BRINGING UP PRESTO! Christmas Special

Fifty-three Christmases ago, when Barbara and I had been married slightly more than three months, my mother gave us a beautiful top ornament for our first Christmas tree.  It was our first "special ornament."

Each year something that symbolizes what was special about the year just concluding becomes that year's special ornament.  A Greek palace guard from our visit to Athens; a steel drummer from one of our trips to Young Island, our favorite spot in the Caribbean; special ornaments given to us by our parents; the laminated cover from my first book, Remembering to Breathe; items that represent important career achievements; a stuffed dog announcing the Christmas gift that turned out to be Honeybear; and, increasingly, mementos from dog sports triumphs -- obedience for me, conformation and agility for Barbara; a special item from our 50th anniversary party.  And on and on.  Fifty-two of these memory-loaded treasures.

It should come as no surprise that 2012 has gone down as the Presto! year.  And the year of the world's most delightful competition obedience students. 

Those two happy circumstances intersected on a Saturday morning this summer.  Two of my students showed up at a lesson with a surprise "puppy shower."  Only it wasn't a shower, it was a downpour of puppy things which filled "Presto!'s first toy box."  Mostly toys but also a brush, shampoo that my little guy is still using, even a kit to record his first paw print.

The piece de resistance, though, was an almost real , nearly life-size stuffed border collie.  He's waited patiently the rest of the summer and through the fall for his turn in the lights.  And now his time has come.  Nestled up there in the branches, surrounded by lights, he represents the very best of 2012.  He's this year's special ornament.

Merry Christmas! everyone.

Willard

BRINGING UP PRESTO! Little Pleasures

So Presto! is seven months old, at least a year -- probably more -- away from the Novice B ring.  Right now it's all about teaching fundamentals . . . and making it fun.  As I write this, I have two lacerations on my nose and one on my upper lip.  Yeah, we're having fun.

Attention, fun and want-to:  in training and competition they're like a three-legged milking stool.  Lose any one of those and the whole thing topples over.  Presto! was born with want-to gushing from every pore.  My challenge is to sustain that enthusiasm while at the same time teaching pinpoint heeling, spot-on fronts perfect finishes, relentless focus, and "discipline," a word not easily installed in the vocabulary of a young border collie.  Ah yes, discipline.  More on that in an upcoming post.

So we train and play, play and train..  My mantra:  patience, patience, patience.  And the big rewards -- the truly thrilling moments in our training sessions -- are the little pleaures.

I've been amazed at how easy it's been to teach my little guy to sit and stay.  Planted there while I go to the van to get whatever.  Sitting at attention (well, most of the time) while I put cheese on  the go-outs pole.

Sitting yes, downing no.

Presto! has known the concertina (fold-back) down since he was about nine weeks old.  He's also known how to pop right back up. And I quickly learned that trying to hold him there was the most counter-productive thing I could do. But this past Monday, one day after his seven-month birthday, the light bulb went on.  I ran back into the house.  "Barbara!" I said, "He just stayed down for about ten seconds . . . on his own!"  And we've progressed from there.  Laugh if you wish, but that made my day.

Then there's the matter of the finishes.  My bad!  Fronts have always been my Waterloo -- or so I thought.  Near the end of  Bravo!'s obedience career, before it was cut short by the double whammy of lymphangiectasia and an arthritic right hip, he was regularly putting on a heeling clinic in the ring.  And we were losing our points elsewhere.  On fronts?  Where else?

There are six fronts and seven finishes in Utility.  The last few times Bravo! showed, I approached the judge after our run with something like,  "How many of those points were fronts?"  And was surprised to get a response something like:  "It wasn't the fronts, it was your finishes."  Which puzzled me.  I can look over my shoulder and see the finishes, and most of them looked good.  Had I hit a run of blind judges?

Fast-forward now to Presto!'s early training in the backyard.  I'm practicing get-around finishes.  The kitchen window opens.  Barbara says, "Every one of them is crooked."  Oh God!  Barbara's vision is failing, too.

It took 23 years, my wife's keen eye and her explanation for me to understand how I was teaching finishes, wrong.

I'm slew-footed.  It runs in my family.  In the 8th grade a classmate said:  "Here comes your grandmother;" and he demonstrated with his feet  pointing more east-and-west  than north-and-south.  "Here comes your mother."  Another demo.  "And here you come."

Yep.  And I've been teaching my dogs to finish lined up with my left foot, which is perpetually in impending-let-turn position.

So I've taken a full-length mirror out into the back yard, and we do finishes in front of that mirror.  When Presto! is seated at an angle to my left foot but parallel to the prime meridian, I've got a good finish.  A little victory?  I think so, but we'll see how it goes in the ring.

And then there's retrieving.  I learned early on that the little stinker won't retrieve . . . anything.

As far as nonretrieving dogs are concerned, this ain't my first rodeo.  A long time ago my first instructor, Debby Boehm, told me, "Anytime someone brings me a dog with retriever in its name I know only one thing: the dog won't retrieve."  Indeed, it took me a year to teach Cheddar, my now-retired golden retriever, to play ball (or even to tug, for that matter).

I haven't pressed the issue with Presto! until now.  In the beginning I tried throwing a tennis ball for him.  He'd chase after it then settle down and begin stripping the fuzz off of it.  So much for tennis balls.  Besides, our play style has not included my being a ball-throwing machine for him.  Our play is interactive, down and dirty, like two dogs. (Hence the lacerations.)

Now though, I've begun to serious up about the retrieving.  I don't want to work on it outside where there's a lot of room.  I want a tightly confined space.  My home office is at the end of a hallway, at the front of the house.  So I close the door, creating a dead end.  I get down on my knees about seven feet out and toss a small Kong toy toward the door.  If Presto! brings it back to hand, he gets a treat.  So far he isn't putting on weight.

But we had a breakthrough a couple of days ago.  He brought back three in a row.  Granted, I had to stretch my arms all the way out and grab the toy to keep him from dropping it.   But I want him to succeed.  By the way, one of these sessions lasts less than two minutes; I don't drill on anytrhing.

"Big deal," you say?  Maybe, but I'll take my little pleasures where I can get them.

Patience, patience, patience.

Willard

Bringing Up Presto! The Most Fundamental Fundamental

When I think about training a puppy -- or a dog of any age -- for competition obedience, my thoughts default to heeling.  Not to the exclusion of all the other important competition fundamentals like fronts and finishes and retrieving and sits and downs and stands and recalls.  But my mental picture of the performance I'm seeking features the dog in perfect heel position, head up, eyes bright . . . lovin' it.

After all, when you walk into the Novice ring or into any of the advanced A classes, what's the first thing the judge is going to get the opportunity to assess?  Heeling. That's where the judge's first opinion of a team's performance is formed.  And that first impression is bound to influence how she scores the rest of the exercises.

Heeling is also where the lion's share of the attention imprint can be applied.

So in my own training, in my students' training, heeling gets high priority.  There are many ways to teach heeling, but I've found that for me the best method to get the best results is AnneMarie Silverton's Pinpoint Heeling.  For a little primer on Pinpoint Heeling as well as a good grounding on dog obedience in general, please refer to my series titled "Attention, Attention, Attention," posted to this blog in October and November 2011.

I start my dogs and my students' dogs off-leash.  That's the way it is the very first day when we begin the puppy's little follow exercises.  Then it just sort of progresses from there.  Along the way I've discovered a few benefits -- not the least of which is the total absence of the horrible trauma that comes at the terrifying point where it's time to remove the leash and heel Fluffy.  "Oh, my God! I haven't slept for a week!" 

First of all, -- and I've found there are quite a few of like mind about this -- I regard the leash as an impediment.

Beyond that, in the traditional method of training heeling, where you are initially wedded to the leash, there are all these silly gyrations, accompanied by lots of heartburn.

I had this "shark line" on my Novice A dog, Honeybear.  The idea was that it was thin; she wasn't supposed to know it was there.  I wonder if she got a clue the first time I popped her?

The shark line was only batting practice for the part of the game that got really bizarre.  We had two leashes on the dog as we started out heeling.  At some point, in a sequence worthy of an Academy Award, with much ceremony and extraneous clicking, we'd remove one of the leashes. Now the dog thought she was leash-free, right?  Oh, I hope not! Any dog that stupid should be taught to shake, then retired to the couch.

Anyhow, less by design than by the natural progression of things, my students and I start the process off-leash.  It's only later, when we want to introduce a few corrections, that we add a leash.

So in the Pinpoint Heeling scheme of things, my students and I start the process off leash.  It's only later, when we want to introduce a few corrections, that we add a leash.

In the beginning, the treat, very visible between the thumb and index finger, is first on the dog's nose, then in tiny steps (SLOWLY!  We're talking months here.) it moves up to waist level.  And then to the attention stick.

From the tone of my earlier posts you might think all of this is a piece of cake.  Tra-la!  And away we go.  Don't you believe it; those are little drops of blood on my forehead.  If you are not a serious dog trainer but just stumbled on this blog while looking for the latest week-after-Cyber Monday specials, know that training a dog to excel in competition obedience is exceeded only by Chinese water torture.  And that's before the setbacks.

Which is where we are now in Presto!'s heeling progress.  I've got the treat about three or four inches above his nose and recently his head position and his focus deteriorated.  To cope with this revoltin' development, I want to introduce some leash corrections.  I've had the leash on him from time to time with my hands occupied this way:  The treat, Presto!'s focal point for right now, is in my left hand. The leash is in my right -- which was in arm-being-twisted position behind my back.

That's a very awkward position when I want to administer a little pop to redirect Presto!'s attention to the treat.  What's more, now I've lost the ability to use my right index finger to point to the treat as I say, "Look!"

Oh, what I'd give for a third hand right now!

Which is why I'm positive that in 10,000 years all competition obedience trainers will be born with a third hand.  How often, when training your dog, have you felt the need for an extra hand?  Evolution will take care of that.  Trouble is, none of us will be around to benefit from it.  Unless, of course, there's some way to factor in the time spent in the blind during out-of-sight sits and downs.

Way back when, in a time and place long since forgotten, someone, also long since forgotten, told me about the behind-the-back leash position.  But now it was bugging me.  So I went right to the source, the current doyenne of Pinpoint Heeling, Louise Meredith.  I told her of my current discomfort and asked her how she handles the situation.  Here's her response.

I don't like having the leash behind my back and in the right hand when I'm heeling.  It's way too awkward and I can't give a proper correction.  So when the treat is still in my left hand, above the dog's head, I have the leash in my right hand.  My right hand and arm come across the front of my body, slightly above the level of the treat that's in my left hand.  There is next to no slack in the leash and I pop up on it when the dog loses attention.  The leash is tight enough so that the dog can't forge or lag.  But if he does slightly forge or lag, I either pop back or forward, depending on whether it's a forge or a lag.  

The conclusion to that little anecdote is simple and sweet.  I've been working with the new position of hand and leash for several days now and it's just what the doctor ordered.

However, dealing with heeling focus lapses is swell, but I'm not deluding myself.  There's more to this than a simple transient heeling problem.

Yesterday Presto! turned seven months old, and he's intact.  There may be hormonal factors involved here.  If so, there's no way they'll be an excuse.  We'll train through whatever obstacles present themselves.

More to the point, I think I need to work a little harder to keep Presto! engaged when he encounters the interesting new sights, sounds and smells present in the parks where we train.

I'm working much harder to keep him Velcroed to me when we practice -- treating the entirety of each practice session as one "seamless" exercise.  Stressing "right here" as we move from exercise to play interlude to exercise.  In the early weeks of this mode he's getting leashed as we move from place to place.  He then moves at my side to whatever's next.  No drifting away to sniff.

I'm also ramping up my practice of distracted recalls on a flexi.  For me, that works best by going for short walks, allowing the dog to get distracted, then:  pop/"Presto! come!/"Good come!"/ treat.  I tell my students, "When the 18-wheeler is bearing down on your dog, you want him to turn on a dime and come to you.  So practice distracted recalls until you are blue in the face."  Right now I'm trying to get a little blue in my own face.

And of course there's a lot more play being melded into our practice sessions.

Next time we'll take up other fundamentals stuff we're working on.

Willard

BRINGING UP PRESTO! Fun Begets Focus

Presto! flew home with me from Chicago on the day he was eight weeks old.  He started training for competition obedience the next morning, at the ripe old age of eight weeks and one day.  Little fun things, but fun things with a purpose.  Now Presto! is more than six and one-half months old.  A real dog, no longer a tiny puppy.  And across those 158 days that we've been together there's never been one day, one training session, where things have just randomly happened.  There's been a plan for each session, each fun match.  In writing, on a 4x6 card.

All of it anchored by the training philosophy I have for this puppy:  Fun, fun,fun.  Attention, attention, attention.  Fundamentals, fundamentals, fundamentals.

My pants have muddy knees, grass stains.  I get down on the ground with Presto!  On his level -- the better for him to bite me in the nose.  On the ground is where I cuddle him, pet him at the end of of an exercise, tell him how proud I am of him.  More often than not that petting session leads to roughhousing.  As I write this, I have nicks on my face and on my wrist.  To say nothing of a big swollen bruise on the bone just above my right eye where he nailed me yesterday.  I've learned to leave my glasses behind when we train.

Or maybe we tug.  With a leash or a rope toy or the Cynde toy.  What's a Cynde toy?  Well, in everyone else's world it's called an "udder toy."  It has something  to do with milking cows; I have no idea what.  Those of us in competition obedience have found its highest and best use.  I couldn't imagine that a dog would like it until Cynde Leshin gave it to me, hence the name.  Presto! loves his Cynde toy.

I haven't said anything about playing ball, have I?  That's because we don't.  Presto! doesn't retrieve.  So far.  We'll have to deal with that shortly.  But for now that's just fine with me.  I don't want our play style to feature me as a ball-throwing machine.  That's not really interactive.  I want our play to be more hands-on, me-centered, down and dirty.  And it is.    In our training group, we have a saying:  "If you bleed, it's been a good training session."

Attention?  I've learned you can never have enough attention, enough focus.  Once upon a time when I thought of attention I pictured the dog looking up at me when we heeled.  Nothing more.  But over time I've learned -- the hard way! -- there's so much more to attention.

Presto! started little follow exercises the morning after we flew in from Chicago.  I'm teaching the pinpoint heeling method.  Right now my little guy has graduated to my holding the treat in line with the seam of my pants and about four inches above his nose.

I tell my students, "Give him the treat when the dog is in perfect heel position, head is up and all four feet are on the ground."  Oh yeah!  Easy for me to say, but we're trying. 

A long time ago, when Honeybear and I were just starting out with Debby Boehm, we did a lot of stationary attention.  I haven't done that with my last three dogs, but I've added it into Presto!'s practice repertoire.  I'm using the attention stick on the belt.  Presto! sits in heel position and looks at the treat on the end of the stick for increasing amounts of time.  Then, "Get it!" and he jumps for the treat.  For the last several days I haven't had to fend him off before it's time to get it. (Folks, if I can teach this loaded gun of a dog to wait, you can teach your dog to wait.)  Woohoo!

It took much too long, but I've learned the critical importance of holding the dog's attention between exercises.  We practice, "Right here," a lot as we move from exercise to exercise.  Control!

The other day a friend who has been in border collies for 30 years said, "Presto! has natural attention."  Sure he does . . . until somehing in the environment becomes more interesting than I am.  I'm taking nothing for granted.  I'm demanding attention when we're training.

So what I want is for Presto! to remain engaged the whole time we're training.  But what I see so often being ignored by other trainers is that attention should be a two-way street. You want your dog's undivided attention; shouldn't you reciprocate?

I'll spare you the rant about training sessions deteriorating into a coffee klatch.  Just one example about what all too often goes on in the AKC ring.  It's the handler having a pleasant conversation with the judge while rubbing up the scent article.  Meanwhile the dog is gawking at God knows what outside the ring.  Totally unfocused.

Points one and two here are closely related.  If training is fun for the dog, if there's a generous amount of play incorporated into the training session, Fluffy is going to want to stay engaged.

Through these early weeks, Presto has been learning lots of fundamentals.  Which we'll talk about in the next post.

Willard

BRINGING UP PRESTO! Mayday! Mayday!

HELP!  I'm trapped here with a six-month-old border collie, and I don't know where to hide.

Many years ago there was a sweatshirt that said, "Border Collie:  Everything you've ever heard is true."  My friends, you better believe it.  And you probably haven't heard the half of it.

Presto is six months, two weeks and one day old.  He's 17 inches at the withers and he weighs 32 pounds.  He adds breadth and depth to phrases like "hell on wheels" and  "a piece of work" and  "a handful"  and "a holy terror."

At the same time, though, he has certain sterling qualities which should be recognized and appreciated.

Presto!'s cup (?) runneth over with love.  When Presto! was still just a little guy, the owner of Barbara's company dropped by for lunch.  My little lover crawled up his chest . . . and peed on his shirt.

Presto! is a lap dog.  Sit down in a chair at your own risk.  BAM! He comes out of nowhere, takes off five feet out, and his butt hits your lap at the same instant his tongue hits your face.  God help you if you were holding a cup of coffee.

Presto! is extraordinarily focused.  On the dining room table and the kitchen counter.  His mission in his young life is that not one unattended morsel -- of anybody's anything -- escapes.  So what if now and then the peace is shattered by shards of china crashing around the room?

Presto! is playful.  Cheddar is my 10-year-old retired golden retriever competition obedience dog.  And Presto!'s canine best friend.  They would roughhouse 24 hours a day if I didn't break it up.  Trouble is, Presto! has now reached the age and the size where he can maul Cheddar.  Did you know that you can sink your teeth into the forehead skin of a golden, directly above and between the eyes?  And get a good enough hold to pull the golden through the house.  Picture one of those guys who fastens a chain to the front bumper of an 18-wheeler, holds the other end in his teeth and pulls the big truck down the street.  That's Presto! dragging Cheddar through the house.  Do you wonder why I step in and break it up?

Cheddar seems to love it.  He may run to one of us for protection from time to time, but he goes right back for more.  Which is why we've taken to calling him Saint Cheddar.

Did I mention that Presto! likes to play?  But it's a whole different game with Bravo!, my also-retired rescue border collie  (the most titled obedience dog in the history of Arizona Border Collie Rescue). Bravo! took charge of the ascendance/submission relationship early on.  From day one, Presto! knew Bravo! was putting up with no crap.  The relationship has developed slowly.  Now, at six months, Bravo! is Presto!'s mentor.  Presto! follows Bravo! around and does what he does. But it's their play where the relationship has really blossomed. (Blossomed? Well, sort of like a mushroom cloud.)

It's best described as "war games."  Bravo! usually sets it off.  And there are "really weird" (that's Barbara speaking) things that trigger Bravo!  If I go through the house changing the water bowls.  If I shake pills from a bottle.  If I carry the scent articles throught the house.  Those triggers send Bravo! into a cataclysm of spinning and roaring, always with a toy in his mouth.  At first that frightened Presto!  He hung back.  Nowadays he participates full bore, peak decibels -- lunging at the spinning, roaring Bravo! -- barking growling.

It's like World War l l l .  You'd think they're killing each other.  Or that we're training pit bulls in the living room.  So far the neighbors haven't called the cops.

Presto! is a pain in the ass.  Barbara again.  Recently, after she had shooed Presto! away from the kitchen counter for the umpteenth time in a five-minute period, she declared:  "Border collies are so cute when they're little, and they're so great after they grow up.  In the middle they're a pain in the ass."

Have I mentioned that we love Presto! like crazy?

* * *

Next time we'll take a snapshot of where the little pain in the ass and I are in our competition obedience training here at six months and counting.

Willard

BRINGING UP PRESTO! Why Presto! Won't Be Neutered, Part 2

For information on the authors of the studies cited here as well as the key to the footnotes, see Part 1 of this two-part series (Oct. 12)

A dog's sex hormones have roles well beyond sex.  For instance, they are essential to timely closure of the growth plates.  Deprive the dog of those hormones and the bones continue to grow, often with abnormal results.  You can spot dogs that have been neutered or spayed too early -- that is, before puberty -- because they have longer than normal legs, often narrower than normal skulls.

Writing in her influential -- but unfortunately not influential enough -- 2005 article, "Early Spay-Neuter Considerations for the Canine Athlete," Chris Zink pointed out that, "This abnormal growth results in significant alterations in body proportions and particularly the length (and therefore weights) of certain bones relative to others."

She gave the following example:

. . . if the femur has achieved its genetically determined normal length at eight months when a dog gets spayed or neutered, but the tibia, which normally stops growing at 12 to 14 months of age, continues to grow, then an abnormal angle may develop at the stifle.  In addition, with the extra growth, the lower leg becomes heavier (because it's longer), causing increased stresses on the cranial cruciate ligament.  These structural alterations may be the reason why at least one recent study has shown that spayed and neutered dogs have a higher incidence of CCL rupture. (3)

Zink goes on to cite another study that demonstrated that dogs spayed or neutered early were in significantly more danger of hip dysplasia than those who had the surgery later.

So I'm supposed to screw around with hormones that are important in Presto!'s growth and development in the name of . . .   In the name of exactly what?  Oh, something called "standard protocol."

* * *

More recently (2010), Parvene Farhoody, a graduate student at Hunter College (in the City College of New York system) published, with thesis advisor Chris Zink, a masters thesis entitled "Behavioral and Physical Effects of Spaying and Neutering Domestic Dogs (Canis familiaris)."  By the way, Farhoody is a well-regarded animal behavior consultant in New York City, so she brings a certain weltanschauung to the project.

Farhoody collected information on seven behavioral characteristics from 10,839 dogs -- the largest sample ever used to study behavior in dogs.  The tool she used is a 101-question survey called the Canine Behavior and Resrarch Questionnaire.  She points out that C-BARQ (sorry, guys) is a qualitative behavior assessment instrument created by James Serpell and his colleagues at the Center for the Interaction of Animals and Society at the University of Pennsylvania.  At the time her thesis was accepted C-BARQ was the only behavioral assessment instrument that had been peer-reviewed and found to be reliable and valid.

Read Farhoody's study and more reasons not to neuter your canine athlete come cascading down upon you.  (Note that the reasons not to spay are equally compelling but, as I said in Part 1, these posts are male-oriented.)  Farhoody's thesis summary may be accessed at www.caninesports.com .

Here are a few of the significant things she found:

     -- There was a significantly higher aggression score in neutered dogs as compared to intact dogs regardless of the age at which the dogs were neutered.
     -- There was a significant increase in fear, anxiety and excitability scores in neutered dogs as compared to intact dogs regardless of the age at which the dogs were neutered.
     -- There were significant correlations between neutering and decreases in trainability and responsiveness to cues.

Overall, Farhoody says in her summary, "the trend seen in all these behavioral data was that the earlier the dog was neutered the more negative the effect on the behavior."

* * *

Here's my bottom line.  God gave Presto! balls.  They produce hormones which play important roles in his growth and development, both physical and mental.  Why on earth should I take them away from him?  Add to that the cancer-related culpability of neutering which the data suggest (see Part 1).

In our case I see it as a no-brainer; Presto! won't be neutered.

Now then, many who have read these two posts have sharply contrary points of view, I'm sure.  Following each post there is a place for comments.  Well-documented rebuttals are invited and will be welcomed in the comments space.  If you email your rebuttal directly to me, more than likely the hundreds who read this blog will never see it,

Willard

BRINGING UP PRESTO! Why Presto Won't Be Neutered, Part 1

Down through more than five decades of marriage, Barbara and I have shared our home with ten animals -- seven dogs and three cats.  None has remained intact.  Until now.

This post and the next will present what I believe is a compelling case in support of my decision not to neuter Presto!

I could simply say, "Not so fast!  I have here an extraordinary puppy out of an extraordinary litter, bred by one of America's premier breeders of border collies.  I could say that while presently I have no plans to breed Presto! I'm reluctant to do something that could not be reversed at a later date.  I could say that and it would seem sufficient.  But it would skirt the real issues here, the guts of what has driven this decision:  a ton of documentation that neutering is just plain bad for the dog.

* * *

The common wisdom across the past several decades is that unless you plan to breed your dog you have him/her neutered/spayed before six months of age.  Early spay-neuter has been driven by the overwhelming overpopulation of dogs, resulting in the horrendous situation facing American shelters.

Shelters have embraced the concept of very early neutering of puppies and kittens before adoption as one step toward pre-empting overpopulation.  Veterinarians (not unmindful of the revenue stream involved) took up the cause with marketing and client education featuring messages about the pet population explosion as well as avoidance of various types of cancer.

However -- HOWEVER! -- there is mounting epidemiological evidence that early spaying/neutering triggers serious orthopedic, behavioral, immunologic and oncologic issues.

Right here I'm shifting the emphasis of this post to neutering.  There is an equal amount of evidence to support second thoughts about hurrying pell mell into early spaying (or spaying at all).  But this is about Presto!  And Presto! is a male, so we'll focus on neutering.

* * *

Everything that follows in these two posts is meticulously documented by references that can be found in peer-reviewed veterinary medical literature.  Rather than weigh these posts down with lengthy lists of references, I'm providing links to the sources, which are:

Alice Villalobos, DVM  is president of the Society for Veterinary Medical Ethics.  The comments I've included here appeared in the December 2008 issue of Veterinary Practice News, in an article titled "Is Early Neutering Hurting Pets?"  www.veterinarypracticenews.com/authors/alice-villalobos.aspx.

M.Christine Zink,DVM,PhD,DAVCP has long been a go-to person in care of the canine athlete.  Several of her books (see the link) are classics on the topics they cover. She is professor and director of the department of molecular and comparative pathobiology as well as a professor in the department of pathology and molecular microbiology and immunology at the Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University.  I've referred extensively to her 2005 publication titled "Early Spay-Neuter Considerations for the Canine Athlete."  That article may be accessed at www.caninesports.com.  Where I've included a number in parentheses, that number refers to a footnote in her article.

Parvene Farhoody, a graduate student at Hunter College (of the City College of New York) completed a masters thesis (with Chris Zink as her advisor) in May 2010.  It was titled "Behavioral and Physical Effects of Spaying and Neutering Domestic Dogs. (Canis familiaris).  Her summary of the thesis may also be accessed at www.caninesports.com.

* * *

It begins with cancer. Early on, Alice Villalobos, who conducts an oncology-heavy practice in Woodland Hills, California, was a strong advocate of early spay-neuter.  But by 2008 the weight of evidence to the contraty caused her to write, "It's earth-shattering to consider that some of the cancers we have been battling may have been enhanced by early neutering instead of the reverse."

She points to a study (also cited by Zink) by Ware (6) who found a 2.4 times greater risk of hemangiosarcoma in neutered dogs as compared to intact males.

Many veterinarians recommend neutering as a way to reduce prostate cancer.  However, Villalobos says, "We need to re-examine the common belief that neutering dogs helps reduce prostate cancer.  She points to a 1987 study (9) which reported that neutering provides no relief from prostate cancer.

So . . . I should castrate Presto! to obtain questionable protection from prostate cancer while in the process setting him up for increased risk of hemangiosarcoma.

Zink cites a study (7) of 3,218 dogs which concluded that those who were neutered before they were one year old had a significantly greater risk of developing bone cancer.  Then she underscores her point by citing yet another study that showed that neutered dogs had a two-fold higher risk of bone cancer.

Those are the highlights of the neutering/cancer story.  Moving right along . . .

Barbara has had three toy or miniature poodles.  All three had been spayed early and all three had urinary incontinence -- they leaked.  All three were on phenylpropanolamine for the rest of their lives.  "Yep," the respective vets said,  "early spaying can cause that."  Until I was researching this topic, I didn't know that neutering may also cause urinary sphincter incontinence in males. (13)

A survey done by the Golden Retriever Club of America indicated that spayed or neutered golden retrievers were more likely to develop hypothyroidism. (2)  A finding that was corroborated by Panciera. (14)

Finally, Howe et al have demonstrated that infectious diseases are more common in dogs that have been spayed or neutered at 24 weeks or less. (15)

* * *

As they say in the infomercials, "BUT WAIT!!!  THERE'S MORE!!!"

In the next post we'll look at the negative effects neutering has on growth and development.

Willard