The boom of pet ownership leaves a few questions about the importance of neutering your pet.

There can often be mixed feelings and a lot of old wives’ tales when it comes to what’s best for the health of your cat or dog. A number of countries have a huge stray problem which could be helped if spaying and castration were more readily available and affordable. While dog neutering can be expensive for pet owners, many consider it to be a necessary expense as part of their duty to be a responsible pet owner.

In the UK, most pets, specifically cats and dogs we meet, are neutered. However, with the recent boom, there seems to be a lack of education about the neutering aspect of owning a pet. Here are some of the important factors to consider and why you should be neutering your pet.

Importance Of Neutering Your Pet

Longer and Healthier Life

Spaying helps prevent uterine infections and breast cancer, which is fatal in 50% of dogs and 90% of cats.

Neutering male pets can prevent testicular cancer, if done before pets are six months and older. On top of preventing disease, spaying and neutering also protect your pet from unwanted and unplanned litters.

Lack of exercise and overfeeding will cause your pet to pack on the extra pounds, not spaying or neutering. A common old wives tales that we need to forget, along with it’s good for them to have 1 litter. It most certainly has its health implications along with financial strains.

Your pet will remain fit and trim as long as you continue to provide energetic activities and monitor food intake. They will not get fat just because they are neutered.

Won’t Have Seasons

While cycles can vary, female felines usually go into heat for four to five days every three weeks during breeding season. To “advertise” for mates, they’ll yowl and urinate more frequently, sometimes all over the house. This can be for very long periods of time and if they are allowed out the house they will go searching for a mate.

Female dogs go into heat on average twice a year. It can be for two to four weeks each time and also exhibit undesirable behaviours including messy discharge. This can leave your female dog vulnerable to male dogs if out on walks during her season.

Close To Home

An un-neutered male cat or dog will do just about anything to find a mate. That includes digging his way under fences or dashing out the door to escape from the house. Once he’s free to roam, he risks injury in traffic and fights with other animals.

This urge to seek a mate is lessened after neutering. They are more likely to stick to their territory which is their own back gardens and surrounding gardens.

Neutered Pets Are Better Behaved

Dogs and cats that are not neutered may mark their territory by spraying strong-smelling urine all over your home. It can be a struggle to remove cat urine smell from your furniture as the scent seems to linger.

Neutered pets focus their attention on their human families, and early neutering may help avoid aggression problems too.

This can be beneficial to training and building a bond with your pet. This can also help your pet bond with its other fur-family so they can live harmoniously together.

Cost-Effective

The cost of your pet’s spay or neuter surgery is a lot less than the cost of having and caring for a litter. That is without any complications that might occur during pregnancy.

It also beats the cost of treatment if your unneutered pet escapes and gets into a fight with the neighbourhood stray. Which with more of us having cats it’s more likely that your beloved pet will have a run in with another cat at some point in their day.

Letting your pet produce offspring you have no intention of keeping is not a good lesson for your family. There are so many unwanted animals that end up in shelters, this can be avoided if we are not letting our pets breed.

Lucy’s law has been put into place to try and discourage backyard and unethical breeders.

Overpopulation

Every year, millions of cats and dogs of all ages and breeds are euthanised at animal shelters or suffer as strays.

These high numbers are the result of unplanned and unwanted litters that could have been prevented by spaying and neutering. Over breeding and fashionable breeds of dogs also end up in shelters where they no longer fit in with the life or style of their own.

Right Thing For Wellness

As a pet owner, it is your responsibility to offer the best care possible for your cat or dog.

As part of your duty of care spaying and neutering your pet is the right thing to do and should be one of the first things addressed once your pet is acquired. There is a certain age which is deemed most appropriate and this is a discussion best to have with your vet based on your individual pet and circumstances.

The Community

It is sad to see a stray cat or dog unkempt without a home.

Stray animals pose a real problem not only to themselves but to other cats, dogs, and people. They can cause traffic incidents, carry, and spread disease, and frighten people and their pets.

Spaying and neutering pack a powerful punch in reducing the number of animals on the streets. The importance of neutering your pet and ultimately fewer strays and unwanted pets are left to fend for themselves.

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