Many owners think that sterilizing their pet, no matter male or female, is an act of brutality. This way of thinking is normal if we take into account that the cat has been, until recent time, an eminently street animal, admitted by people only thanks to its versatility: excellent hunter of mice that does not need feeding and because he can search and find food by his own means.

    But times are changing and we need to understand the figure of the cat. In fact, more and more the cat has been revealing that he is the best mate of the urban and sedentary person, able to be alone in a flat during the long hours his owner spends out working. Furthermore, he does not need to go out of the house to satisfy his basic physiological needs. The cat becomes the perfect pet for those who have a long working day and they don’t have enough time that would need, for example, to have a dog.

    For these reasons, the cat becomes, almost exclusively, a pet. On very few occasions does he have access to the outdoors (which would be quite dangerous because serious diseases such as Feline Leukaemia or other parasitic diseases so feared by people such as the Toxoplasmosis are common in the colonies of street cats) and hardly ever is he used for breeding in a responsible way.

    In fact, cats acquired for such aim (breeding) would not have to be sterilized - the reason, of course, is obvious -. Nevertheless, why should then a non-breeding cat remain un-neutered? Many people think that to deprive a cat of his reproductive organs is, in short, to mutilate him. Perhaps it would better to analyse the advantages of castration, and then, judge that possibility.

We would like to add that although sterilizing our cat implies a surgical operation, this is a minor operation, only a bit complicated in the case of the female. The castration of males consists on only two incisions and they not even need stitches.  Recovery basically depends on the anaesthesia effect rather than on the area of the wound. In the case of the females, generally vets tend to extract the uterus and ovaries making an incision in the abdomen of the female, which needs to have a few stitches. Keeping adequate hygiene and disinfection of the area does not need extra postoperative treatment in most of the cases. It is possible to remove only the ovaries, but we don't recommend this procedure since conserving the uterus could only lead to a possible infection; besides, cysts can appear as the kitty grows older.

    MARKING

    The adult non-neutered male needs, by instinct, to mark the territory. Marking consists on expelling, like a spray, small amounts of urine of a really intense odour all around our home. If we neuter him before he begins to mark (around 7-8 months of age) we can be sure that our cat won't mark our home walls, sofas or furniture.

    ESCAPES

    In heat seasons, females utter a series of characteristic meows which indicate to males their predisposition to copulation. Our male, who is always willing to do a "favour", will not doubt twice about going to the call of the females, escaping through the most unsuspected place. So, with the elimination of his sexual hormones, we would have finished also with non-desired escapes. We should take into account that our cat is capable of detecting the presence of females who live in a neighbouring building or even street females wandering around our area.
    ODOUR
    Although this is an exception, there are few males who don't usually mark territory. But even in these cases, the male expels a characteristic odour, much stronger and disgusting than the odour of a female (who hardly smells to anything). Almost in all cases, this odour lessens when the male is neutered. Besides, the urine odour of a non-neutered male is much stronger in comparison with the corresponding of a neutered cat as this last does not contain sexual hormones.
    CHARACTER
    As a rule, males are more quick-witted, naughty and independent than females are. This last attribute, the one related to independence, consolidates as the cat grows up. A neutered cat, however, is a cat of an endlessly young character, that is, he will keep on being good-humoured and extrovert for all his life, much more attached to his owners rather than a non-neutered male.

    PREGNANCY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES

    Maybe the most well-known advantage of sterilizing the female is to prevent her from having undesired pregnancies. Although the kitty won't try to escape from home (females are usually much more home-loving than males), we should be very careful with her during the heat season as in those days her hormones are asking her to a thing that can only be found outdoors. And please pay attention; the only risk that she will run is not being pregnant: among street cats infectious diseases like Feline Leukaemia are very common and the vast majority of them are carrying parasites which are very dangerous not only for the health of our kitty, but in lot of occasions for the health of our own family (toxoplasmosis, giardias, coccidios, etc). If our kitty makes contact with her street congeners, she will not only become a focal point of infections indoors, but also her own life would be endangered. Sterilized females never feel the desire to escape, preventing them from all these problems.

    THE HOT

    An adult kitty in heat often becomes an unbearable company. Her humour changes (she will get extremely affectionate with her owner) and her persecution complex with her "buttocks" up behind us are only the nice part. Soon, we will get fed up with her for being extremely strong and insistent with her night meowing and her attempts to escape (of fatal consequences as we have read above), in addition to the fact that a few females mark during their "receptive" season. Sterilization nips this undesired behaviour in the bud without causing her any kind of secondary effects.

    Some people think that in order to finish with this behaviour a solution so radical as such sterilization is not necessary, since there are "laboratory" remedies, such as progesterone hormones, taken either orally or intravenously.

    Nevertheless, these kinds of treatments are not completely safe because of the following reason: when a female is pregnant, her body produces a hormone known as progesterone. This hormone is responsible for the total seal of the uterus producing an accumulation which is known as "vaginal plug" in order to prevent babies from possible infections from the outside. This plug is expelled by the kitty some hours before labour. Now, if we give our female this hormone, either in tablets or in injections, her organism will interpret that as if the cat was pregnant. Obviously heat will disappear, but the uterus, in order to protect supposed kittens inside it, will also develop the "vaginal plug". But, on this occasion, as there will be no labour, there won't be either uterus dilation and consequently, there won't be any plug ejection. Consequences are the imaginable: a uterus permanently sealed is a uterus without the necessary drainage for the natural ejection of the remains and, in the long run, a uterus infected, will turn out to be pyometra. Once the clinic exam has determined that our cat has her uterus infected, sterilization will be COMPULSORY and FUNDAMENTAL for the conservation of the life of the animal as long as pyometra has not gone too far. However, sometimes pyometra is in such an advanced stage that the kitty is condemned to death.

    For this reason, if  long term sterilization is not going to be an option, but an obligation to preserve the life of our kitty, what kind of owner would make his/her cat suffer unnecessarily from such a painful disease?

    CHARACTER

    Although females are by nature more affectionate and calm than males, sterilizing our cat assures us the permanence of this character in her adult age.

    Analyzing all this, any person is probably able to understand that sterilizing a cat does not mean to mutilate him or deny him his happiness. On the contrary, if our cat had the ability to talk, he would surely be grateful to us. Sterilization is not the end, but the beginning of his welfare.
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