Expert: Tina - 1/12/2007

Question
I have a 5 month old male black and white long hair kitten,Jorge, and he has got to be the funniest kitten around.  My question is this, my 2 year old female black cat, Shadow, hisses all the time but when my male kitten, Jorge, tries his lip just quivers and he makes a funny noise.  He is always making funny noises when he plays.  We have never heard him hiss so I am not sure if he ever will.  The other question is, will he end up spraying if I don't get him fixed. ?
Thank you very much for your help.
Cori

Answer
Hi Cori,

Jorge sounds like a delightful and entertaining kitten! If you do not get him neutrered, yes he will start to spray. The current recommendation is to neuter at 2 months of age if the cat is in good health, so at 5 months your kitty is more than ready. The sooner the better, because once he starts to spray it is much more difficult to get him to stop, even if he gets neutered! And trust me you don't want your house smelling like tom cat urine - it's worse than regular cat pee.

Also there are a lot of other reasons to neuter your cat. If not neutered, he will have a strong drive to roam and find females. Even if he's an indoor cat (which I hope he is!) he will try to escape and roam near and far looking for a date. If he is allowed outdoors this goes double. Unfortunately that means several things - first of all it means more kittens being born, and there are already hundreds of kittens killed in animal shelters every single day because there are not enough homes. Roaming also means great risk of injury to him from cars, strange dogs and other tom cats. Fighting with other cats is the easiest way for him to contract FIV (feline immunodeficiency virus) or FeLv (feline leukemia).

If not neutered, your cat will have less interest in you and his attention will be turned to finding females and mating. He may become aggressive towards other cats and could try to mount your female - who I assume is spayed already, unspayed females have the same problems and on top of that go into heat.

Finally, un-neutered makes are at risk for testicular cancer and mammary cancer - yes males can get mammary cancer too!

I recommend you make an appointment ASAP. If you are looking for a less expensive route, most humane societies offer low cost spay and neuter, and the following website will help you locate low cost spay and neuter in your area:

http://www.spayusa.org

Best wishes to you and Jorge and Shadow!