Why Cats Should be Spayed and Neutered
There are a number of practical reasons for getting cats spayed and neutered, but the main reason is simply one of numbers. There are not enough homes for the number of cats and kittens around today.
If you have a cat and want another one, go to your local shelter where you will find a large selection. Do not breed and hope to get rid of the rest of the litter - you won’t.
Another sobering statistic: in the UK alone around 1,000 healthy cats and kittens are destroyed every day because a home can’t be found for them.
Now on to the more practical reasons from a cat owner’s point of view. Male cats that have not been neutered are a nightmare. If they are kept indoors they will spray urine on the furniture, walls and curtains, and try to escape all the time. Outdoor cats that haven’t been neutered will fight, which can lead to abscesses, FeLV and FIV (the feline form of HIV). Neutering also eliminates the possibility of testicular cancer.
Female cats that haven’t been spayed also cause massive problems. They too spray urine everywhere, and howl constantly when in heat. From a health perspective, spaying guarantees that the cat will not get uterine or ovarian cancer, and the risk of mammary cancer is significantly reduced. An unspayed female cat is also at risk from FeLV and FIV because the male bites the females neck during mating, and these bites frequently break the skin. Any male cat carrying the viruses will then pass them on to the female.
Finally, spaying and neutering should take place as soon as possible. There are several notions often stated as fact for delaying spaying and neutering (e.g. females should have at least one litter first) but science has tested these notions, and there are now no reasons not to have kittens spayed and neutered.
Indeed there are several benefits. For example, a kitten that is spayed will only require one stitch to close the wound. Also, getting back to the population explosion, kittens of both sexes can breed at 4 months old. So get it done early.
As a footnote, there is the elephant in the room of pedigree cats. Obviously if they are all spayed and neutered there would be no more pedigree cats - an undesirable situation. If you intend to buy a pedigree cat, do everything you can to make sure the breeder is a responsible breeder. A good sign that they are is if they insist on spaying/neutering of any cats they sell to non-breeders.