We recently rescued a 9 month old mutt and have not gotten him to the vet to be neutered yet. Our 6 yr old mini schnauzer is not spayed. Today, we went out and forgot to put on her diaper. If my poor little girl was violated, how long will it be until we know she is pregnant? What will be the first signs?

From what I can tell -- (and I'm definitely not an expert on this!!) -- one of the first signs is that she'll go through something very similar to morning sickness in humans. Decreased appetite, vomiting, crankiness. After this is over she'll start to gain weight rather quickly and want to eat more -- all within the first 5 weeks. A vet might not be able to tell one way or another until she is about 45 days along, and the forming puppies can be felt in her abdomen. Apparently, I just learned that there's no pregnancy test for puppies!

I'd suggest to err on the side of caution. Ask your vet what she recommends for a pregnant dog -- you may want to look into changing her food and how she eats, just in case. Dogs only go into heat twice a year, though, so there's always the chance that she isn't pregnant. Heat stages last about three weeks and the actual stage in which she is fertile is usually between 5-9 days. Outside of this time, and you might be safe. Any idea when her last heat cycle was?

I don't have any idea when her heat cycle is/was ever. She never gets drippy like people have said they do. For a while, we thought she was fixed (we rescued her from an abusive situation), but the vet let us know she isn't. The male dog is only 9 months old. At a young age, they sometimes have difficulty with the act, so maybe she isn't. The only reason we thought she might be is because there has been a change in her activity level...she wants to be held, always licks (she has hardly ever licked in the 4 years we've had her) and is becoming food aggressive.

How long have you had the new addition? Maybe the change in her behavior is her adapting to the new guy -- staking her claim to her territory and making it know that you are her people and this is her food?

Well, let's hope for THAT one. The other dog is fairly new. We still think she might be preggers,and already have homes lined up for pups. I will have to keep one, of course. Then, they are both off to be fixed!

Good luck!! And good job on already having good homes lined up for the pups -- that's the hardest part!