Breaking breeder contract? (Neuter)

[AngB]

So we got a pandemic puppy last year from a decent'ish breeder. He turns 1 in a couple weeks and is intact. Due to our puppy being a large breed (he was 75 lbs about a month ago), we agreed not to neuter until he was at least 18 mo-2. But we don't have to neuter him at all per the contract/breeder. (I know also not ideal but it is really hard to find a good breeder with a reasonable spay/neuter agreement even for large breeds and vets more commonly recommending to wait at least a year for larger breeds now..a lot wanted them fixed by 6 mo which I was not ok with. ) Anyway our vet did recommend we wait until at least 1 so here we are. We fully intended to wait until 18 mo+ but we are starting to have thankfully minor issues with marking (not in our house but with the dog sitter) and excessively humping other dogs, etc. (We have worked with a trainer but he's super stubborn.) We are going out of town in early June so getting him neutered right after 1 in the next few weeks I think is our best plan but it would technically be violating the agreement. (That hubby didn't even sign if that matters ...) I know it might not magically undesired behavior but I am concerned it could get worse over the next 6 months. That said, there was not any repercussions in the contract for breaking it. And breeder lives 12 hours away so it's not like they would know. Thoughts?

[Snow mom]

Unless the breeder is in direct contact with your vet I guess I would only worry about what your vet says the medically responsible thing to do is. I haven’t had large breed dogs so am not familiar with the idea of leaving them intact so long. It might not solve your issues, especially behaviorally, as I believe many of these “male traits” have to do with brain development in the presence of sex hormones. You’ll remove the testes, but the brain development that has already occurred has already occurred. Does your contract with the breeder specify a consequence of breaking the contract? I wouldn’t think it matters that your DH didn’t sign, as you did and therefore the contract would be enforceable.

[AngB]

Unless the breeder is in direct contact with your vet I guess I would only worry about what your vet says the medically responsible thing to do is. I haven’t had large breed dogs so am not familiar with the idea of leaving them intact so long. It might not solve your issues, especially behaviorally, as I believe many of these “male traits” have to do with brain development in the presence of sex hormones. You’ll remove the testes, but the brain development that has already occurred has already occurred. Does your contract with the breeder specify a consequence of breaking the contract? I wouldn’t think it matters that your DH didn’t sign, as you did and therefore the contract would be enforceable.

I am in a vet group on FB and the very first thing they always recommend for marking/humping is neutering. Since he hasn't marked at our house,etc. I am hoping we would be doing it soon enough that it would help (even trainers that's the first thing they recommend for it.) (And a big reason I don't want to wait 6 more months and hope it doesn't get worse.) But yeah, we know it isn't a guaranteed fix. Our vet recommended that we wait until he was a year but any time after that was fine, and was fine with us having it done at 18 months which was our original plan. But we discussed it when he was 4 months old so it wasn't like we were having issues then. There weren't any consequences in the contract and they don't have our vet info. (Actually our vet is kinda boutique -super high priced but convenient place, it's fine for shots and checkups, but I am probably going to have him neutered and probably his stomach tacked to prevent bloat somewhere else and possibly switch to that vet if we like them.) DH took him to a mobile vet just to get microchipped about a month ago and that vet did recommend neutering him at a year.

[ezcc]

I think if your vet thinks it is ok, I would go with that recommendation. I highly doubt that kind of contract would be enforceable even if they wanted to track you down which seems highly unlikely. I don't know the reasoning behind waiting 18 mos versus a year though- our lab/shepherd mix was neutered before he turned 1 I am sure, although I don't remember exactly when.

[AngB]

I think if your vet thinks it is ok, I would go with that recommendation. I highly doubt that kind of contract would be enforceable even if they wanted to track you down which seems highly unlikely. I don't know the reasoning behind waiting 18 mos versus a year though- our lab/shepherd mix was neutered before he turned 1 I am sure, although I don't remember exactly when.

The idea is to wait until they are fully grown (which for large breeds isn't until 18ish months) to prevent future orthopedic problems hopefully. There was a study done on golden retrievers (which our dog is part golden..) "The study, which examined the health records of 759 golden retrievers, found a surprising doubling of hip dysplasia among male dogs neutered before one year of age." Here's a summary if you are interested: https://www.ucdavis.edu/news/golden-...cts-dog-health . When to do it after 1 is kind of a gray area even among vets, but we had a rescue who was a "pediatric spay" at 8 weeks old and she suffered from lifelong orthopedic problems that the ortho vet thought (even back before there were studies) that being spayed so early probably did at least contribute to her issues. (I know there's a drastic difference between 8 weeks and 1 year, but that's why I didn't want a breeder that required us to neuter before he was 1, specifically. I had hoped we wouldn't have issues with just waiting but here we are.)

[ezcc]

Interesting, our dog is 10 so we got him before that research came out. He luckily hasn't had any health issues, although he is a little creaky these days

[smilequeen]

I would go with the vets recommendation on this one. We waited with ours too based on the current research. One cycle for our girl and about a year for our boy. He got to be like yours and the vet agreed it was time. Our breeders both did have spay/neuter in the contract, although worded to defer to vet on timing.

[mmsmom]

A long time ago I waited for a year with a golden retriever. I don’t remember if age was specified in the breeder contract but I know the recommendation was at least a year. I made the appointment when he started to get into some territorial rumblings at the dog park. It definitely corrected his behavior and he had no issues afterwards. I do know that there was no follow up from the breeder so no way they would have known when I neutered. The spay/neuter clause is mainly to make sure you do get them fixed and don’t breed them. I think if you follow vet recommendations then there is no way anyone would question it.

[MommyAllison]

I think that the only reason it could matter in the future is if your dog ends up having some sort of orthopedic issue, any health guarantee by the breeder will probably be voided by the earlier-than-agreed neuter. I don't know if your breeder offered any sort of health guarantee, though, and I agree with you that unless you contact them about the dog in the future, it's very likely they will never know.

[AngB]

I think that the only reason it could matter in the future is if your dog ends up having some sort of orthopedic issue, any health guarantee by the breeder will probably be voided by the earlier-than-agreed neuter. I don't know if your breeder offered any sort of health guarantee, though, and I agree with you that unless you contact them about the dog in the future, it's very likely they will never know.

He did have a health guarantee but I can't remember how long, maybe one or three years or something like that? I didn't pay a ton of attention to it because it would mean returning the dog and there's no way we would (even though he's a stubborn brat, he's *our* stubborn brat.)

Thanks guys! I went ahead and scheduled it for next month so he'll be just over 1 but have a few weeks to completely recover before we head out of town. I re-read that study on goldens and they simply broke down the dogs into "early spay/neuter" (before 1) and "late spay/neuter" (after 1) and don't really distinguish how long after 1 so I don't even know that there's much research on when after one, I'd imagine a lot of people try to do it soon after one to avoid or stop sex-related behavioral issues. His parents both had good hips, etc. and his growth has slowed down a lot over the last month or so so hopefully it works out.