Keeping entire dogs and bitches in the same house?

CastlelackSportHorses said:
also the male dog tormenting her, marking everything and being a general nuisance
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I appreciate you're a vet nurse, but this part is simply not true about all male dogs. You have to manage the situation.

@blackcob great article.. the table is very interesting. Cocker Spaniel bitches they advise to neuter beyond 23 months due to the cancer risk.
 
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I would say that Scout is being a nuisance but it’s manageable and won’t be for long. He’s not marking (we took him to the pub last night to give him a break and we wouldn’t have risked it if a leg lift was any danger). He is being a pest to all the girls, if allowed to. (Not humping, but being sniffy and over bouncy).
 
CastlelackSportHorses said:
I would honestly spay your bitch early, chances of getting a Pyo are high, and also the male dog tormenting her, marking everything and being a general nuisance will be less if she is spayed.
Im a vet nurse with over 10 years, and you can spay as young as 6 months with no ill effect. Giant breeds we leave until 10 months, but most bitch's don't have a season pre that.

I am a huge advocate for if they don't need them, get rid.
I have seen far too many entire bitches come in extremely sick due to owners thinking they were better off entire. Some never made it off the operating table.
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All the vets I know prefer to wait until at least 12 months , longer for a larger breed . My vet was in total agreement with me waiting until my GSD was 2.5 years before spaying .
 
MurphysMinder said:
All the vets I know prefer to wait until at least 12 months , longer for a larger breed . My vet was in total agreement with me waiting until my GSD was 2.5 years before spaying .
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Each to their own. All my own dogs were spayed/neutered at 6 months. Apart from my Greyhound as shes a giant.
They all were super healthy no issues.
So I would tell people to neuter as soon as they want.
No need to allow first heats.
Opinions tho!
 
The days of a blanket 6 months are long gone. I'm looking now at a corporate group's 5 page guidance document for canine neutering discussions, with an emphasis on contextualised care and not a one size fits all approach. It does broadly recommend that anything with an expected adult weight over 30kg should be delayed until over 18 months of age for males, or between 1st and 2nd seasons for bitches, but with a clear caveat that this guideline should not be taken in isolation with everything else in the document. It also references the study I linked earlier.
 
I do remember a time when it was advised to spay early- my vets used to give a discount if it was done prior to the first season. In fact my now 12.5yr old Dalmatian was spayed at 6months old.
Granted she never had a pyo but she has had more than her fair share of other medical issues including a mast cell tumour.

We absolutely will spay the potential new bitch but she will be given time to mature properly first.

As already stated, the dog (as it stands) is well mannered, quiet, doesn’t mark, isn’t a sex pest and is under control. He will be reminded of all this if he tries to show any behaviours that we aren’t happy with.

We are responsible owners with our dogs health and wellbeing at the forefront of our minds- we are able to keep them separate with the option of my parents taking one for a while if really needed. I’m sure we’ll muddle through!
 
blackcob said:
The days of a blanket 6 months are long gone. I'm looking now at a corporate group's 5 page guidance document for canine neutering discussions, with an emphasis on contextualised care and not a one size fits all approach. It does broadly recommend that anything with an expected adult weight over 30kg should be delayed until over 18 months of age for males, or between 1st and 2nd seasons for bitches, but with a clear caveat that this guideline should not be taken in isolation with everything else in the document. It also references the study I linked earlier.
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Hallelujah! My horsey vet (of long ago, I don't have a horse any more) was a huge advocate of wait until all those hormones had their jobs on the maturing front. He was quite convinced that early neutering was a key factor in a huge number of physiological problems, from digestion to dodgy elbows. He was large animal, but his small animal practice was part of a campaign group to get the studies done and bring on the delay, especially for bigger dogs. In fact it's why my Labrabugger never had his goolies off, and I suppose why I ended up with a litter of puppies. And his son who is my pride and joy.
 
CastlelackSportHorses said:
Each to their own. All my own dogs were spayed/neutered at 6 months. Apart from my Greyhound as shes a giant.
They all were super healthy no issues.
So I would tell people to neuter as soon as they want.
No need to allow first heats.
Opinions tho!
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That’s why it’s handy to have research instead of opinions 👍
 
Argh this grinds my gears so much!

This 'all my dogs were fine' so therefore it must be the case for everybody else's dogs.

It's all the time about everything.

'My dog loves socialising! Reactive dogs just need to be allowed to say hello!'

'Dogs don't need to have their nails clipped. You just have to walk them on the roads to keep them ground down. I have never clipped my dog's nails'

'My dog never had any vaccinations and he lived to be 18! Vaccinations are not necessary'

You get the point. Just because you have had dogs and not had issues resulting from an early spay, does not mean that thousands others haven't.
 
In my state any animal sold from a shelter or rescue has to be spayed/neutered before they are sent home with the new owner. Most of them used to give certificates for the surgery for 6 months but too many people didn't use them. There were even some lovely :rolleyes: planned crossbred litters.

My cat Ralph was neutered at ~8 weeks. And that's even though I know his foster and had worked in vet med for a zillion years. My sister got 2 girls from the same shelter though and she was allowed to bring them back for their spay. I don't know how that works.

If a person doesn't think they can keep a dog from breeding or being bred, then they should do and earlier than ideal surgery.

Rudy lived with bitches in season and had been bred. He didn't mark in the house.
 
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