To spay or not to spay?

Thanks so much everyone. She had her first season back in Feb/March. Our previous dog wasn’t spayed and suffered like SachaMac’s dog.
I just feel it’s a bit unkind to put her through an operation. The vet was very reassuring this morning.

I nearly lost my first whippet with pyometra when she was 8. She was never the same dog again. And my current dog was booked in for a spay after her first season and had what seemed to be a womb infection so they had to be very careful when they operated. I don’t agree with having them spayed before they’ve had a season though.

Yes, without any hesitation. I have always had pets spayed/neutered as had no intention of breeding from them and it saved them from a lot of hassle overall.

Yes, I would have her spayed. We’ve had two female dogs. The first we didn’t spay. She used to go into a depression when she came into season, didn’t want to go out etc. Once it was over, she was back to normal. Looking back, we should have had her done.

When we had a second dog, we had her spayed as a puppy and it saved a lot of hassle.

Yes I would, years ago I had a lovely little Westie, we never had her spayed, no particular reason, we didn’t want to breed with her, we just never got round to it and she rarely came into season. She ended up with a doggy version of breast cancer and had to have surgery to have the affected line of teats removed. It was a hormonal linked cancer & the vet told us it is much more common in dogs that haven’t been spayed. She had two operations to remove the tumours but sadly it came back & she was very poorly & had to be put to sleep. Since then I have had three male dogs but if I had another bitch I would definitely have her spayed. That’s just my experience, I’m sure others will have different opinions.

It is the first thing I do when adopting a female dog. Once the female dog has had her first season then 3months later we have her spayed. It saves coping with a season every 6months, saves coping with changes in behaviour during season, prevents false pregnancies with behaviour issues, prevents pyometra.

Definitely. We had ours spayed after her first season. It saves a lot of mess, and of course stops the attention of all the boys in the district.