Interesting article on waiting to spayed/neuter

jfunk

This article contains some great references to studies that would seem to advocate waiting until latter 14-18 months to spayed/neuter.

http://caninesports.com/SpayNeuter.html

NotoriousScrat

That's a really great article. It's nice to see such an article coming from an expert in the field (I hate how hard it is to find information from vets on some of these issues). That said, I hate how all articles evaluate the cancer risk. It doesn't matter, in terms of cancer, if a risk increases five times if the initial risk was only .01% where spaying/neutering prevents a cancer with a risk of 1%---because 1% is a 20 times greater risk than the .05% risk you would get from the other cancer. The actual percentages of cancer risk for a lot of these would be a lot more helpful, and possibly less misleading, for owners trying to make the decision about when to spay or neuter.

BradnJess

Love the synopsis, without being able to see the articles directly, looks like a good acknowledgement of the limitations and contradictions, as well!
I'm seriously considering forwarding this to my veterinary clinic. I got a cutesy post-card about a month ago that "told" Argos to "tell" me that he's getting close to 6 months old and the only option is to have his testicles removed (a little bit irrate about it). I suppose that's what happens when you only have two options for veterinary clinics.

Losech

@BradnJess Wow, that would annoy me as well.

I agree that early spaying/neutering is bad. I can see some of these affects with Conker (the shelter neutered him at 2 1/2 months), if I am guessing right. He's way too tall for a Shiba, very leggy, but that could be his background (mill pup) as well. Can't early-neuter males have joint problems? I am wondering if his LP is genetic or might have been caused/worsened by the early neuter.

I personally would never spay/neuter a dog under 2 years, 3 for large breeds, if I even did it at all. Which, honestly, I wouldn't unless there was a medical condition that made it 100% necessary or they were a carrier for some really bad inheritable genetic condition.

shibamistress

I'm glad to see another article about this too!

I thought I'd wait longer to neuter Oskar (we did it just after a year) and since we did have complications from the surgery, I'm even a bit more leery now about neutering. That said, I was REALLY tired of him licking Bel (and she was tired of it too!) and even more tired of him licking up her pee, and once he was snipped he stopped doing that!

*JackBurton*

I like this article as well.

http://www.naiaonline.org/pdfs/longtermhealtheffectsofspayneuterindogs.pdf <--- I will be giving a copy to my future puppy owners when the come to get their puppies.

Here is the rebuttal to the article cited by the OP.

http://www.columbusdogconnection.com/Documents/PedRebuttal .pdf