Reversible dog "neutering"

[FoolOnTheHill]

I saw an article about this in the newspaper, but here's a link explaining what it is: Dog contraceptive signals end to castration - life - 11 July 2007 - New Scientist

Seems pointless to me; it will only encourage people to not neuter their dog just in case they want to breed, which they'll probably think "Oh might as well...we'll have cute puppies ".
What does everyone think about this?

[envisionary333]

Oh... my... God. I can't believe it. That may be the worst idea I have ever heard in my entire life, ever. Besides the obvious problem of promoting dog breeding and giving people an excuse not to neuter, who knows what the negative side effects might end up being for the poor dogs.

And I thought that doggy diet pills were bad.

[piggly wiggly]

I think this is ridiculous, the only way I think it is a good idea, is for animals that are at risk going under for surgery. Some animals that are old, or weak or can't have anesthesia. But even still, this is weird.

[DocDolittle]

Oh great, it's a backyard breeders dream. "Maybe I'll wait till later to further the overpopulation of dogs..." Even if these come out, spaying and neutering is still the best option, in my opinion.

[seagirl96]

Sounds like a really bad idea. How many puppies would get produced because someone forgot to mark it on the calendar when the dog was due for a new implant? I can only think of one good use as pigglywiggly said, for older unneutered dogs who might be a bad risk for surgery.

[Hooray4Ashley]

As a vet tech the first thing that pops into my head is that no where in that story did they even suggest the health benefits to neutering. Neutering for me isn't about my dogs not breeding, because for a while I just had two male dogs, it was about the health benefits of doing so. I cannot even begin to tell you the number of older intact males that we have come in with prostate problems and end up needing to be neutered at older ages, 10, 11, 12 to try to aid in correcting these problems. Don't even get me started on using it on female dogs. Pyometras (infected uterus) are deadly a lot of the time, false pregnancies can make them extremely ill, not to mention the chances of cancer that are reduced by spaying alone. It's sickening to think that these people fail to mention all of that in the ad. I read the title of the article to my husband and the first thing he said was "Neutering isn't just about breeding". He hit the nail on the head.

[seagirl96]

Neutering for me isn't about my dogs not breeding, because for a while I just had two male dogs

I'm glad you had your dogs neutered for any reason at all, but there are still other people who think "I don't need to neuter my dog because I have a MALE. I just find that so ignorant and irresponsible. As most of us here know, you don't get puppies without a male.

I hope I made it clear that I am not talking about you, hooray4ashley. I know you're saying yes, I neuter although my primary motivation is the health of my dogs. I appreciate you telling us that because I didn't know it would improve Boomer's chances of good health when I had him neutered. I had him neutered because I didn't want him to be responsible for any puppies and also because I wanted him to stay home. It has been my experience that an unneutered dog will do Anything to get to a female in heat and will travel for miles.

[Hooray4Ashley]

Originally Posted by seagirl96

I'm glad you had your dogs neutered for any reason at all, but there are still other people who think "I don't need to neuter my dog because I have a MALE. I just find that so ignorant and irresponsible. As most of us here know, you don't get puppies without a male.

I hope I made it clear that I am not talking about you, hooray4ashley. I know you're saying yes, I neuter although my primary motivation is the health of my dogs. I appreciate you telling us that because I didn't know it would improve Boomer's chances of good health when I had him neutered. I had him neutered because I didn't want him to be responsible for any puppies and also because I wanted him to stay home. It has been my experience that an unneutered dog will do Anything to get to a female in heat and will travel for miles.

You would be amazed at the amount of intact males we get in because the male owners "can't do that to them!". When their dogs are urinating blood because of prostate problems, but they say "I'm not chopping off his boys" it's sickening! A coworker of mine this week was talking about how her dog keeps getting out and taking off...HELLO! We work at a VETS office! He's not neutered, what do you expect?! Two weeks ago we had an intact male mastiff mix, the sweetest dog ever, three years old, come in because he was hit by a car. They think he got out because the neighbors dog was in heat. He ended up dying a horrible death. Not saying him being intact was the cause of his death, but it is likely the reason he wandered and had he been altered he may not have. It just amazes me some people. I adopted a pit bull from my work when he was 3 years old. He was not neutered and was heartworm positive. It killed me to have to wait until his heartworm treatment was finished to get him neutered. Ideally I wanted him neutered before I ever brought him home, because that's my preference, but the heartworm treatment takes 3 weeks and I was not kennelling him for that long at the clinic. We have clients whose dogs jump through windows and break the glass to go after females in heat. I don't know that this contraceptive would stop that behavior.

[landhermie]

Dog takes medicine. Dog runs outside and gets lost. Dog is lost for years. Medicine wears off. Dog impregnates a lot of stray females. More strays born.

RESULT OF MEDICINE: POINTLESS.

[Alusdra]

Things like this have been around a long time- but I am very annoyed with the tone of this article. It just perpetuates the idiotic notion that male dogs are emotionally attached to their testicles. They're not and they will certainly be happier, healthier and more livable companions neutered. In addition- they say that the shot is ~$90/shot- how many people are going to do that more than once or twice? And at that point you could have even a moderately expensive neuter. This is all around a bad idea. It's too bad the article was that biased- they seem to have decent articles on the environment and other new scientific things of interest... although I'm skeptical on some of the articles. Perhaps this is the science version of a tabloid? (I hope so!)

[Piggersrule]

Doggy birth control, what will they think of next?? I am not the least bit impressed with that article, it's a bad idea. Thank you but I will pass, I'll continue to use the best method of birth control and that to neuter.