Not Neutered Dog.. Is this Normal? and will neutering change him?

[Fran101]

Romeo is not neutered (yet..) I'm going to wait until hes a bit older . Hes about 1 1/2 now and well, he doesn't mark, wander, hump, act aggresively, or anything like that! so I was wondering. is that normal? Isn't that what everyone says un neutered dogs do?

The not marking thing was a big surprise. I even bought a weenie wrap anticipating his arrival. but he doesn't mark inside at all.. he only marks trees and mailboxes and bushes lol Everyone had me worried that this unnetuered chihuahua would be peeing on every upright thing in my house! lol

He is just a friendly, nice, well behaved little dog with just the greatest personality and im worried that neutering him will change him somehow :/ make him less..I dunno, eager lol Right now hes just so peppy about everything in life. always ready for a walk, a game, to meet someone new..
He loves to cuddle and is loving and sweet. hes also very motivated and trainable, which from what I hear.. is not so common with chihuahuas lol

Will neutering change him?

His breeder is giving me free reign mostly on the neutering thing and when it would be best to do it. she likes to wait until atleast 2 I think she said.. & hes on limited registration regardless lol

I dunno, i guess im just being a baby about this but I figure if it ain't broke.. why fix it? hes so small (well hes average for a chihuahua but still @ 5.5 pounds, still pretty small for a dog) and Im just worrying about putting him through the surgery :/

I would really love however for people to stop trying to pressure me into breeding him.. that is getting annoying tho he has so much hair back there that I just tell people he's neutered anyway lol oh and its not just breeding him with other chihuahuas, ive gotten all kinds of offers lol yorkies, shnauzers, pomeranians.. its like they dont care as long as the pups will be small lol

 

[Doberluv]

I think that's a common misconception that neutering will make such a vast improvement in certain behaviors. The most influence on a dog's behavior is his training/personality etc. I'm sure there are some things that neutering may help a little bit. (ie: the tendancy to wander)But to put so much emphasis on it or to attribute neutering to a big difference is just not very accurate, imo. Lots of people have intact dogs and manage just fine.

 

[bubbatd]

I never found any difference , but then I never had horny dogs .

 

[Grab]

I've not noticed any personality changes in my neutered males. I think that, particularly if you're waiting until after two, you won't see a difference. Even small dogs do fine in surgery these days. My 9ish lb dog goes under for a dental every few years, and she's an elderly girl

 

[Xandra]

I'm also a proponent of the "if it ain't broke don't fix it"

I never really considered neutering because a) I thought about breeding him and b) I wanted to work through having an intact dog so I knew how to handle all those crazy intact male dog behaviors when I DO get breeding dogs (lol, non existent in this case).

It's become apparent that he doesn't need to be neutered. Why pay to have someone remove his body parts, which like you said carries a certain risk, when he's perfectly behaved?

My mom's dog, which had the whole pediatric neuter thing dog is the humper at the dog park, my dog has never humped at the park.

The only things I can think of are that some places are not friendly towards intact dogs. Like some doggy daycares, dog parks, etc.

Also, if he gets out the dog catcher fine will be probably be larger.

Other than that... I say keep him the way God made him

 

[Baxter'smybaby]

I had Wilson neutered pretty quickly after he got here since he humped everything in sight--lol! It did cut down on that behavior--but I would also guess my not allowing it and redirecting that behavior also influenced it.
Beyond that-_I don't have much to add!

 

[Dogs6]

We have three unneutered dogs and we don't have any probs but I think we are going to get Fudge neutered anyway just because there is not a chance in the world he will be mated and he is going to hopefully be doing agility and I don't want him to be distracted lol. If it wasn't for that he would probably not be neutered because there is no need and like you said if it's not broken don't fix it.

 

[PoodleMommy]

I wouldnt really worry about his personality changing and I would be concerned about testicular cancer in the future. Also I wouldnt worry about him being put under at his weight.

But the idea that all unnuetered dogs are behavior problems is not true.

Too bad you dont have a girl, I was sick of people asking about breeding, so I just started saying Chloe was fixed even though she isnt, LOL... but I guess you cant really do that with a boy.

 

[elegy]

i wouldn't expect to see much change in his personality upon neutering either.

steve is a marker (i suspect that comes from his insecurity more than anything) but that's really the only behavioral issue i have with him. he's 13 months now. he has a retained testicle so he has to be neutered, but i think i'd still go ahead and neuter him anyway when he turns two. i want to wait until he's fully mature, but i don't particularly want to deal with the health issues (prostatitis, perianal fistulas, etc) that are more common in intact dogs, and i don't think that neutering him as an adult will be especially detrimental to him.

 

[bubbatd]

My females were bigger humpers that my males ..... not on people though !

 

[colliewog]

I've never neutered a male before 6-7 yrs old. I've never had any hormone-related bad behaviors, so saw no need to rush. I'm with the others ... If he ain't broke, don't fix him (yet). LOL

 

[Boemy]

Doesn't not neutering increase the risk of testicular cancer?

I've never had neutering/spaying make any difference in my pets in terms of personality--friendliness, aloofness, dorkiness, etc. Haven't had any ballooning weight gain either.

It DOES sometimes make males stop marking. One of my coworkers had two chihuahuas that started marking her furniture. She neutered them. They stopped. I can guarantee it was the neutering that changed them and not any training on her part because she didn't do a lick of training with those dogs. Thank God they started marking because otherwise she was planning to breed them to a French bulldog her friend owned.

I guess my question would be . . . has he ever been around a female in heat so you'd know how he would react? And if there was a female in heat around, are you positive you can contain him and keep him away from her? Will he drive you crazy while you're keeping him away? All things to consider.

About the surgery risks . . . Really, I don't think there's much risk with neutering. It's not invasive at all and can be done on animals much, much smaller than 5.5 lbs. (My cats were done when they weighed 1 lb 4 ounces each.)

Edit: Are there options for neutering with just local anesthetic instead of "putting them under"? I started thinking about this because it's what they do with horses, isn't it?

 

[colliewog]

Testicular cancer is not that common to be honest.

With neutering, the process is different in dogs than it is in cats (and I assume horses). They require general anesthesia for the process.

 

[Xandra]

With neutering, the process is different in dogs than it is in cats (and I assume horses). They require general anesthesia for the process.

Could you elaborate on that? lol this is intriguing.

 

[colliewog]

How they are 'designed' is different for one, although I don't have pics to elaborate, I can describe the typical castration process, as I've assisted quite frequently in both. (Different vets might do it differently, but this is the most common method for both I've seen over the 14 yrs I was a vet tech).

With cats, you make an incision at the back of the scrotum, pull out the testes, auto-ligate the tubes (some vets will tie off with sutures), cut off the testicles, and then let the area heal on its own ... no suturing.

With dogs, you have to make an incision in front of the scrotum (between the scrotum and the penis sheath), pull the testicles out of the scrotum and out through this incision. Then, the same process - either tie off or auto-ligate and then remove the testicles, and then release the tubes back into the body. Then you suture the incision closed.

With horses/cattle, I honestly don't know what they do.

Now a spay of a dog/cat is the same technique, it's just the boys that are done differently.

 

[Juicy]

Valentino is neutered......still crazy nutjob of a dog lol and he was neutered 'too early' too. Well all my dogs are fixed, and they're all nutcases.

I was afraid of Princess being a dachshund gaining weight from being spayed, but she's still her twig self.

 

[lizzybeth727]

hes also very motivated and trainable, which from what I hear.. is not so common with chihuahuas lol

That's actually quite common with chihuahuas.... it's NOT common, however, for chihuahua owners to be driven to train their chis.

I don't think you're going to see much difference when you do neuter Romeo. I've worked with intact males and seen the difference when they get neutered, and IMO the biggest difference is in dog interractions. Two intact males sometimes have issues together, and I've seen some almost obsessive about marking the same spot that the other dog has marked; those things often (not always) go away after the dog is neutered and you give them time for the hormones to get out of their system (it's not an immediate change, takes a few months).

Could you elaborate on that? lol this is intriguing.

I don't know the process of neutering dogs or cats; but my friend used to be a vet tech and her vet would let her neuter cats on her own because the surgery was so simple. She was not allowed to neuter dogs or other animals, though.

 

[Juicy]

About the surgery risks . . . Really, I don't think there's much risk with neutering. It's not invasive at all and can be done on animals much, much smaller than 5.5 lbs. (My cats were done when they weighed 1 lb 4 ounces each.)

Neutering compared to a spay, is a small invasive procedure. You could get animals like ferrets, rabbits and stuff neutered, why not a small dog? The shelter that I got my dogs fixed, they s/n as young as 6 or 9 weeks I believe it was and as long as the animal is more than 2lbs.

 

[Grab]

Testicular cancer is not that common to be honest.

.

It may not occur in every unneutered dog, but I've worked in two vet practices (in two different states..so it is not an area specific thing) and have seen quite a few cases of testicular cancer in dogs. My grandparent's dog died of testicular cancer that spread. (and, for what it is worth, I knew of a human male who had a retained testicle not treated in his childhood years for whatever reason, who had testicular cancer that spread to his liver, lungs and brain...so not just a dog thing). We currently have a 1 1/2year old Golden coming in with a nasty testicular tumor, whose owners can't yet afford to neuter him. Part of that is on the vet, who focused on his losing weight and insisted on lab tests for other illnesses (which were negative), so used up their neuter money. So now they cannot yet afford surgery.

I doubt it is as common as mammary cancer in female dogs (which I see much more often), but it does happen. As well as hernia and prostate issues (the latter of which I do see quite commonly).

Just to note, I in no way think every male dog needs to be neutered. As long as their owners are responsible, it really doesn't matter what parts they have. However, for my own pets, since I have no plans to breed, I choose to neuter. I've seen a dog's prolonged recovery after a neuter for a testicle tumor (since they usually take all of the scrotum skin as well) and don't want to take the risk with my pets. And perianal hernias are some of the, to me, grossest things ever. So I'd like to avoid the chance of that too (because ick)

As far as the neuter surgery itself, it takes about 20 minutes tops from first induction of anesthesia, shaving/cleaning the area etc to the last suture. Most of the time I've barely written up my surgery chart by the time the surgery is done.

 

[Doberluv]

The cancer prevelence, type and severity, in intact males is much, much less than those cancers in neutered dogs. Bone cancer is more likely in (early) neutered dogs than it is in neutered. There is a higher incidence of it than say, testicular cancer in intact dogs. If a dog is neutered after he is through maturing, I believe this is much safer and allows his bones to develop more normally. This is my understanding, at any rate.

The main thing for me is that intact dogs....male or female do NOT accidently breed. If a person is not really, really, really good at preventing escapes or accidental breedings, then the dog should be neutered or spayed.