Health

What Are the Benefits of Spay or Neuter?

By Michelson Found Animals

Black & white dog rolling on back in grass

What Are the Advantages?

Spayed or neutered animals no longer feel the need to roam to look for a mate. They stay home, making it less likely they’ll be hit by a car and lowering their incidence of contracting contagious diseases.
Spaying or neutering your pet reduces the risk of certain types of cancer that can be terminal for your pet, not to mention EXPENSIVE to treat.
Spaying or neutering your pet can eliminate undesirable behaviors like spraying, marking, and fighting.
Dogs and cats spayed before their first heat (six months of age) are virtually assured of not developing mammary cancer, a relatively common disease in unspayed females.
Spayed pets cannot develop the uterine infection called ”pyometra,” which is a life-threatening disease that occurs commonly in older, unspayed dogs and cats.
Spayed animals don’t go through heat cycles or produce unwanted puppies or kittens. “Heat” refers to when female dogs and cats prepare for mating and pregnancy.
In Los Angeles, spaying and neutering is the law. Fines for noncompliance start at $100. It’s also cheaper to register your pet with the city if he/she is neutered or spayed.

Spaying or neutering your pet reduces the risk of certain types of cancer that can be terminal for your pet, not to mention expensive to treat.

Answers to Common Questions

Spaying or neutering will NOT make your dog or cat fat and lazy. Overfeeding and inactivity will.
It is NOT true that a cat or dog should have one litter before being spayed. This only leads to more unwanted puppies and kittens.
It is NOT true that a cat or dog should have one heat cycle before being spayed.
Altering your pet will NOT change your pet’s personality. Cats’ personalities do not fully develop until about one year of age, and dogs’ personalities between one and two years. If your pet’s personality changes after spaying at an early age, it would have changed anyway, regardless of surgery.

The Michelson Found Animals Foundation’s mission of saving pets and enriching lives is made possible by the generous contributions of Dr. Gary Michelson and Alya Michelson.