For All The Unethical (But Responsible) Dog Owners ...

[Simply Grand]

Apologies if I've missed it or lost track in the discussion, but Willem what is the actual problem you are identifying with this thread?

You've brought up a number of different issues in the general context of desexing - registration cost, health impact, number of dogs in existence, dogs in pounds and rescues, dogs being put down in pounds, behaviour impacts of desexing - that I am not clear at all on what your actual concern is.

[Willem]

Apologies if I've missed it or lost track in the discussion, but Willem what is the actual problem you are identifying with this thread?

You've brought up a number of different issues in the general context of desexing - registration cost, health impact, number of dogs in existence, dogs in pounds and rescues, dogs being put down in pounds, behaviour impacts of desexing - that I am not clear at all on what your actual concern is.

I have some issues with the persistent promotion of the de-sexing campaigns (vets, councils, politicians, rescue troupers etc.) that leaves dog-owners who don't agree with de-sexing in the 'unethical' and 'irresponsible' dog owner corner.

The math I did a few posts (#108) before indicates that it is highly unlikely that the target, to reduce the numbers of dogs dumped and surrendered, can be achieved with the currently promoted de-sexing strategy. This strategy won't have an impact at all if not over 95% of the Australian dogs will be de-sexed - who really believes that those extreme figures can be achieved if it seems even impossible to register all dogs?...the responsible owners will register their dogs, and might de-sex their dogs - but it takes less than 5% entire dogs in the hand of irresponsible breeders to maintain the status quo, fuel the market and fill the pounds.

Therefore it is not only a strategy without having a chance of any positive results (wrt less dumped / surrendered dogs), but will also cause severe health issues (including death / manmade cancer due to de-sexing) and even more dog aggression and behaviour issues. I'm aware that some people will still ignore the findings of recent studies, but some might not, and who knows, perhaps the day will come when there will be enough dog owners acknowledging the studies and force the authorities to develop a smarter and less harmful management scheme to control the dog numbers.

At this stage the only outcome evolving from the currently adopted approach I can see are rising numbers of sad stories with mourning dog owners.

Eta: BTW: thanks for asking.

Eta: I acknowledge that there are also other factors beside irresponsible breeding that lead to overfilled pounds, but these factors won't be addressed via de-sexing either.

Edited May 12, 2016 by Willem

[Simply Grand]

Ok, thank you for your response, how you have expressed it makes sense and makes clear your concern :)

I don't necessarily agree things are as black and white as you are saying, but I also don't think legally mandatory desexing is necessary or effective in solving the issue of unwanted dogs (different story in roaming cats but that's another topic). I don't necessarily think discouraging desexing in general would solve any of the problems raised though either.

I think desexing/management of entire animals is one part of a whole paradigm of responsible animal management that would only be effective as a whole, and is unfortunately not where we are at in Australia.

And just for context, personally, as mentioned growing up we always desexed our pets, including a guinea pig after an oops litter (we thought they were both girls), as an adult I desexed my pet cats, desexed one dog at 6 months, one at 13 months when he was fully grown (small breed) and have one entire 4 yo bitch who has been through a number of seasons now and has had no issues, who I hope to breed if I can do so properly but who will be desexed as she gets older whether she has a litter or not.

ETA the dog desexed at 13 months had a testicle retained in his abdomen which can apparently increase risk of cancer so in his case desexing reduced health risks.

Edited May 12, 2016 by Simply Grand

[asal]

Having just dealt with pyometra, my position on de-sexing has changed a bit. I would always de-sex now. Pyometra is frigging nasty. I have had no problems with any de-sexed animal - cats, dogs & horses oh and a steer!

I understand that going through this is a terrifying experience (I followed your thread about Amber) - however I don't believe that dealing with cancer is more pleasant. Here a study that shows some interesting figures about mortality for pyometra: http://bmcvetres.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1746-6148-10-6...interestingly, the mortality for the medical treated ones was 0%!...the surgical treated ones (OHE) was only 1%. The overall mortality considering also euthanized dogs (due to various reasons) was 10%.

Compare these figures with the survival rate of dogs with cancer due to de-sexing http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0055937:

quote:

...For females, the timing of neutering is more problematical because early neutering significantly increases the incidence rate of CCL from near zero to almost 8 percent, and late neutering increases the rates of HSA to 4 times that of the 1.6 percent rate for intact females and to 5.7 percent for MCT, which was not diagnosed in intact females.

...from zero to 5.7% for MCT!!!...plus all the other side effects. Based on these figures pyo seems to be the less dangerous evil...

I dont desex, but then mine have dog proof fences so no accidents.

in 40 years and being a breeder 3 to 8 bitches at any given time, from retired to puppies had one case of pymetra and one breast cancer in one teat, both removed and no further complications.

other friends seem to have similar,others not as lucky.

ditto results with friends with desexed pets.life tends to be a lottery for us and our pets

http://www.dogsnaturallymagazine.com/your-dog-needs-to-be-spayed-or-neutered-right/

....more scare-mongering pseudoscience ...but hold on, so many studies coming to the same conclusion

love this bit "Another danger is male aggression, though this is largely a cat issue, and in my experience much less likely in intact male dogs. Tom cats are prone to getting into serious fights when they are intact, and this can make for wounds, abscesses, and disease transmission, if they are wounded by a cat carrying FeLV, for example."

our vet never told sylvester he was now a neuter. for the next 17 years he street fought his way to top cat on the block pile, with an array of expensive injuries to prove it. the other chap always came out worse, even the doberman who offended him once.

one time I asked his vet to issue a desexed certificate we could show him to prove hes NOT a tom anymore.

so whats up on the vets wall next visit?

"warning, 11 % of desexed males wont know their desexed"

thought it was funny at the time, but wait till the day that cute colt you had gelded grows up thinking hes a stallion AND YOU KNOW hes got no nuts, you saw the vet remove em...........GRRRRR!

Edited May 12, 2016 by asal

[Willem]

Ok, thank you for your response, how you have expressed it makes sense and makes clear your concern :)

I don't necessarily agree things are as black and white as you are saying, but I also don't think legally mandatory desexing is necessary or effective in solving the issue of unwanted dogs (different story in roaming cats but that's another topic). I don't necessarily think discouraging desexing would solve any of the problems raised though either.

I think desexing/management of entire animals is one part of a whole paradigm of responsible animal management that would only be effective as a whole, and is unfortunately not where we are at in Australia.

And just for context, personally, as mentioned growing up we always desexed our pets, including a guinea pig after an oops litter (we thought they were both girls), as an adult I desexed my pet cats, desexed one dog at 6 months, one at 13 months when he was fully grown (small breed) and have one entire 4 yo bitch who has been through a number of seasons now and has had no issues, who I hope yo breed if I can do so properly but who will be desexed as she gets older whether she has a litter or not.

wrt highlighted text: I absolutely agree!...de-sexing should be one option, but people should be aware that it can't be the silver bullet and that it comes with side effects. We should aim to use de-sexing as the last line of defence, not as the first line. As Steve worked out, the current strategy was adopted without detailed knowledge of what really causes the high numbers of dumped and surrendered dogs the pounds have to cope with - too many things have been overseen till now.

[Willem]

Having just dealt with pyometra, my position on de-sexing has changed a bit. I would always de-sex now. Pyometra is frigging nasty. I have had no problems with any de-sexed animal - cats, dogs & horses oh and a steer!

I understand that going through this is a terrifying experience (I followed your thread about Amber) - however I don't believe that dealing with cancer is more pleasant. Here a study that shows some interesting figures about mortality for pyometra: http://bmcvetres.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1746-6148-10-6...interestingly, the mortality for the medical treated ones was 0%!...the surgical treated ones (OHE) was only 1%. The overall mortality considering also euthanized dogs (due to various reasons) was 10%.

Compare these figures with the survival rate of dogs with cancer due to de-sexing http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0055937:

quote:

...For females, the timing of neutering is more problematical because early neutering significantly increases the incidence rate of CCL from near zero to almost 8 percent, and late neutering increases the rates of HSA to 4 times that of the 1.6 percent rate for intact females and to 5.7 percent for MCT, which was not diagnosed in intact females.

...from zero to 5.7% for MCT!!!...plus all the other side effects. Based on these figures pyo seems to be the less dangerous evil...

I dont desex, but then mine have dog proof fences so no accidents.

in 40 years and being a breeder 3 to 8 bitches at any given time, from retired to puppies had one case of pymetra and one breast cancer in one teat, both removed and no further complications.

other friends seem to have similar,others not as lucky.

ditto results with friends with desexed pets.life tends to be a lottery for us and our pets

http://www.dogsnaturallymagazine.com/your-dog-needs-to-be-spayed-or-neutered-right/

....more scare-mongering pseudoscience ...but hold on, so many studies coming to the same conclusion

love this bit "Another danger is male aggression, though this is largely a cat issue, and in my experience much less likely in intact male dogs. Tom cats are prone to getting into serious fights when they are intact, and this can make for wounds, abscesses, and disease transmission, if they are wounded by a cat carrying FeLV, for example."

our vet never told sylvester he was now a neuter. for the next 17 years he street fought his way to top cat on the block pile, with an array of expensive injuries to prove it. the other chap always came out worse, even the doberman who offended him once.

one time I asked his vet to issue a desexed certificate we could show him to prove hes NOT a tom anymore.

so whats up on the vets wall next visit?

"warning, 11 % of desexed males wont know their desexed"

thought it was funny at the time, but wait till the day that cute colt you had gelded grows up thinking hes a stallion AND YOU KNOW hes got no nuts, you saw the vet remove em...........GRRRRR!

I found the comments about ADD very interesting too (the other stuff wasn't new for me), here the link (the link in the article seems to be broken): http://www.atftc.com/health/SNBehaviorBoneDataSnapShot.pdf

quote:

Summary

The above data is just a small sample of the significant data that were determined in this study. By using large a sample of dogs than any used previously to examine behavior in dogs, we found significant correlations between neutering dogs and increases in aggression, fear and anxiety, and excitability, regardless of the age at which the dog was neutered.

There were also significant correlations between neutering and decreases in trainability and responsiveness to cues

. The other three behavioral categories examined (miscellaneous behavior problems, attachment and attentionseeking behavior, and separation-related behavior) showed some association with neutering, but these differed more substantially depending on the age at which the dog was neutered. The overall trend seen in all these behavioral data was that the earlier the dog was neutered, the more negative the effect on the behavior. A difference in bone length was found between neutered and intact dogs, suggesting that neutering has an effect on bone growth, which may be related to other orthopedic effects documented in the literature. Examination of changes in bone length of gonadectomized dogs is continuing.

[asal]

Having just dealt with pyometra, my position on de-sexing has changed a bit. I would always de-sex now. Pyometra is frigging nasty. I have had no problems with any de-sexed animal - cats, dogs & horses oh and a steer!

I understand that going through this is a terrifying experience (I followed your thread about Amber) - however I don't believe that dealing with cancer is more pleasant. Here a study that shows some interesting figures about mortality for pyometra: http://bmcvetres.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1746-6148-10-6...interestingly, the mortality for the medical treated ones was 0%!...the surgical treated ones (OHE) was only 1%. The overall mortality considering also euthanized dogs (due to various reasons) was 10%.

Compare these figures with the survival rate of dogs with cancer due to de-sexing http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0055937:

quote:

...For females, the timing of neutering is more problematical because early neutering significantly increases the incidence rate of CCL from near zero to almost 8 percent, and late neutering increases the rates of HSA to 4 times that of the 1.6 percent rate for intact females and to 5.7 percent for MCT, which was not diagnosed in intact females.

...from zero to 5.7% for MCT!!!...plus all the other side effects. Based on these figures pyo seems to be the less dangerous evil...

I dont desex, but then mine have dog proof fences so no accidents.

in 40 years and being a breeder 3 to 8 bitches at any given time, from retired to puppies had one case of pymetra and one breast cancer in one teat, both removed and no further complications.

other friends seem to have similar,others not as lucky.

ditto results with friends with desexed pets.life tends to be a lottery for us and our pets

http://www.dogsnaturallymagazine.com/your-dog-needs-to-be-spayed-or-neutered-right/

....more scare-mongering pseudoscience ...but hold on, so many studies coming to the same conclusion

love this bit "Another danger is male aggression, though this is largely a cat issue, and in my experience much less likely in intact male dogs. Tom cats are prone to getting into serious fights when they are intact, and this can make for wounds, abscesses, and disease transmission, if they are wounded by a cat carrying FeLV, for example."

our vet never told sylvester he was now a neuter. for the next 17 years he street fought his way to top cat on the block pile, with an array of expensive injuries to prove it. the other chap always came out worse, even the doberman who offended him once.

one time I asked his vet to issue a desexed certificate we could show him to prove hes NOT a tom anymore.

so whats up on the vets wall next visit?

"warning, 11 % of desexed males wont know their desexed"

thought it was funny at the time, but wait till the day that cute colt you had gelded grows up thinking hes a stallion AND YOU KNOW hes got no nuts, you saw the vet remove em...........GRRRRR!

I found the comments about ADD very interesting too (the other stuff wasn't new for me), here the link (the link in the article seems to be broken): http://www.atftc.com/health/SNBehaviorBoneDataSnapShot.pdf

quote:

Summary

The above data is just a small sample of the significant data that were determined in this study. By using large a sample of dogs than any used previously to examine behavior in dogs, we found significant correlations between neutering dogs and increases in aggression, fear and anxiety, and excitability, regardless of the age at which the dog was neutered.

There were also significant correlations between neutering and decreases in trainability and responsiveness to cues

. The other three behavioral categories examined (miscellaneous behavior problems, attachment and attentionseeking behavior, and separation-related behavior) showed some association with neutering, but these differed more substantially depending on the age at which the dog was neutered. The overall trend seen in all these behavioral data was that the earlier the dog was neutered, the more negative the effect on the behavior. A difference in bone length was found between neutered and intact dogs, suggesting that neutering has an effect on bone growth, which may be related to other orthopedic effects documented in the literature. Examination of changes in bone length of gonadectomized dogs is continuing.

no idea where to find it now but in the 70's there was an experiment and colt foals were castrated at 3 months. other sibling colts left entire and compared when adult (around 5 to 7 years old) it was discovered the early gelded foals had developed longer limbs and the skeleton including pelvis was indistinguishable from that of a mare.

the uncastratd colts growth plates closed at a younger age as puberty kicked in and were therefore shorter in height with bulkier appearance

Edited May 12, 2016 by asal

[Willem]

no idea where to find it now but in the 70's there was an experiment and colt foals were castrated at 3 months. other sibling colts left entire and compared when adult (around 5 to 7 years old) it was discovered the early gelded foals had developed longer limbs and the skeleton including pelvis was indistinguishable from that of a mare.

the uncastratd colts growth plates closed at a younger age as puberty kicked in and were therefore shorter in height with bulkier appearance

the same with dogs (there's enough studies done to verify this); I assume the changed lengths of the limps is one reason for the dramatically increased CCL damage and HD that comes with de-sexing.

[Simply Grand]

I don't agree that desexing should be the last line of defense, I think with how thing currently are it should be the default, as long as people (like me, and you Willem) have the legal option to opt out, as we currently do. As far as I am aware, keeping entire dogs has different requirements according to state/local government but is not illegal anywhere.

See my earlier post:

I think one thing being missed here is the "in between" group of pet owners that are NOT irresponsible uncaring people that don't bother picking up their pets when they escape and get impounded or breed willy nilly for money or don't care that their pets roam BUT are also not "crazy animal people" enough to learn all about pet health and management and breeding and be on forums.

The average family who has a pet that they care for just fine. Like my family growing up. We had cats and small animals and they were fed and safely houses and came inside and were played with cared for and given regular vet attention, but my parents weren't "animal" people who researched all the options. Our cats were desexed because "that's what you do". When chipping and rego became requirements we did them because "that's what you do". Had those things not been either encouraged or required I doubt my parents would have thought about going off and researching the best options or building enclosures or keeping inside our male cats. They wouldn't have wanted kittens so had we had a female get pregnant they probably would have looked at the options but because it was "just what you do" all out cats were desexed by 6 months and we never produced more cats that would need homes.

I think that is the aim of the rules and the encouragement around desexing and I think if we are considering stats about the effectiveness of the program's we would have to take all this "in between" owners into account as well.

Having worked full time in a shelter, doing surrender interviews, doing behaviour assessments on both surrenders and stray dogs, doing behaviour modification, teaching classes, seeing the positive results of good early socialization and training, and the sometimes unfixable results of thoughtless breeding, making the decisions about which animals will live and which will die, and holding them as they die (that is not by any means meant as a guilt trip but just to say I have experienced the raw end result), as well as considering what I know of scientific research based evidence, I believe THOUGHTFUL, CONSIDERED BREEDING is VITAL.

If that means the default is desex so people CANNOT automatically breed legally with no consequence, but have the right to spend some more effort and money in order to keep their dog entire because it's what they believe is best, then I think that's a good thing.

Edited May 12, 2016 by Simply Grand

[Maddy]

Having just dealt with pyometra, my position on de-sexing has changed a bit. I would always de-sex now. Pyometra is frigging nasty. I have had no problems with any de-sexed animal - cats, dogs & horses oh and a steer!

I understand that going through this is a terrifying experience (I followed your thread about Amber) - however I don't believe that dealing with cancer is more pleasant. Here a study that shows some interesting figures about mortality for pyometra: http://bmcvetres.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1746-6148-10-6...interestingly, the mortality for the medical treated ones was 0%!...the surgical treated ones (OHE) was only 1%. The overall mortality considering also euthanized dogs (due to various reasons) was 10%.

Compare these figures with the survival rate of dogs with cancer due to de-sexing http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0055937:

quote:

...For females, the timing of neutering is more problematical because early neutering significantly increases the incidence rate of CCL from near zero to almost 8 percent, and late neutering increases the rates of HSA to 4 times that of the 1.6 percent rate for intact females and to 5.7 percent for MCT, which was not diagnosed in intact females.

...from zero to 5.7% for MCT!!!...plus all the other side effects. Based on these figures pyo seems to be the less dangerous evil...

I dont desex, but then mine have dog proof fences so no accidents.

in 40 years and being a breeder 3 to 8 bitches at any given time, from retired to puppies had one case of pymetra and one breast cancer in one teat, both removed and no further complications.

other friends seem to have similar,others not as lucky.

ditto results with friends with desexed pets.life tends to be a lottery for us and our pets

http://www.dogsnaturallymagazine.com/your-dog-needs-to-be-spayed-or-neutered-right/

....more scare-mongering pseudoscience ...but hold on, so many studies coming to the same conclusion

Scare-mongering pseudoscience is claiming a link between vaccinations and pyometra, amongst other absolutely absurd claims you've made in this thread.

But anyway, I'm sure you've got three billy goats to terrorise from under your bridge, in between frothy, attention-seeking rants about the evils of vets, vaccines and something about Hitler and/or Trump (or maybe me?) being the cause of all dog problems.

[Willem]

@SG: I think we are not too far away regarding our views and opinions - I just would wish that people would recognize that an entire dog can be actually a healthier and less aggressive dog and easier to train and to handle and therefore actually in a way a better dog, and I have some hope that once people recognize the gain, it will motivate them to put the additional effort in that is required to manage an entire dog.

Edited May 12, 2016 by Willem

[OSoSwift]

Many of us here do recognise that.

I don't seem to be following you well but that's nothing new.

The rules cater to the irresponsible, I really don't care about percentages, that is why we end up with the rules we do. It really is that simple.

Do I get pissed off that often if you have an entire dog you are seen as irresponsible? Absolutely.

[trifecta]

@SG: I think we are not too far away regarding our views and opinions - I just would wish that people would recognize that an entire dog can be actually a healthier and less aggressive dog and easier to train and to handle and therefore actually in a way a better dog, and I have some hope that once people recognize the gain, it will motivate them to put the additional effort in that is required to manage an entire dog.

If you had done a search, Willem, you would have gleaned that is the concensus on DOL - there have been many discussions on the pros and cons of desexing on this forum over the years. But you would have known that from your penchant for googling as the discussions show up in searches.

Instead you choose to be inflammatory and confrontational, well that's your choice, but I won't be drawn in and neither will many others who probably have valuable contributions to make to discussions.

[Willem]

@SG: I think we are not too far away regarding our views and opinions - I just would wish that people would recognize that an entire dog can be actually a healthier and less aggressive dog and easier to train and to handle and therefore actually in a way a better dog, and I have some hope that once people recognize the gain, it will motivate them to put the additional effort in that is required to manage an entire dog.

If you had done a search, Willem, you would have gleaned that is the concensus on DOL - there have been many discussions on the pros and cons of desexing on this forum over the years. But you would have known that from your penchant for googling as the discussions show up in searches.

Instead you choose to be inflammatory and confrontational, well that's your choice, but I won't be drawn in and neither will many others who probably have valuable contributions to make to discussions.

don't worry, a lot of people (including me) won't miss those probably valuable contributions if they have the same explanatory power as your last post..

Eta: ...guys, if you don't want to post in this thread: there is no need for posting that you don't want to post!...'I've tried not replying too but can't help myself.'...seriously???

Edited May 12, 2016 by Willem

[aussielover]

I actually agree that there is no point in charging higher rego for entire dogs. Truly irresponsible owners are unlikely to register their dogs in the first place.

Having a higher fee for entire animals may well put some people off registration.

But you really can't compare Australia to Norway- the attitude towards dogs and culture is so different.

as for desexing- I wouldn't judge anyone either way. However it is clear that willem feels people who choose to desex are the "unethical" ones who are risking their dogs health, rather than the opposite way around which he implies in the title of this thread.

[Steve]

Too bad some of the posts in this thread are inflammatory and confrontational toward the OP and seem to be designed to punish the OP in some way for wanting to discuss something he sees as worthy of a chat. It also prevents other from saying what they truly think in fear of being belted.

For me personally Ive never given much thought to the whole increased fees for entire animals ,never really thought about whether they are punishments or incentives and several other things which have sparked my thought processes because of this thread.

I think its a worthy conversation and I would like to see people being able to say what they think so we can challenge our own views and take a look at others.

So far its led me to thinking differently about possible solutions for the numbers being dumped which Ive not considered before and Im enjoying it because I think challenging the same old same old so we don't get the same old same old results is healthy and what is best for the dogs

Im more than happy to be proven wrong if it means less dogs suffer and change my view and put in place programs which may help so if you dont want to contribute and debate what you feel is one thing or another why muck it up for everyone else?

[Steve]

I actually agree that there is no point in charging higher rego for entire dogs. Truly irresponsible owners are unlikely to register their dogs in the first place.

Having a higher fee for entire animals may well put some people off registration.

But you really can't compare Australia to Norway- the attitude towards dogs and culture is so different.

as for desexing- I wouldn't judge anyone either way. However it is clear that willem feels people who choose to desex are the "unethical" ones who are risking their dogs health, rather than the opposite way around which he implies in the title of this thread.

That's not clear to me - to me it is clear that he doesn't like being tagged unethical because he doesn't desex ,he is tired of being penalised and having to defend himself because of his choice.

He thinks his decision is right and he is defending why he made it and wants to talk about it - where is the problem here?

[Steve]

By the way this topic has been done before - a lot and I and many others have presented provable facts regarding the pros and cons for the welfare of dogs which some people want to call pseudo science. If there are other studies which prove what I believe to be proven facts based on the numerous studies Ive researched Im happy to look at them and take them into account as I form and keep my opinion.

Dog owners are entitled to know the proven facts of pros and cons of desexing and how age of desexing may impact on their dog's health before they get bullied into doing it just as they should know the consequences of other things which are seen to be or are aspects of being a responsible pet owner .

So some people are sick of it some people have never heard of it some people are at a different place now to where they were when they first saw it .

What is the goal of providing lower fees for desexed dogs and will having more dogs desexed attain that goal or make it worse. Its not just about me , my decision and my dogs its about the system that never seems to budge off what is .

How do we progress if we stop debate and dont challenge political correctness .

If this environment enables people to feel free to give their experiences and opinions and dont feel under attack if these are challenged we may even get somewhere.

[Willem]

I actually agree that there is no point in charging higher rego for entire dogs. Truly irresponsible owners are unlikely to register their dogs in the first place.

Having a higher fee for entire animals may well put some people off registration.

But you really can't compare Australia to Norway- the attitude towards dogs and culture is so different.

as for desexing- I wouldn't judge anyone either way. However it is clear that willem feels people who choose to desex are the "unethical" ones who are risking their dogs health, rather than the opposite way around which he implies in the title of this thread.

That's not clear to me - to me it is clear that he doesn't like being tagged unethical because he doesn't desex ,he is tired of being penalised and having to defend himself because of his choice.

He thinks his decision is right and he is defending why he made it and wants to talk about it - where is the problem here?

Thanks!...hits the nail.

I might look at the problem from a different angle, but my aim is the most healthy and most happy dog possible, and currently I believe that there is room for improvement regarding the currently adopted approach to control the numbers.

[JulesP]

- where is the problem here?

The problem is the OP posting history.