Castration age - urinary problems

[Vio&Juni]

Poor Pichu had a bad day yesterday - he couldn't pee at all and we took him in the evening to the emergency vet and he had to get the catheter (sp?).

He had been bad for the last few days and I was planning on taking him to the vet today (I have a day off), but I couldn't wait any longer. The vet told me that he was castrated too early and his penis is too small, undeveloped, so that leads to urinary problems (together with a few other factors). Now, having Milo who needs to be castrated also, I was wondering what would be the best age to castrate him to avoid the same problems with him.

So, I wanted to know when did you castrate your male cats and how many of you have male cats with urinary problems, so please drop a short answer with the age of castration either way

[emily_the_spoiled]

Usually I have done my guys between 4 to 6 months (depending one how big they are). I have been fortunate and not had any urinary problems with them.

[Medusa]

My vet said no earlier than 6 months and I've not had any problems in that regard.

[critters]

*shrug* I've had 2 blockers neutered as adults, a blocker neutered at 6 months, and a BUNCH of non-blockers neutered at 2 months.

[catnapper]

Allen was nearly a year and we have behavioral peeing. He pees when something doesn't go his way :rolleyes:

Pouncer was 7 months and had crystals real bad. He had the surgery last month to alleviate his problem and so far so good :)

Harry right at 6 months and noooo problems at all :)

[Maya & Inka's mommy]

My RB Sydney was 8 months. He was perfectly fine afterwards :)

[kimlovescats]

I usually wait until at least six months and the furry balls are easily noticed! ;) So far, I have not had any urinary problems with any of my boys.

[Medusa]

I usually wait until at least six months and the furry balls are easily noticed!

Interesting that you should say this. That's how Coco Puff got his name. When he walked away, he had the cutest little furry brown "coco puffs" and I hated having them removed but, of course, I had to. And he's still the sweetest, most even tempered boy; never have heard him hiss or growl. He's the baddest cat I have, gets into everything, but that's another story. :p

[Randi]

Fister was neutered at the age of 1, but you know he had problems with struvite crystals and ended up getting his bits chopped off. :( However, he's been fine since then. :D

You may want to put him on a diet which dissolve crystals, if that is part of the problem.

One thing I've heard is, that they can get all sorts of problems, if they're taken from their mom too early. How old was Pichu when you got him?

Sorry I can't be of much help here.

Good to see you here anyway! :)

[jazzcat]

I'm so sorry to hear about handsome Pichu. Poor little guy.

Wow, I had never heard that the age could cause a problem. I think I would wait till Milo is 5-6 months old.

Ripley was 5 months old and he's only had a few infections in old age that go along with his kidney failure.

Rocky was neutered at 5 months and so far no problems but he's only 3 years old now.

Now I'm very worried because we had Decker done at about 9 weeks old because of the situation of having to trap him and he being a wild/feral kitten. If we couldn't tame him the plan was to release him back into the yard so we went ahead with the neuter but then the sedation from the neuter made it easy for the wonderful vet tech to work with him and by the time he came home I could actually pet him without a towel over him. The rest is history. I really pray my sweet little deck boy doesn't end up with urinary problems. :(

[AmberLee]

I had Perspicacity (Cassy) and his littermate/brother Sassafras (Sassy) neutered on their 4-month birthday. So far no trouble on Cassy's behalf. Sassy died unexpectedly just after their 19 month birthday due to heart problems...

I've heard that there is a higher incidence of crystal problems when kittens are neutured before 6 months, but am not sure whether this is just speculation. Thanks for running this poll: I think you are getting great insights from cat lovers around the world.

[Catlady711]

Where I work at they won't spay/neuter any animal until 5-6 months old. The theory is (at least with cats anyways) is that they have a naturally higher crystal content in their urine anyways and having the surgery done when they are a few months older allows the urethra (the part the urine passes through) to grow a bit more which should decrease incidents of being blocked up when they are older. In male dogs waiting seems to allow them to look more masculine than younger neutering. I honestly can't say for sure on the female dogs young vs older spaying as I've never actually asked before, I just know it's better to get them done BEFORE their first heat cycle which is around 6 months old.

For my own cats:

Jack was neutered at 8 months old when he got his second set of shots and has only had one minor UTI several years ago which caused no blockage and was treated with Amoxi-drops for a week. He has not had that problem since then and he's now almost 8 years old.

Pooky & Bear were neutered at 5 1/2 months old because they had started acting like tom cats. Neither one has had any kind of urinary problem and they are now 5 1/2 years old.

Cami was spayed when she was 1 year old (when she showed up) and has not had any urinary problems. She is 3 years old.

Sabrina, Sassy & Josh were spayed/neutered at 6 months old and have not had any problems but they are only just now 1 year old.

[DrKym]

Being that we do mostly rescue our guys are done as soon as we take them in, some are 8 weeks some over a yr.
Other than my RB siamese Solomon we never had issues, he however had contracted an infection so he did urinate in less than desirable places when stressed.( the stove ,the laundry, the couch :rolleyes: )

[krazyaboutkatz]

When I adopted Storm he was already neutered and he was around 1 year old so I don't know how old he was when he was neutered. He became blocked 2 times and had to have the PU surgery when he was almost 9 years old and he's had a few UTI's since then.

I was told that Sunny was neutered at 6 months of age and so far no problems. Sky was adopted when he was about 1 year old and he was neutered sometime before his first birthday. So far so good with him too. Starr was neutered when he was between 6-7 months and he's had a couple of UTI's but he's always been a sickly cat.

The surgeon told me that Storm's urethra was very small so it was only a matter of time before he would become blocked. He was on Royal Canin Urinary S/O wet and dry food but now he's on a grain free diet which was approved by both his regular vet and his holistic vet and he's doing very well.:)

I sure hope that Pichu will be okay and that he won't need to have surgery. I'll keep him in my thoughts and prayers.

[lvpets2002]

;) Well I have always had Girls & they all were spayed at 5-6 months of age.. I just within the last few months have 4 wittle boys.. Bump is 7 months & just had his surgury & is doing great.. Skid is 7 months & get his surgury done at the end of this week.. Rastus will be 7 months as of Nov 1 & then he will be scheduled.. Scrapster is only 5 wks & has a long while before we think about it.. My Vet & I had a long discussion about ages & surgery & she (vet) will not do males before 7 months of age due to could be problems with the uninary track in which could lead to UTI..

[catmandu]

None Of The Lucky Found Paradise Males Have Had Any Problems What So Ever, But None Of Then Were Neutered At A Young Age.
We Are Sending Prayers For Pichu , And Hope That Hes All Right Soon.

[Vio&Juni]

Thank you everyone for input.

Thankfully, Pichu is much better now, we're still giving him injections and pills and we're watching him every time he goes into the bathroom (poor guy).

He does it just in the litter box even when he is sick and I think that is very nice of him.

The vet that castrated him kept telling us that he is older than we were thinking, and I should have listened to myself, I knew that he was just a big boy. I was sure he was under 6 months when we castrated him. Well, we'll wait a little longer for Milo and here we know more about his age, when we got him, there was no way he was older than one month.

On a happier note, Juni and Pichu are adjusting pretty well here, Milo is being a pest, but P&J are not complaining much. As for Milo, finally he found other tails to play with besides his own :D.

I am taking pictures, but still cannot upload them to the desktop, so, I'll try to get Internet on my laptop and then I will post a lot of them.

The house feels so much more like home with them around :)

[Barbara]

Tigris was neutered at about 6 months. He came up with this iFLUTD (idiopathic Feline Lower Urinary Tract Disease) at the age of 9 years and he has been fine since. I cannot imagine that there is a connection.
Filou was about 9 months ( it was later when he started singing his coming-of-age songs in the staircase) and he has no peeing problems.
I must say Pichu's problems do sound to me similar to Tigris. If he is fine until next year and if he wants to emigrate to Germany we'll be happy to have him checked by our vet. I think I would want a second opinion.
When Tigris takes a bath you can see his little penis :o and it looks quite ok ;)

[Vio&Juni]

Pichu couldn't pee again tonight, so tomorrow we'll call the vet again :(.

I will lock him in a separate bathroom tomorrow to check how much he eats, drinks and pees.

Barbara, Pichu very much wants to emigrate to Germany next year, so I hope we'll see Tigris' vet.

The emergency vet we saw on Sunday told us that they do a certain surgery that removes the penis and then they don't have problems at all, sounds kind of scary...

[krazyaboutkatz]

Here's some information about the PU Surgery. There are some graphic pictures so please only look at them if you want to. Here's the link perineal urethrostomy (http://www.vetsurgerycentral.com/urethrostomy.htm).