Does neutering early affect size?

Miko was neutered at 7mos old and is 19" tall. But it was obvious from about 18 weeks on that he was going to be oversize. How much oversize and whether neutering made a difference, I'll never know.

He doesn't lift his leg to pee either… EVER! Nope… he squats… his tail very "gayly" propped straight up and curled over his back… and he looks off into the distance like he's pondering the meaning of life. I giggle everytime I see him do it!! :lol:
 
I believe it does but my husband the Vet disagrees:lol:
My question or thought does it alter their voice, bark. Maverick was neutered at 11months and he has a very deep bark. Ryder was neutered at 5.5 months, and at 18 months still has that high pitched puppy bark. Is it like the old days when they castrated choir boys.:confused2: Food for thought.
 
MavRyder said:
I believe it does but my husband the Vet disagrees:lol:
My question or thought does it alter their voice, bark. Maverick was neutered at 11months and he has a very deep bark. Ryder was neutered at 5.5 months, and at 18 months still has that high pitched puppy bark. Is it like the old days when they castrated choir boys.:confused2: Food for thought.
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Justice 9 yrs who is still intact has the highest girly bark and went he gets excited it is even worse. High pitch ear piecing scream. I have seen 10yrs human girls with a lower pitch.:lol: So no I don't think it makes a differnence.
 
I don't think it makes a difference either. Alfie was neutered at 6months and he has the bark of a GSD! Very deep and loud. But I think by neutering early I kept his puppy like personality, and the fact that he doesn't mark territories. These are the main reasons I neutered him so early.
 
Both my previous dogs were boys (I have a pair of girls right now).

Neechee (Sheltie) was neutered at the ripe old age of 2 yrs 7 months. Max (Border Collie) was neutered at 5 months. Both were done on the same day, as my thought was that there would be no dominance problems.

Neechee raised his leg to pee from the age of eight weeks. He was so tiny that a gust of wind at the wrong moment would topple him over (thus incurring his barking wrath at the wind, and learning to pee looking into the wind). He had no other male dog examples to learn from, as he was an "only" until he was two years old. His maximum height was 13 inches, and maximum weight was 12 pounds. He was extremely lightly boned as well. Very delicately built.

Max, on the other hand, was neutered at a hair past 5 months. He never raised his leg in spite of Neechee's example. He grew to an eventual height of 25 inches, and weighed 73 pounds at his heaviest (with no fat - that dog was a muscle machine). I always wondered about his disproportionate legs -they were always long, but not spindly. Both his parents were normal-sized BC's that were working stock (his grandmother was the mother dog in the movie "Babe" - the one that says "sheep are INFERIOR!"). I don't know about the ligament problem - Max had a fall at the age of 10 months that resulted in a "degloving" injury (his skin peeled off most of his left front leg like a sock) and some lingering nerve damage. So I had to retire him from agility, and after his CD, obedience too. He just couldn't take the jumps any more.

On a funny note, both dogs had high, squeaky voices for about a month after neutering day. Then they both went back to their macho man-dog bark.
 
Oh, and as far as longevity is concerned, Neechee lived to be 17-1/2 years old and died from a stroke. Max, however, died at age 12 due to a cancerous tumor in his chest.
 
Justicemom said:
Justice 9 yrs who is still intact has the highest girly bark and went he gets excited it is even worse. High pitch ear piecing scream. I have seen 10yrs human girls with a lower pitch.:lol: So no I don't think it makes a differnence.
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I really have to video tape him. especially when he howls.
 
huh, this is an interesting topic. I really never thought about neutering/spaying having that kind of affect on the growth of the puppies. I initially wasn't going to get my boys neutered, but ended up getting them neutered at 6 months because the vet kept telling me to check month after month to see if Luna's testicle would finally drop, and if it didn't then they would need to do extensive surgery to try and find his other testicle and remove it because they were afraid if left unattended that it would turn into cancer. So at 6 months and I went ahead and did it because I was afraid for his health. But now that everybody has mentioned this, I have noticed that both Ash and Luna's legs have gotten a little bit longer, but they look proportionate to me. *shrugs*
 
LunaBear87 said:
because they were afraid if left unattended that it would turn into cancer.
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They make it sound like that retained testicle is going to explode into cancer and kill your dog inside a week. In reality, I think the risk of testicular cancer goes from 1% to 1.5%, or some other negligible amount. It's not really that bad. The effects of neutering early far outweigh the cancer risks of leaving one nut in there a bit longer. Marque's sire had testicular cancer at like 8, they neutered him (easy fix to that cancer), and he lived to be 14.

What we *did* see in my dad's dog with a retained testicle was a bit of dog aggression as a puppy. He was very edgy. The retained testicle puts out more testosterone, and that increase caused some personality changes. They neutered him at about a year, and he settled immediately. That is certainly a concern for new dog owners who can't deal with that edginess.
 
When to Neuter

I logged on to see what other male Sheltie parents where leaning toward because our Vet is "on the fence" with an answer. I recently read that neutering, this was a discussion about males, prior to growth plate closer significantly raises the chances of osteosarcoma (bone cancer).
We neutered our first male, Beauregard, at 6 months and he got 2 cancers in his leg and hip at age 12 years...lived to 15 after a sugery and chemo round. Then we neutered Buddy at age 10 months and he lived to 15 with no cancer scares. Now we have 7 month old Brody and I think I'm going to hedge my bet and try to hang in there until 12 months. I do plan to call his breeder to ask when her line of Sheltie reach mature height because each line differs from my research.
Just hope he doesn't start doing "The Mamba" on our legs.
 
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