Should I neuter a hypersexual dog that was supposed to be a show dog?

August 7, 2023 10:27 AM

I committed to a breeder to have my dog as a stud dog but none of us likes dog shows. Also my dog has a strong sex drive and is sometimes hard to handle, so I was considering neutering. He is no longer trying to mount the pets he lives with but after meeting any other animal he goes nuts.

I have a 2.5 year old dog. I knew I wanted a rough collie, so I bought it after long consideration from what I thought was the best breeder. She was actually mentoring another "trainee" on another side of the country. She asked me if I wanted to try myself in dog shows and I made it clear I have a dog mostly as a pet but if I have a chance, I will try myself out, who knows, I might have a new hobby.

She took a chance and gave me a hand written contract which states that she and her trainee will take care of promoting my dog and finding him mating partners and my obligation is to give them 60% of the financial benefits I receive from them, claiming it is very hard work and I cannot make it without connections. I naively signed it.

Time went by and I went to one show. The breeder has never even met me in real life to guide me about dog shows as it was her trainee having a litter and giving me all the information, he was a decent and fair person. The trainee decided to go with me once, along with his dogs, and told me there is not much I need to know except the posture and training him to let his teeth be shown, so when we went there, my dog, being a full on teenager who is not motivated by any food, toy, acted puppy like, bit his leash,jumped around...so the trainee said let us not embarrass ourselves anymore. He won the title only because he had no competition. After the show I went to handling training, he was just not interested in learning it and was focused more on other dogs.
Other than that, I am unable to afford this sort of a hobby on a single salary with a mortgage, I had no idea it was so expensive.

He is a rather dominant dog in general, yet very friendly and never aggressive but still in-your-face, he wants to get to know every dog possible and if i do not have him closeby to tell him to "leave it", he would chase anyone and try to mount them. When females are in heat, all the training goes through the window anyway, even after an otherwise successful recall training he ran all the way across the street full of traffic to reach a female in heat. Also, he tried to mount every dog and most people he meets, even blankets. His naughty habit is also stealing my underwear from laundry basket while getting ready for the washing machine. As well as going straight to everyone human crotch straightaway. I love him to bits but he embarrasses me a bit by that :) he also refuses to eat quite often, especially when females around are in heat.

Second thing is that his "main" breeder got the bad reputation and public exposure for spreading lies about other breeders, local and abroad, and defamation, so nowadays there is a lot smaller circle of people who want to work with her, including her trainees. I know that to be true as she was talking a lot of shit about other breeders even to me as a buyer and I was a bit surprised by the attitude. I do not like the dog show circles in general as I found out just another world of corruption so I decided to not pursue this any further. Training-wise I got advised by trainers and vets to get him castrated to tackle his hypersexuality so it will be easier to work with him as he is otherwise a very good dog.
The trainee is now independent and understanding about it and even said long time ago I can do it and nobody would mind. When I tried to contact him to talk about it, a natural disaster struck our country and him, along with his 4 dogs and pregnant gf, got stuck in their village, so they have more important concerns.

Now my main concern is, would you consider neutering in this case? I know it is stupid and unreasonable but I love him so much and I no longer know how to tackle his "naughty" side, I know castration would be healthier for him but it still scares me how final measure it is. After he is gone, there will be nothing left "after" him, I know it is silly as there are so many wonderful shelter dogs. As well as I am terrified of him not waking up from anesthesia. I tried dog trainers, socialization camps and similar, he is a bit better about it but the behavior still persists. Or should I just train him differently or elsewhere to eliminate the unwanted behavior?

posted by Salicornia to Pets & Animals (17 answers total)

It's unclear whether you are required to keep the dog intact under the contract, and if so for how long. From what you've written, it sounds more like you agreed to cut the breeder in to the tune of 60% for any stud fees you may receive. If the trainee is telling you that it's okay to have the dog neutered, I would assume it's okay for you to have the dog neutered. If you don't already have this in written form, maybe send a quick CYA email to the trainee confirming that they had told you it was okay to neuter the dog and informing them of your plan to go ahead with this. Your dog will be a lot happier and healthier if you go forward.
posted by slkinsey at 10:36 AM on August 7, 2023 [9 favorites]

Sounds like you can do it and nobody would mind. Sounds like everyone's got more important things to worry about than some weirdo breeder making real half-assed offer a couple years ago, handing you off to a trainee and the trainee giving the obligatory try. You and your dog will both enjoy life a lot more if he's neutered.
posted by wellifyouinsist at 10:36 AM on August 7, 2023 [6 favorites]

I would castrate him. There are plenty of rough collies in the world.

Regarding your fears about anesthesia: my very much loved cat stopped breathing under anesthesia for a dental cleaning and extraction. And it was fine, because the vet team had the monitoring and equipment in place to keep him supported and get him breathing again. As my doctor brother-in-law says, if you're going to stop breathing, on a table surrounded by medical professionals is the best place to do it.
posted by Rhedyn at 10:41 AM on August 7, 2023 [12 favorites]

This is such a simple solution that will allow your dog to have much happier and probably healthier life. Both of you will feel calmer and able to have an easier, warmer relationship without you having to try to train him to manage all of the testosterone infused behavior. Your dog doesn't care if there any other little collies running around that happen to share his DNA. But he does care very much if you, his person, are happy with him and approve of his behavior. Do it!
posted by metahawk at 10:58 AM on August 7, 2023 [7 favorites]

The only reason I can imagine to consider not doing this is if your contract requires you to leave him un-neutered; and if that is the case, this is important enough that I would spend some money on legal advice about how enforceable it is and how to get you out of it. Or if his vet had some medical reason to advise against it.

Otherwise, absolutely, get him neutered. Both your lives will be better for it.
posted by Stacey at 11:20 AM on August 7, 2023 [5 favorites]

Neuter your dog; it seems to be what you want and neutered dogs live longer than unneutered dogs (I was going to link something but there are SO MANY studies out there that if you google it, you'll see).
posted by cooker girl at 11:21 AM on August 7, 2023 [3 favorites]

It doesn't sound like he has the right temperament to be bred anyway. The point of purebreds is only propagating the lines of the best dogs. Yours is a Good Dog, but "not trainable" is not a trait breeders of livestock guard dogs generally look for. So neuter him guilt free.
posted by I claim sanctuary at 11:33 AM on August 7, 2023 [12 favorites]

I know castration would be healthier for him

That's all that matters in my opinion. We are so incredibly lucky to have dogs as companions and our most important responsibility as dog people is to make hard and sometimes painful decisions for the health of our dogs.

This is not the last time you will have to do something unpleasant because you love your wonderful dog and you care about him. It would be so easy to just do whatever is easiest for us but then our fabulous dogs would bear the brunt of our decisions. I had similar feelings as you do about getting my first dog spayed after rescuing her from the woods she was dumped in. I am so glad I did. She lived a very long and very healthy life and I also saved myself the agony of having to steal her puppies and give them away to other homes. She was a very good and very happy dog.

I think it is clear how much you love your dog so I think you know what you should do for him. It's not going to be easy but love isn't always easy.
posted by RobinofFrocksley at 11:34 AM on August 7, 2023 [2 favorites]

It’s almost certain that the contract is unenforceable.
posted by Bottlecap at 12:18 PM on August 7, 2023 [1 favorite]

In my experience breeders who want the dog shown, and sell to someone with no experience in showing the dog, make more of an effort than your breeder has shown. (My sister has a show-quality golden, and the breeder is very engaged in the show process and often handles him in the ring.)

If you signed a contract with the original breeder, and the breeder says it's okay to neuter the dog, then document that agreement, send it back to the breeder as confirmation, and neuter the dog.
posted by suelac at 12:35 PM on August 7, 2023 [1 favorite]

Perhaps consider chemical castration?
posted by SageTrail at 12:41 PM on August 7, 2023

The breeder can pay to harvest his seminal fluid, freeze it, store it, and use it. We did that when we got our puppy three years go.
posted by Ideefixe at 1:45 PM on August 7, 2023 [1 favorite]

Some people breed dogs with artificial insemination. You may be able to have sperm frozen to sell.

Unless you really want to breed the dog, and as long as there's no contract saying you can't, neutering is an excellent choice.
posted by theora55 at 2:08 PM on August 7, 2023

My understanding is that if you aren't going to show the dog, then neutering is the responsible choice. Dog shows aren't really for fun or enrichment of the animal, they are supposed to help propagate a breed standard. Breeding a dog who isn't being judged on conformation is backyard breeding.
posted by muddgirl at 2:36 PM on August 7, 2023 [5 favorites]

(apologies I do see that he's been shown once but given the circumstances you describe, I'm still not sure that it's ethically responsible to breed him.)
posted by muddgirl at 3:00 PM on August 7, 2023

Either you contact the breeder and arrange to have him bred, or you get him neutered. Simply keeping him intact and suffering and annoying people is not a good option.

If your breeder doesn't come through and provide him with opportunities to act as a stud after you contact her, you can work from the assumption that she doesn't think he has real breeding potential and she fooled you into paying more for him by claiming she did. Other people above have already observed that if he is hard to train the chances are he's got traits that other dog owners would rather not deal with. If she comes back with an opportunity months later you can give her the brush off without telling her you already had him neutered.

The regret that he will never have progeny can be dismissed with the thought that he probably already has, at some point, mounted a stranger female who turned up pregnant. He could easily have thirty little offspring somewhere from encounters like you described.

TBH, if he is un-trainable, your breeder is either incompetent because she didn't know it, or she knew it and palmed you off with an unsuitable dog on purpose, in which case it was fraud. She should have warned you a lot more about his temperament. If your vet advises neutering to control his behaviour, listen to your vet and get it in writing and have the operation done. But keep in mind that getting him neutered may not turn him into a well behaved dog. He may keep being a dog who is not capable of socializing with other dogs, because he can't unlearn the habits he already has.
posted by Jane the Brown at 9:31 AM on August 8, 2023

The default position always be to spay or neuter your dog; it's better for the dog, better for its owners, and better for the world in general since there will be fewer unwanted animals. You should only refrain from spaying and neutering if you have a compelling reason.

You don't have such a reason. You're not interested in showing him or using him as a stud - in fact you seem pretty burned out on the breeder you got him from and the dog world in general. It also sounds like he might not be ideal breeding stock.

It seems like your reluctance is mostly coming from anxiety about him dying and how it will make you feel. Unfortunately, there's nothing you can do to prevent the sadness of a pet's death - but you can make it better by giving them a good life while they're here, so you can look back on their life knowing that they were as happy and healthy as possible. This has always given me a lot of peace. Spaying and neutering is a part of giving them that good life.
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 10:28 AM on August 8, 2023 [1 favorite]