Boonie Tails

By Grace Keilbach & Annika Carlson

The importance of spay and neuter

A few weeks ago, we shared the heartbreaking reality of working in a field as distressing as rescue. Every week, most of the dogs at the mayor’s shelter are mercifully euthanized, then another week passes and somehow the shelter is full again. No one wants to see animals die, especially healthy ones. However, what’s even worse is leaving those animals to fend for themselves knowing they will breed with each other, creating another generation of pain and suffering. 

To end this grim cycle, we need to stop the stray population from growing, and the most efficient and humane way to accomplish that is through sterilization: spay and neuter surgeries. A single surgery makes a huge difference; if not spayed, one female dog and her descendants can have up to 67,000 puppies in just 6 years, and cats reproduce even faster.

Fixing pets

Getting your pets spayed and neutered is not only crucial for animal population control and helping the shelter crisis, but there are also many amazing health benefits for your pets! Here are some fun facts about this life-saving surgery:

1. Tamper down sexually aggressive behavior. Have you ever met an unfixed male dog? Yeah, enough said… Neutering males can significantly improve behavioral problems such as aggression, marking their territory, sexual mounting, and roaming. Unfixed males can be an extreme danger to themselves by getting into fights with other male dogs and doing everything it takes to mate. Male dogs can smell a female in heat up to three miles away and will escape trying to find her. Save yourself the chase and keep your dog safe. 

2. Avoid going into heat. Like humans, dogs and cats also have menstruation cycles. During the period when they go into heat, blood spotting occurs. Spaying females stops them from going into heat, meaning that you and your animal do not have to experience this process and the behavior that comes with attracting a mate, such as extreme vocalization (think howling and the most obnoxious meow you can imagine). As with males, females in heat can also put themselves in dangerous positions searching for a mate. 

3. Improved quality of life. Fixing your pet can help them live a longer, happier, healthier life. Spays have been proven to help prevent uterine infections and breast cancer while neutering, if done before 6 months, helps prevent testicular cancer. Getting your pet fixed can also help them avoid STDs. 

If saving lives and minimizing overpopulation is not reason enough, get your animal fixed for the positive impacts on all humans and animals involved! Many people don’t see the big deal with their animals reproducing, but the fact of the matter is that there are already too many unwanted animals in shelters paying the price of this with their lives. If you care about your pet, do the right thing by getting them fixed and encourage others in your life to do the same.

Fixing strays

If you’ve ever been to Greece, or other places with massive cat populations, you might have noticed lots of free-roaming cats with clipped ears. It may look odd, but that clipped ear is the universally acknowledged sign that a stray cat has been fixed. There are numerous “trap-neuter-release” (TNR) programs throughout Greece and many other countries with overwhelming cat populations. This method alone will not solve a stray problem, but combined with public education and adoptions, sterilizing feral animals will decrease the free-roaming population and improve the quality of life for the animals.

Of course, without a veterinarian on the island, this gets complicated. We have to rely on visiting vets to perform our surgeries, and we often don’t know when the next one is coming. On top of that, surgery is expensive (especially if you want to fix twenty or so dogs at once). This is why we are working toward a program for spay and neuter support, TNR, and education across Saipan and beyond.

Luckily for us, we know the next vet visit to Saipan will be in mid-October. To make the best use of this opportunity, we are starting a new fundraiser specifically to sponsor spay and neuter surgeries! We don’t want cost to be the reason someone doesn’t get their pet fixed. Help us save lives by donating what you can. Funds will support surgeries for Boonie Babies, Saipan Kitten & Cat Rescue, Saipan Humane Society, and other community members in need.

Donate now!

It costs $75 to spay a female and $50 to neuter a male. Saipan Kitten & Cat Rescue currently has eight cats needing to be spayed or neutered. (Read more about Saipan Kitten & Cat Rescue.) We want to raise at least $1,000  by next month to cover the cost of these surgeries and others. Your help makes a huge difference! Thank you for donating and for sharing this fundraiser with others.

Boonie of the Week

Our little sister, Ava, quickly became her person, and the two have been inseparable ever since. They can typically be found doing training sessions at the park or skateboarding together through the neighborhood. Although all boonies are smart, Faline definitely knows some of the most impressive tricks and has become our poster child for training. Last week we shared our new video with The Koala, where you can see our prodigy in action!

We are so happy that our family is able to have a piece of Saipan with them, and that one special boonie got the happy ending they all deserve but so few get.

See more of Faline’s story in our video with The Dodo!