically and mentally healthy. The female Labrador should have decent muscle tone and a balanced weight before breeding.

Apart from physical health, they also need to be in good mental condition. A mentally stable female Labrador will make a better mother than one that's insecure or has an unstable temperament.

A month before breeding, the female Labrador should go through pre-breeding physical examinations by a vet. You need to get her checked for common health problems, such as elbow dysplasia, hip dysplasia, and eye disorders.

The vaccinations of both parent Labradors should be current, and the female Labrador should be tested for parasites as well.

DNA Testing

Another health check that I would highly recommend for any dog owner, but especially for one that is considering breeding, is to have DNA testing done.

In recent years human DNA testing has become extremely popular with companies like 23andme emerging. People are interested in understanding their background, health sensitivities, etc. This is no different for dogs!

A company called Embark has a Breed + Health testing kit that allows owners to learn about their dogs breed, health, and ancestry! This kit tests for over 170 health conditions and uses over 200,000 markers to identify and build a complete genetic profile. It is simple and non-invasive. All you have to do is perform a quick oral swab and mail it in! Easy!

Follow this link to receive a discount on your kit!

Conclusion

We've just talked about a lot of different things. Here are the important points from this article:

Male Labradors reach full sexual maturity after 12 to 15 months of age.
Female Labradors have their first heat cycle after six months of age.
We should wait until the third heat cycle before breeding, which happens after 18 to 24 months of age.
The mating should take place between the 10th and 14th day of the female Labrador's heat cycle, as she's most fertile during this period.
Conception before physical maturity can cause health complications.
We also need to perform pre-breeding health checks to ensure that the female Labrador is healthy and ready to conceive.

Labrador Behavior By Age

When my first dog was an unruly puppy, a Labrador owner told me that the onset of adolescence would be worse. Then that hed improve quite a lot at a year old, and fully settle down at three years old. It wasnt really what I wanted to hear at the time. But with hindsight I can kind of see their point. In fact, whilst there will always be exceptions that prove the rule, there are also some reliable patterns of Labrador behavior by age. Puppies will be attention seeking and need lots of management. Adults will be active, friendly and easy-going. And seniors will start to slow down and show signs of old age. Heres a year-on-year guide to what to expect from your Lab as they grow up.

The development of Labrador behavior

Just like our own lifetimes, Labradors lives are characterized by distinct periods infancy, adolescence, adulthood and old age. Of course, it all happens much faster in them though, because they pack it all into and average of just 12 or 13 years. Youve probably heard the adage that one human year is worth 7 dog years. But the rate at which they mature (and their behavior changes with age) isnt uniform. A more accurate way to think about it is like this:

The first 6 months of a puppies life is roughly equivalent to the first 10 years of a human childs life.
Between 6 and 12 months old, they will enter adolescence.
At a year old, they are a mature adolescent.
Sometime between 2 and 3 years old they become physically and mentally mature.
And at 9 years old, they start to become seniors.

Labrador behavior by age: the first 6 months

Infant Labradors are champion nappers, attached to their primary carer to the point of clinginess, playful, and impulsive.

Sleep patterns

Young Labrador puppies are growing and learning fast, and they need a lot of sleep to support their development. However, its likely theyre still waking up in the night, or at least getting up early in the morning, in order to pee. So, they make up for it by napping frequently during the day. Which is alright for them, even though it can be cripplingly tiring for us! But hang in there most puppies are sleeping through the night at 14 weeks old. After that they will gradually start waking earlier in the morning too.

Clinginess

Infant Labs are often described as velcro puppies. Its highly likely that theyll want to be close to you at all times. There is a double whammy of reasons for this. Firstly, they are instinctively aware that they are still too small and vulnerable to survive alone. So they know its in their best interests to stay close to you, and make sure you dont forget about them. Secondly, Labradors have been bred over many generations to be innately people-focussed, since dogs who were naturally motivated to remain close to their owners made better workers.

Playfulness

Labrador puppies spend more time playing than at any other time in their lives. But lots of first time puppy parents are taken aback by exactly how ferocious puppy play behavior can be! Barking, growling, lunging, pouncing, and biting are all completely normal elements of puppy play. In the wild, they would be valuable practice for hunting in future, and the natural instinct to start practicing early lives on, even this long after domestication.

Impulsiveness

Puppies of all types are generally a chaotic presence. They have very little impulse control, so they rarely sit still for long, and they cannot resist temptation. Its up to us to manage their environment so that this doesnt become a problem. For example, dont wait for them to start playing with shoes, then try and teach them not to. Make sure those shoes are kept out of reach in the first place, and give your puppy plenty of suitable toys instead.

The sweet spot

There is a point when a Labrador puppy is roughly akin to an 8 year old child. They sleep well, use the toilet in the right place, understand instructions, and hang off your every word. Enjoy it while it lasts, but dont get complacent that your training is over, because puberty is just around the corner. A whole new stage of Labrador behavior is coming!

Labrador behavior by age: adolescence

Labradors adolescent period is characterized by becoming more bold, confident, and independent. If we think of it in terms of their wild ancestors again, they are no longer so vulnerable and reliant on the protection of adults around them. And time to start thinking for themselves, in anticipation of being an self-sufficient adult soon.

You might start to discover that the little puppy who never left your side off the leash will suddenly cross soccer fields to say hello to another dog. And that when you try to call them back, theyve gone deaf to the recall cue which worked so reliably a couple of weeks ago. These are all normal parts of growing up. During this stage, you need to protect your cues by not using them when your dog is likely to ignore you, and manage their opportunities to make unwanted decisions instead. For example, by using a long line, or exercising them in a secure field.

Adolescence is also associated with the onset of sex differences in behavior. For example, unneutered male dogs tend to carry out more scent marking than either spayed or intact females, or neutered males. And unspayed female dogs will start going into heat every 6 months or so.

The secondary fear period

Some adolescent Labradors also go through whats known as a secondary fear period. As they become more independent, and stop relying on others to look out for them, they instinctively become more cautious about new and unfamiliar things as well. In the wild, its a tried and tested survival adaptation. But it can be frustrating to deal with if it also means they start becoming reactive in situations when they previously werent. If this happens, the key is not to push them to handle more than they are comfortable with given them space, and and gradually restore they emotional response to a positive one using treats.

Labrador behavior by age: adulthood

By the time your Labrador is 2 or 3 years old, their physical and emotional journey to adulthood is complete. Hopefully, if you socialized them carefully as a puppy, and trained them consistently until now, they have become all the things you dreamed of. And at last, they have reached a point where if you treat them consistently, their behavior will remain consistent too.

The Labrador breed is famous for being friendly and easy company. They are exceptional at learning and remembering new cues, and famously food motivated, so teaching and maintaining good manners should be straightforward. They have lots of energy and stamina, so theyre great buddies for running, hiking or cycling with. But without enough exercise they might resort to unwanted behaviors such as chewing furniture, barking or digging in the garden.

Factors which will affect the behavior of your mature adult Labrador include:

The temperament of their parents
Socialization they received as a puppy
Training
How much physical exercise they get
How much mental stimulation they receive
Diet
How much time they spend alone
Health factors
Positive and negative experiences

An example of how health factors and experience can affect behavior is if a Lab experiencing joint pain from hip dysplasia is jumped on by a playful younger dog. This could make them reactive towards encounters with other dogs in future, because they want to warn off another potentially painful experience.

Labrador behavior by age: the senior years

In veterinary terms, Labradors are considered senior from roughly 9 years old onwards. However, many Labs remain active long past this point. The average retirement age of Labradors working as gundogs is 10 years old, and this is more likely to be due to physical factors such as arthritis or deafness than not being mentally up to the job any more.

Theres no reason why old age alone should change a Labs behavior. But, old age is associated with a broad range of physical changes, and increased likelihood of illnesses, many of which can cause behavior changes. For example

Senior dogs are more likely to be diagnosed with diabetes, and are less able to fight off infections like UTIs. Which means their toilet habits might change, including needing to get up in the night to pee again.
Sensory changes such as sight and hearing loss mean they might become less responsive to your cues, or less confident in unfamiliar situations.
Physical changes like loss of muscle mass and degeneration of their joints means they might slow down, and be less interested in things they used to enjoy, like walks or playing fetch.
The older they get, the more likely dogs are to show signs of canine cognitive dysfunction (CCD), which his akin to dementia in humans. CCD may include behavior changes such as night waking, forgetfulness, and becoming disorientated.

Take your senior dog for regular veterinary checks to help manage these changes, and for practical advice on making their golden years as comfortable as possible.

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Labrador behavior by age summary

Labrador behavior by age can be viewed in terms of four distinct periods puppyhood, adolescence, adulthood and senior years. Adulthood is the easiest, and (thankfully) the longest too! Whilst all the other stages present their own unique challenges, they are just that stages, which will pass. Knowing what to expect makes them easier to manage, and realizing they are transient helps us appreciate the privilege of spending a lifetime with our Labs.

Let us know how your Labradors behavior changed over their lifetime using the comments box down below. Have you got any tips for surviving the puppy and adolescent stages? Or for making their senior years