Pro or contra neutering?

Thanks for your reply.
 
Actually, no I don't have experience with cocker spaniels.
 
""When the ears are really trimmed, well gosh, it's just a little ear.""
 
I didn't realize this.
 
Do you have any photos of bare Cocker Spaniel ears that have been shaven?  I was under the impression that the ears themselves (even without the massive fur) were long and pendulous.
 
Please post photos if you can.
Thanks!!
 

ORIGINAL: glenmar

Sadly, all my cockers have gone to the Bridge, but yes, we did own cockers for many years.

The REAL problem with cockers isn't the structure of the ear so much as peoples unwillingness to GROOM those ears.

The ear itself isn't terribly long or ponderous.  When the ears are really trimmed, well gosh, it's just a little ear.  But the FUR is massive.  It's hard to keep the ears trimmed AND maintain the cocker "look"....and those ears are really the crowning glory on a cocker.  What we learned to do is to SHAVE the inside of the ears and really feather the outside to keep them lighter.  Truely it's the weight of all that lovely fur that keeps the ears tight to the head and the canal dark and moist.

Based on that, I still can't see any vet being willing to do that type of preventative surgery.  Cuz, see you can trim the end of the ear, but you can't get the owners to KEEP the fur trimmed....and the fur is the problem.  Dvet?  Do you agree?  You've got some experience with such things....just a little! []  And I don't mean with ear cropping, but with the overall cocker ear structure.

Oh, gosh... A shaven Cocker ear is less than a Beagle ear. Unfortunately, I've started underlining and can't fix it, but.....

I don't have any photos, and can't seem to find one. I'll try to get one next time I shave a Cocker bald

OH! Callie keeps Billy shaved down. Maybe she has a good one.

We keep Billy shaved, AND I work like heck to keep his ears 'good'.  Cocker ears, as a breed (typically both 'English' and 'American' which neither has a thing to do with the 'country' or origin) typically have very very slender ear canals virtually made to infect.   I'll post pics of TWO cockers (as it happens we have rescued two buffy coats over time). 

Muffin, the first, had 'bad ears' when we got him and unfortunately I knew far less then than I do now.  He had long-term ear infections and the vet never treated them properly.  No one explained to me the difference between yeast infection and bacterial infection, NOR that bacterial can be so hard to find or treat.  Ultimately, Muffin had to have both ears removed -- and I mean the inner/middle/outer ear including the 'hole' or ear canal.  After surgery he looked like a dog from FAO Schwartz -- ear flaps with nothing underneath.  Lift the flap and it was just fur .. NO hole.

Be aware folks - this surgery completely deafens them ... 100% stone deaf.  There IS no inner ear (no bones to 'vibrate' with sound and no ear drum to 'percuss' that sound) - it simply doesn't exist any more.  Muffin learned sign language eagerly and I suspect his years of ear infections, both before and after we got him, rendered him extremely good at lip reading.  But ultimately he knew over 50 signs, including alpha signs so he knew the difference between Dr. D (holistic vet) and Dr. B (regular vet), Dr. M (surgeon) and Dr. R (his oncologist).  Yep, Muffin ultimately had cancer and survived it ... twice.  However another genetic weakness -- kidney problems, exacerbated by medication and too many cancer treatments robbed him from us.

Not sure how many pics I can string in here but I'm going to try for Muffin post ablation surgery, and Muffin simply healed and as himself -- deaf and proud of it.  But we always kept his ears shaved to his head/ear flap with no extra hair.  I could care a fig less if a dog "looks" like a cocker. 

But I have to emphasize -- had I been better educated, as I am with Billy now, Muffin likely wouldn't have had to lose his ears.  It was veterinary carelessness and lack of concern and my own ignorance.

This was Muffin 'before' surgery -- just a plain old pic of Muffin.  It shows the length of his ear flaps well (however, even then I can now see the 'pain' in his eyes that we thought ... because we rescued him and he always looked like this,  was just 'him'.)
[linkhttp://www.critturs.com/images/muffindog.jpg]http://www.critturs.com/images/muffindog.jpg[/link]

This was as 'shaggy' as we ever let him get -- hair probably not even 1/2" long.  But he would get so cold we'd allow it in Florida winter:  This was Muffin the Intrepid after ear ablation surgery.  Muffin was A BIG boy -- he was probably 8" longer than Billy and altho he was a bit chubby here at 48 pounds, his normal weight was about 40
[linkhttp://www.critturs.com/images/muffinpose2.jpg]http://www.critturs.com/images/muffinpose2.jpg[/link]

This is another good one to show the ears -- post ablation -- you can't even see a difference because there was NONE in the ear flap itself.  Just still kept shorn pretty close to the skin.
[linkhttp://www.critturs.com/images/muffinsleep.jpg]http://www.critturs.com/images/muffinsleep.jpg[/link]

This was Muffin at probably his best health of his whole life.  The ear ablation literally got rid of the source of internal infection he'd always carried -- so the skin problems pretty much went away.  So we could allow him to be soft and shaggy (the kids at Give Kids the World and the other facilities we vist LOVED his coat long and shaggy -- but you can still see the length of the ears.  If you pulled up the flap I'm serious -- he looked like a stuffed toy -- no ear 'hole' at all.
[linkhttp://www.critturs.com/images/intrepid1b.jpg]http://www.critturs.com/images/intrepid1b.jpg[/link]

Now to Billy -- he's also an English cocker -- and when he came to us (first picture was the day after we got him and we hadn't had him groomed yet) his ears were literally swelled shut (the canals were totally blocked) because of ear infections.  But he was young enough we were able to treat it with the right antibiotics and also with the Blue Power Ear solution and we achieved clean, totally clear ear canals.  The Zymox I've talked about maintains them VERY well without endangering the ear canal (ear cleaners tend to be NOT good and can lead to more problems and deafness).   You can see the ear length but also that the hair flipping up on the ends was very long.
[linkhttp://www.critturs.com/images/billyincar.jpg]http://www.critturs.com/images/billyincar.jpg[/link]

This one taken last winter.  I can't post the 2d one because it's too big.

But I can NOT emphasize enough.  You can't 'crop-away' Cocker ear problems.  Because if you too away enough of the ear flap to let air truly into the ear (like they do with dobies and other breeds) it wouldn't stick up at all and there would be NOTHING AT ALL (because of how the ear canal is structured and goes into the head) to keep out dirt and bacteria.  Most breeds with prick ears have some folds in the cartilage so the ear is protected that way.  With a cocker it is not -- it's just an open 'hole' and that would breed even more problems than anything else.

If you simply keep the ear flap shaved down (so it looks like a beagle or any other flat-coated dog) it helps avoid the problems, and from there you just make sure you keep the ears maintained. 

Unfortunately we humans are always looking for the easy out and cropping the ear flaps sounds easy -- but it's not. 

Much of the problem lies in the fact that while they bred the cocker ear flaps to be long and pendulous and 'pretty' they also bred the ear canal itself to be tiny tiny tiny which is where much of the problem lies. 

A littrle film about the sensitive subject of neutering...from a dogs point of view.

http://www.atomfilms.com/af/content/dog_years

x

Thanks for posting the pics, calliecritturs!  Yes, I can see that the ears are much smaller without hair (although, they still are relatively long & pendulous in comparison to most dogs).
 
Wow...you really went through a lot with Muffin.  He's lucky to have had you and that you cared enough to rescue him, get surgery for him, and ultimately fix his painful ear problem.
 
Regarding the "cropping-away" comment pasted below.  I didn't intend to sound like I was asking about making a Cocker's ears look like a Doberman's (I agree that they wouldn't stand up at all on a Cocker).  I was asking if getting a "half-crop" (taking off the bottom half of the ear flap), would help keep the ear physically lighter and more "floppy" (like that of most dog breeds) so that air could get to it.  It seems like it would be no worse than when Cocker's tails are docked.

But it sounds like from the posts of Cocker owners such as yourself that shaving alone (along with the proper ear cleanings, of course) might do the trick of keeping the ear physically lighter weight so that it can flop and keep things aerated and bacteria free....

You can't 'crop-away' Cocker ear problems.  Because if you too away enough of the ear flap to let air truly into the ear (like they do with dobies and other breeds) it wouldn't stick up at all and there would be NOTHING AT ALL (because of how the ear canal is structured and goes into the head) to keep out dirt and bacteria.  Most breeds with prick ears have some folds in the cartilage so the ear is protected that way.  With a cocker it is not -- it's just an open 'hole' and that would breed even more problems than anything else

I still can't see any vet being willing to do that type of preventative surgery.  Cuz, see you can trim the end of the ear, but you can't get the owners to KEEP the fur trimmed....and the fur is the problem. 

I am curious as to if this is true or not.  Just for the sake of argument: If vets are certainly willing to do complete ear croppings just for the "looks" of a Boxer, for example, then why would they object to doing a "half-crop" to a cocker?  I told a Boxer owner not too long ago that I liked the look of his dog with floppy uncropped ears.  I asked him if the dog would still be able to show in a dog ring.  He said "yes".  So, based on that, it seems like Boxer owners that get their dogs ears cropped are doing it solely for looks...and if vets are willing to crop those ears, I don't see why they would object to someone bringing in a normally floppy eared dog to get a 'half crop'.

I don't know what all the "flap" is about - usually, when a Cocker has recurrent and persistent ear infections that do not respond to usual treatment, the end result isn't a crop it's ablation.
 
As to neutering, the primary reason for doing it in the U.S. is to prevent the abysmally high number of unwanted dogs from getting even higher - basically, to reduce euthanasia of healthy dogs.  Also, it can help to prevent some cancers and unwanted male behaviors, such as mounting and urine marking - and to reduce dog to dog aggression.  In America, we often enjoy taking our dogs to off leash areas, dog parks, day care, etc., and it is easier (not to mention less likely to result in unwanted puppies) to do so with a neutered pet.

Yes, I realize that cropping after-the-fact wouldn't be as helpful.  I was posing the hypothetical situation of an owner of a healthy spaniel puppy (not necessarily a cocker, but any heavey-eared spaniel) getting a 'partial cropping' off the very bottom of the ear, along with, of course, keeping the ears groomed and cleaned, as a preventative procedure.  It would seem to be no more of an outrageous procedure than getting tails docked or ears cropped for aesthetic reasons....which are done to thousands of puppies every year without anyone blinking an eye, so I would think that there would be vets out there willing to do such a procedure.
 
Are there any vets in these boards?
 

I don't know what all the "flap" is about - usually, when a Cocker has recurrent and persistent ear infections that do not respond to usual treatment, the end result isn't a crop it's ablation.

    You live in Germany? My parents live there and my mom reports a completely different attitude about dogs. She tells me that most dogs are left intact, dogs are allowed most everywhere, and tail docking and ear cropiing are illegal.

    Before moving to Germany, my mom bought a min pin. Immediately the Germans knew it was an american dog... which is pretty funny b/c most of the time Germans think my mom is Dutch. Anyway, they would ask her, "did you get this dog from the United States?" Apperently her docked tail gave her away.
        I am not sure why I went off on that tangent, but it sounds as though Germans are more responsible pet owners than they are here in the States. (in general) My mom told me she has never come across a misbehaved German dog, and that dogs don't just run free. Although most Germans do not spay or neuter there is not a rampant over population. She told me Most Germans have to adopt their dogs from other countries.

        I have 7 dogs. They all came to me as strays or rescues. The Southeastern United States (where I live) is not a very welcoming place for dogs. Our local shelter Euthenizes 300 animals a week. You can not drive down a street and not see a dog permenently tethered. Being that I have both male and female rescue dogs, I have them fixed. I do not want to add to the terrible overpopulation that already exists in the area. Not only that, but if I ever did have puppies there would be an huge chance the puppies would be tethered at their new home... 24/7... I can not live with something like that.

       I understand where you are coming from. If Americans trained and had the same relationship with thier dogs as Germans do, there would probably be a lesser rate of spay and nueter, but most of the time American life style is too hectic or too lazy for this level of training and relationship building. Also, there are too many irresponsible owners and it leaves a huge number of uncared for and abandonded dogs. Spaying and neutering is a way of speaking against this issue and ensuring that you never contribute to it..

      Although I think my dogs have a great life, they could definately use more attention and obedience training, but at this time I cannot give them more time. It just does not exist. So in the mean time, I will eliminate possible agression and dominance issues by spaying and neutering.

It is a very different place for dogs here, than in Germany.