Health, Wellness and Fitness for People & Pets JUNE 2015

Spay & Neuter: Responsible pet ownership The decision to spay or neuter your pet can be the single best decision you make for your furry family member’s long-‐term welfare. Spaying and Neutering our pets help them to live happier, healthier, and longer lives while also helping to reduce pet over population, which also saves lives! It is right around this time of year when the serious extent of pet over population becomes overwhelmingly clear because all of the shelters in our community fill up with unwanted pregnant females and their puppies. This serious issue can be so easily curbed if people would just take the responsibility of spaying and neutering their animals. There are so many reasons why spaying and neutering our pets should be the obvious choice. First and foremost, we all want out fur children to live the longest, healthiest happy lives possible and a sure way to exponentially increase the odds of achieving this goal is to have our pets spayed and neutered! Studies show that neutered male dogs live 18% longer than in tact male dogs and spayed female dogs live 23% longer than un-‐spayed female dogs. Spaying and neutering our furry companions helps to prevent infections and cancers in the reproductive systems which is fatal in about 50% of dogs! Not only is spaying and neutering our pets what is in their best interest health wise, it is in the best interest for all of the homeless dogs in our communities! Nationwide, more than 2.7 million healthy, adoptable, deserving cats and dogs are euthanized in shelters every year. This is a tragic fact and the only true way to help minimize this horrific number is to spay and neuter our pets so they cannot reproduce offspring that are only going to end up in shelters. Because really, a shelter life is hardly a life at all! Curbing unwanted behavior is another great reason to spay and neuter our pets. Un altered dogs and cats are instinctually driven to urine mark. This is a terrible habit to have, especially inside the house! Spaying and neutering dogs will reduce urine marking and may even stop it all together. Excessive barking, mounting and other dominance related behaviors are all behaviors that can be minimized through spaying and neutering as well. Despite common misconceptions, although getting your pet spayed or neutered can help curb undesirable behaviors, it will not change their fundamental personality. So, a dog with high energy will still have high energy after being spayed or neutered. Neutering a male dog also dramatically minimizes their instinctual focus on mating so that it is possible for them to focus on other things in life like their human family! An intact male and a female in heat will do just about anything to find a mate, including escaping from home. Free roaming dogs obviously are at a high risk of being injured in traffic, are exposed to the potential for a fight with another animal and countless other mishaps. Obedience training with a dog who can focus on life with their humans versus their only desire of mating can dramatically improve the canine to human relationship and it also allows training in a group class setting to be much more manageable since the dog can really focus on learning new things! Enabling our pets to live a life not primarily focused on reproducing and reproducing only, we are really enhancing their quality of life while simultaneously helping to keep the pet overpopulation under control! And to add to that, spayed and neutered dogs also have the opportunity to get the enjoyment and fulfillment of a full day of play here at Camp Bow Wow! J Samm Weymouth Certified Dog Trainer & Behavior Specialist Camp Bow Wow®, Behavior Buddies®

Health, Wellness and Fitness for People & Pets JUNE 2015 | Page 38