The Humane Society for Animals, Inc. works with local vets to spay or neuter every animal that comes through our shelter. For those in our community that give our animals a loving home or otherwise support our mission, we thought it might be helpful to explain why we spay and neuter our animals (and you should too). Here are just a few reasons for our spay-neuter policy.
The Health of the Pet
To spay your pet is to have their uterus and ovaries surgically removed; to neuter your pet is to have their testicales surgically removed. While that may sound like your animal companion is losing something, the routine procedure adds years to your pet’s life expectancy.
Spaying or neutering your pet eliminates their chances for ovarian or testicular cancer. Female pets also see a dramatic reduction in their chances for uterine infections or breast cancer. Each of these illness results in at least a 50% fatality rate, so why take the chance? We don’t.
The Behavior of the Pet
Have you ever heard that people do stupid things for love? Well, the same goes for our favorite animal companions. When female dogs are in heat, they urinate and bark more often in order to be noticed by the cute dog next door. Male dogs, in search of an unfound mate (or smelling the one next door), will perform wild escape acts, digging under fences, chewing up doors and otherwise wrecking your backyard.
Once an animals is spayed or neutered, these urges and their associated behaviors disappear. Other more abrasive behaviors dissipate as well, including the reduction in the especially foul smelling territory-marking male cats and dogs are more likely to engage in while intact.
The Number of Pets without a Home
This is the reason you will hear most often, and it’s sadly true. The ASPCA estimates approximately 6.5 million companion animals enter shelters every year with roughly half of those being dogs and the other half being cats. They estimate only roughly 4 million companion animals are either adopted or returned to their owners each year.
Unfortunately for the companion animals we all love so dearly, there are too few good people that become pet owners and too many animals without homes to allow the unchecked mating of pets. Our mission is to find loving homes for pets and not add to the ever-growing population of animals without families.
The Law
Our last reason is simple: it’s illegal for a shelter to not to spay or neuter our pets in the state of Arkansas. Fortunately for us, it’s an easy law to follow when we believe it will benefit the health of this generation of pets, making pet owners lives a little less smelly and decrease the number of pets without a home in the next generation of companion animals.
