CockersOnline Forum
Cocker Specific Discussion => Behaviour & Training => Topic started by: bizzylizzy on April 09, 2017, 12:12:30 PM
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Apologies for dragging up the subject again but am rethinking my position on castration and would appreciate your opinions please.
Humphrey's coming up to 2, sociable and friendly. We've just joined a local dog club and this morning he's been in a scuffle with a two year old uncastrated Australian Shepherd. He's had a couple of affrays in the past, always young males and although he hasn't been the one to attack, has not been entirely innocent in provoking it ( this was at least the opinion of the trainer this morning and the same as what the trainer at the previous group had told us). He can be very obtrusive and doesn't seem to read the other dog's signals and doesn't appear to learn any lessons from it either.
The owner of the other dog has said he's going to have his castrated soon and I'm rethinking whether it might make things easier if Humphrey was done aswell - we'd like to start doing activites at the dog club now, so he's likely to come into contact with all sorts.
My main concern is that I've heard it can intensify the hunting instinct - we're just SO happy that Humphrey hasn't shown any great hunting tendencies so far which, living in the country, is a blessing and I wouldn't want risk changing that. Does anyone have any thoughts / experience of this please?
Thanks!!
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I've never heard of it, but it's interesting because William, castrated at 15 months because he had an undescended testicle, is an absolute shocker for sight hunting rabbits and squirrels. I can't remember exactly when he started, but it wasn't when he was a puppy. I've always blamed a friend of ours who encouraged William to join in with his motley pack of a Corgi, two Border Terriers and a JRT who were always hunting in rabbit warrens on his own land.
I'm still inclined to think that's why William suddenly took up hunting. But it's interesting that Louis, who is entire and has a much better nose than William, isn't interested in chasing rabbits and squirrels and will come back to call off a scent.
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I think the reaoning was that while still entire, they have other things on their minds! ;)
Interesting that William and Louis would seem to support the theory but I suppose it could just be coincidence..... thanks for the input, its certainly food for thought..... :D
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I think the reaoning was that while still entire, they have other things on their minds! ;)
Interesting that William and Louis would seem to support the theory but I suppose it could just be coincidence..... thanks for the input, its certainly food for thought..... :D
That doesn't quite work in Louis' case because he's never shown any interest in the ladies. In fact it's castrated William who always knows when a bitch is in season. He never tries humping or shows any real interest, but he's aware. Louis just looks a bit perplexed and clueless :005:
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I think the reaoning was that while still entire, they have other things on their minds! ;)
Interesting that William and Louis would seem to support the theory but I suppose it could just be coincidence..... thanks for the input, its certainly food for thought..... :D
That doesn't quite work in Louis' case because he's never shown any interest in the ladies. In fact it's castrated William who always knows when a bitch is in season. He never tries humping or shows any real interest, but he's aware. Louis just looks a bit perplexed and clueless :005:
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We've have just had Oscar 'done.' Since we got him, on walks his nose would be to the floor, he wanted to run after every bird,squirrel, person! At about 8 months he became quite dominant over other male dogs that hadn't been done and got into a scrap with one in the park that was quite frightening to see as nothing I said would stop him. On walks with the dog walker she said he had started to try and hump the other dogs and suggested we get him done as it may calm him down. Also the scent marking, leads walks were really difficult because of this! I was cautious at first as I'd read so many different things.
Anyways it's been two weeks since and he is much better on a walk, his first class at Doggy school after his Op he was super hyper, but didn't have any issues with the un- neutered males which was nice to see. He hasn't changed much in personality other than he seems to sleep a lot more.
Was it the right thing to do, I think so, has it made an improvement to the humping/dominance issue, havnt yet seen this as we've not been for our usual walks yet as he is still recovering and don't want to over do it until he is properly heeled.
Not sure that's helped, but he seems himself still which was what I was worried about!
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Never heard of this either. I can't say I noticed any real differences before and after castration for Ollie regarding hunting instinct - he has always had his nose to the ground and in fact we use this to manage him when we are out by directing him to hunt if we spot another dog in the distance that we think he may have problems with. He doesn't seem to get lost in it however but continually looks to us for guidance on where to search - so it's a useful behaviour to us rather than a problematic one. He's never run off (actually since he's been neutered.. beforehand he did run off on occasion although this was over female dogs). He generally takes direction better and focuses on us more than he did prior to neutering.
Neutering hasn't been a cure-all for scuffles for us, but the nature of them has changed - less intense, shorter in duration and we are more able to safely intervene.
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Murphy was castrated at 10 months and he really has no interest in hunting at all. He is far more interested in ripping his ball to pieces.
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I have never heard of it effecting hunting instinct !!
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I have never heard of it effecting hunting instinct !!
Nor have I! I have heard it can slow them down but someone forgot to tell Coral this......although she is a girl of course ;)
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Coincidence maybe ??
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Mine is 3-5 years now and a full male.
Between the age of 2 and 3 he "grew up". There were a lot of changes. The kind of things that in my mind may be associated with being a full-male.
He stopped being very interested an other dogs. Except a few "mates". Just goes about his business.
A lot of muscle developed. I really think this is helpful in the long term with spine and leg problems.
The coat is fantastic.
He is extremely gentle and considerate with very young children.
All the training tasks he learned as a puppy clicked in. For example he will "really" stay. Not just, you hope he won't move for half a minute. He just stays. I can clear off out of sight. many minutes can pass, then one shout and he's released.
Can't prove a castrated male would be different. But I'd expect so.
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Thanks everyone! I'm not going to make any rash decisions at the moment, I'll have to see how things develop and there are a lot of things to consider but I'm glad to hear that the hunting thing would seem to be just another mythe,so its one thing less to worry about!
Its always good to hear the experience of COL'ers, far more reliable than a lot of the rubbish that's written online!! Thankyou!
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Hi Jayne. I haven't castrated Marley. He's 18 months old. He's not particularly interested in other dogs sexually. He does try to hump my friends when they come over but I just tell him no and he stops. He's also tried it on me but again I just tell him no. As for marking when on a walk I'm working on that. He's slowly Getting the message that when he's walking on lead with me He is not allowed to stop and Mark. I'll let him do whatever when I give him permission or if he's off lead.
If you don't want him getting in trouble with other dogs then try and keep him away from popular dog walks if possible.
I'm not going to castrate him unless there is a medical reason to do do. I've had him a year now and I've seen no change in his behaviour. If your dog is always with you and he's not wandering the streets on his own I don't see the point. I've seen other cocker spaniels when out on walks. I see a certain one every week I thought it was a puppy it was so small and overweight with arthritis I asked the owner how old he was he said 6 I was shocked it must have something to do with him being castrated it stopped his growth. Marley is much bigger than other cockers I've seen. They need there hormones for so many things.
I don't think it would make any difference to a dog wanting to chase birds etc. It's in their dna. So if I were you I wouldn't do it.
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If this were true all working gun dogs would be neutered...and they're kept entire wherever possible ;)
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Can't think of any reason why castration should have increase the hunting instinct. I have never heard anyone else suggest it.
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If this were true all working gun dogs would be neutered...and they're kept entire wherever possible ;)
I am with you on this one Helen, if it was the case every dog in gundog history not needed for breeding would have been done
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If this were true all working gun dogs would be neutered...and they're kept entire wherever possible ;)
I am with you on this one Helen, if it was the case every dog in gundog history not needed for breeding would have been done
Except it's a bit of a conundrum as you'd not know how brilliant a hunter it was (and worthy of being bred from) until it no longer had the necessary bits!
(As an aside, I believe hunting instinct/keenness is either there or not - it's genetic. And if we're talking about show bred dogs then you have loads that just aren't interested and the odd one that is. Be they entire or not. Whether they run off after rabbits or birds is down to training not hormones).
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If this were true all working gun dogs would be neutered...and they're kept entire wherever possible ;)
I am with you on this one Helen, if it was the case every dog in gundog history not needed for breeding would have been done
Except it's a bit of a conundrum as you'd not know how brilliant a hunter it was (and worthy of being bred from) until it no longer had the necessary bits!
(As an aside, I believe hunting instinct/keenness is either there or not - it's genetic. And if we're talking about show bred dogs then you have loads that just aren't interested and the odd one that is. Be they entire or not. Whether they run off after rabbits or birds is down to training not hormones).
A quality gun dog needs the right breeding, but I am positive as I have done it twice you can get any spaniel to work to the gun if you introduce them to enough game at an early age, treat a show puppy as a gun dog and it will become one. It will not win a trial but it will put game in the bag that you would not have had without a dog.
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If this were true all working gun dogs would be neutered...and they're kept entire wherever possible ;)
I am with you on this one Helen, if it was the case every dog in gundog history not needed for breeding would have been done
Except it's a bit of a conundrum as you'd not know how brilliant a hunter it was (and worthy of being bred from) until it no longer had the necessary bits!
(As an aside, I believe hunting instinct/keenness is either there or not - it's genetic. And if we're talking about show bred dogs then you have loads that just aren't interested and the odd one that is. Be they entire or not. Whether they run off after rabbits or birds is down to training not hormones).
A quality gun dog needs the right breeding, but I am positive as I have done it twice you can get any spaniel to work to the gun if you introduce them to enough game at an early age, treat a show puppy as a gun dog and it will become one. It will not win a trial but it will put game in the bag that you would not have had without a dog.
Yes, fair point. My show cocker has a better nose than my 'working' working one. What I was saying is that it's got little to do with castration/ not whether a dog hunts and chases game. I agree you can train any number of different breeds to work to the gun provided you have the patience and inclination. And depending on what sort of end result you're after. We had a ridgeback on our shoot, and there are always terriers in the line.
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Is there scientific evidence that castration affects hunting ability? As emilyoliver said, it's hard to measure as you can't make a control situation for each individual dog - you can't measure his hunting ability before castration and ability after AND eliminate all other variables as a cause of change in behaviour. You can only compare dogs to each other, and some are just more genetically driven than others. So measuring what might or might not be affected by castration in terms of hunting ability is incredibly hard to to do.
Is it the case that working dogs are not castrated because it is the long held belief that they shouldn't be, rather than it being actually known is a bad idea? I can see that if you don't have any evidence one way or another, not castrating is the best and least risky option, because it still keeps all options open. But that convention in itself is not proof.
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The only comparison I can make is in my gun dog classes. There was an early neutered dog - his attention span was poor and it took a really long time for him to learn and retain any commands. There was a dog neutered at 13 months and he was ok, didn't really have much drive or urgency and would rather play with other dogs than do his job. Then there were the entire ones - they had much more drive, they were much quicker to pick things up (literally and figuratively) and they had no interest in any of the other dogs in the class. They were far more switched on and focussed.
Not scientific and purely anecdotal but it may be one reason why working dogs are not neutered as routine.
I think it's also fair to say that early neutered dogs in particular can be perpetual teenagers as their hormones were never allowed to develop and level out. That, on a shoot, or in training, is just not desirable. Entire dogs mature and this is essential for a working dog.
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Hunting is what cocker spaniels were born to do. Taking away their hormones shouldn't make a difference
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As a generalization/sweeping statement, I would think that castrating a male dog would if anything, take the edge off somewhat as there'd be no testosterone. If you look at entire male animals in general they're typically larger, stronger and bolshier than their castrated counterparts - examples like bulls and oxen, and stallions and geldings. In a working dog you'd want as much drive as is manageable for it to do it's job no matter what. I'd not castrate any of my male dogs unless there was a medical reason for it.