Snip, Snip – Yikes! They are gone!!
February 28th 2007
Today I was loaded up and brought to where the white coated lady lives.
I was all ready to fight her AND all her Amazons, but they were giving me treats so I tolerated their company.
Suddenly I felt wozzy.
Did they drug my treats?!
Those sneaky, sneaky females!
HELP!!! I am losing consciousness … need chicken soup.
Slowly I awaken.
Something seems different.
Yikes! – I have this stupid thing around my neck (see first picture). I feel itchy, wozzy, and yucky.
White coated lady really sucks.
Wait a minute … something else is missing too … NOOOOooooooo!!
Shiba Wisdom
I don’t miss them. They just got in the way!![Note from 2-legs: Neutering prevents some health issues down the road and can help with mounting and some forms of dog aggression. However, spaying and neutering can also slightly increase the risk of certain types of cancer.]
I have a cute female Shiba pup (just turned 5 months) and is 17 lbs! Her name is Foxy and I have her down for being spayed once she’s 5 months and 2 weeks old. Is that too early? Will she continue to grow normally?
Have you found any reliable evidence or information on the effect of neutering on improved socialisation for male dogs? It seems to be an assumption or maybe a correlation but it seems impossible to know the effect of it on social or antisocial (inter-dog) behaviour as each dog is different and you don’t get to see both options in the adult dog. Too many times I’ve had my intact male dog playing happily with other people’s dogs in a dog park while they talk about how you can spot one a mile away and you always have to avoid them – evidently they are wrong as they then go on to tell me how much better my dog behaves than their own. Yet there must be something in this idea that being neutered helps them remain calm as he has had more incidents of other dogs showing aggressive postures and lunges toward him as he matures and he is now starting to be less than calm himself (no problems with any situation whatsoever to 11 months and now at 15 months I worry about seeing a husky in the park).
We have all the other reasons to neuter under control, not an issue or balanced either way but this one: is it neutering he needs or management, practise and training to get past this? Obviously you could say both but its hard to know, when I see so many dogs in dog parks who have been neutered being so much worse and normal for them I wonder how much is hormones and how much is giving him the mental tools to manage the situations better. He almost always seems relieved when I catch him in time and tell him to take it easy so it’s as though he’s forgotten that he has choices sometimes. He’s just started to behave badly (I really mean that: he will growl and stand over another dog in ernest – but of course no hint of damage – it’s communication but it’s not play) 3 times and its when he feels overwhelmed but it seems this happens quite ubruptly.
Reading this, if neutering helps, it’s time. But does neutering really help?
This article has a summary of some of the effects of spaying and neutering, together with relevant references to scientific studies-
http://www.associationofanimalbehaviorprofessionals.com/effects_of_neutering.html
However they also state the following –
I was wondering what age should Shibas be neutered? My 9 wk old has descended both testes and the vet says he can be neutered any time now. He has started humping my son, but I think that is Naru trying to gain dominance over him. Thanks for the help!
Hello Gennelle,
Shiba Sephy got neutered at around 6 months old.
The most difficult part of neutering was that he had to wear the Elizabethan Collar or cone collar. Sephy kept worrying at the wound area so he had to wear the cone the whole time and he did not like it. The low activity constraint was also difficult for us.
Poor Sephy – No Shiba running or jumping. 😀
As for the humping, Sephy did that as well, before and after neutering. For Sephy, the best way to stop that was to very consistently non-mark him (No or Ack-ack), and if he ignores that, he goes right into timeout. Sephy really dislikes timeouts, so he stopped his humping after he learned that it did not bring him good results.
http://shibashake.com/dog/puppy-biting-how-to-stop-puppy-biting#timeout
The cone! The dreaded cone!! I have been having major biting issues with my boy Shadow, but it only started after his surgery and wearing that cone for a week. He hated it and tried to bite me every time I hooked him up to go outside. The day I took the cone off he bit me three times and has bitten me a few more times, badly, since.
He has always disliked being picked up, but aside from that I used to be able to play with him, pet him, brush him… but no more. Other people can, his biting is only directed towards me. I’ve had my vet and a professional trainer help but to no avail. Besides biting me when I try to handle him Shadow and I get along fine. He follows me everywhere, wags like crazy when I come home, sleeps with me…
I’m at the point now I am seriously considering re-homing him to a friend who knows his story but gets along great with him.
Ahhh that darned cone!
Heh yeah – the only thing Sephy hates more than the Cone of Shame is the Vet! 😀
After a vet visit, he completely ignores us, and just stays in the backyard howling to the moon.
With time, you can likely retrain Shadow to be less sensitive to touch – but this type of desensitization work can take a long time and the change happens very slowly. I had to do some of that with Sephy because I used the alpha roll technique on him early on, and it really made him very distrustful of any kind of restraint or handling. He is much better now – but he still does not like getting picked up.
How did Sephy do with the cone? Once I went to pick up Reptar, our vet filled us in that Reptar was a terrible patient (they told us he was a good boy so we didn’t worry). Some Shiba screams and fights, then some crazy whining. Once he was home though, he left the stitches alone for the most part. No cone as our vet thought that would have an even worse impact on him. She recommended using some bitter apple on the incision site or putting vanilla extract around the incision. Reptar enjoyed the vanilla but scoffed at the bitter apple.
Hahaha – Sephy was awful with the cone. He absolutely hated it and tried getting it off himself. Initially, the vet office only fastened the cone on partially, and Sephy managed to get the cone half off by himself. It got stuck on his mouth, and cut his lip. There was a major production to get it off and then put it on again. We made sure to fasten it on fully after that – through all of the cone tabs.
We really needed the cone though because Sephy would start worrying at the incision site as soon as it came off. Bitter apple did not work with him.
And of course Sephy was totally going nuts because he was under a low activity routine – no jumping and no Shiba running. He was not a happy camper and he made sure that everybody around him knew it! Sephy is a terrible patient – just like me 😀
Btw. did you ever see Pixar’s Up? There are some hilarious scenes in there with the dogs and the Cone of Shame. 😀