Spaying/Neutering Small Mammals

Find an "exotic" vet, one who specializes in treating small mammels. Years back I had two pet rabbits and got them both spayed and neutered with no problem whatsoever with recovery from surgery and they live much healthier lives just like our cats/dogs after being fixed. I also had a few rats (they were the most fun pets to have, very intelligent!!!) I had gone to a pet store with my daughter to get her a rabbit, and saw these poor rats in a large rubbermaid container who were being sold as snake food or pets if you so desired. I had never even touched rats before but they seemed so desperate to be rescued. So of course, I rescued two females and my daughter couldn't believe it (she was seven at the time). I did get both of the girls spayed (after babies were done nursing) and then got all four babies fixed too. So it can be done, if you find the right vet! They lived until almost three years, which is a long time for rats... Oh, and my daughter did get her pet later that week, she picked a guinea pig instead of a rabbit and the guinea pig was pregnant as well ARGH!!!!!

My rabbits are spayed. No different than spaying a kitten, but you do need to find a decent exotics vet, because they need a particular kind of anesthetic. Male rabbits ought to be fixed, too. Ferrets also must be altered to make decent, long-lived pets.

For the really small (under a pound) pets, I'm a bit more reluctant to spay/neuter. I would probably neuter the males, but not spay the females. . .I've read a lot of things saying that spaying doesn't really reduce the risks of reproductive cancers and is too much of a risk to be done routinely. Neutering is less invasive so there wouldn't be as much of a risk.

I would consult and interview some exotic vets ... Here some of the regular vets do rabbits and ferrets but never heard about the really small animals ....

I'm not sure that I really believe in neuter/spay ALL animals. I had rabbits and hamsters growing up and they were never neutered/spayed - I never even heard of anyone doing rabbits till recently.

And from what I understand its a lot more expensive to spay/neuter a rabbit then it is a dog/cat!

Hamsters/gerbils only live a few years (3-5) so I really don't see the point in spending money to neuter them - its not gonna extend their life.

You separate the males/females at an early age and if you can't tell the difference you shouldn't be letting them breed!

Now ferrets are another story - they either have to be bred all the time, or spay/neuter or the females will literally bleed to death if not mated!

The reasons for spaying/neutering rabbits are pretty much the same reasons we spay/neuter cats--for health and behavioral reasons, besides birth control. Females have something like an 85% chance of getting reproductive cancer if not spayed, and both females and males will spray urine like a tomcat to attract the opposite sex. Unneutered males will fight with each other, frequently causing serious injury. If you want to keep them indoors, altering will make them much more agreeable housepets.

Plus, I procrastinated too long in having one of my rabbits spayed, and she seemed to get "broody", I guess you'd call it. She pulled all the fur off her tummy, wouldn't eat, and kept digging nests in my carpet. She just wasn't happy at all. She's much more content now that she's spayed. Additionally, rabbits are social creatures, and aren't happy alone. Obviously, spaying/neutering will make group dynamics much easier, and make male/female pairings possible (without ending up with tons of bunnies!), which is good because male/females pairs tend to get along better (like cats).

The exotics vet who spayed my bunny actually charges $2 less for a rabbit spay than a cat spay (prices around $100, more than my dog/cat vet charges). He does a really good job, though, on cat and rabbits.

For ferrets, altering is absolutely necessary. Intact males stink so bad it's hard to be in the same room with them, and have a lot of disagreeable habits. Females stay in heat until bred, and if they are never bred will eventually die from aplastic anemia. But most pet ferrets are sold already spayed/neutered, so it's not something most ferret owners need to think about.

For the smaller pets, the main reason to spay/neuter is for birth control, or to make it possible to keep multiple males in the same enclosure without fighting. Some species are social and can become very attached to each other (not hamsters!), so breaking up a bonded pair to prevent babies can be very stressful. In a case like that, I'd neuter the males, and not put the females through such a traumatic surgery.

ETA: since female rats also have a very high rate of reproductive cancers, for a while routine spaying of pet rats was widely recommended. Unfortunately, it didn't seem to make any difference in their cancer rates.

Interesting. We only had 2 female rabbits and 1 male - and only did breeding once a year. No problems with any of them like you describe. The rabbits were never sick in any way nor did they have behavior problems like spraying.....etc.

And the hamsters - we only had one male and one female and they were separated unless we wanted to breed them.

A female rabbit who is used for breeding will not have as high of a chance of getting cancer. Like humans. . .the more pregnancies you have and the longer you breastfeed, it lowers the chances for certain cancers. But because of the rabbit overpopulation problem (it's bad. . .an adult rabbit has almost zero chance of being adopted from a shelter, and most shelters get a LOT of rabbits), and the fact that most pet owners don't want to sell their bunnies for snake food, the majority of pet bunny owners aren't going to breed their rabbits.

Were your rabbits inside? Most people don't notice the spraying in rabbits kept outside. It doesn't really matter where they pee in an outdoor hutch! Also, how long did they live? A lot of rabbit owners I've talked to had no idea that rabbits should live 10-12 years.

Yeah, hamsters aren't social. They'll kill each other, neutered or not. But for the social types, like gerbils, separating a bonded pair can cause a lot of stress.

Definitely find a good exotic vet. And be sure to ask tons of questions.....if they've ever neutered a gerbil- how many?? You want someone with experience. I've had gliders in the past and had the males neutered. They are somehwhat close in size to gerbils. I found an excellent exotic vet that had experience and was very pleased with the whole thing.

My bunny Patches, was neutered, and he was perfectly fine afterwards. He continued to have a good life, while he was with us. He had no problems from going under or anything. He even came home that day. He didn't have to stay over. Just like when my kittens got spayed/neutered.

I think the rabbits were around 8-10 yrs old (about average). They were part outside, part inside. The hutch was next to the house and in the winter, my dad insulated the rabbit house. He actually built it as he was a carpenter and built our house.

In the summer they would sometime come inside to run around in the basement for awhile and never messed in the house either.

It depends on the animal.
Female rats have a very high instance of mammary tumors-- I believe it is something like half or more intact female rats will develop them. I had one rat who had a mammary tumor removed. The cost of surgery to remove a tumor is about the same as the cost of a spay, and spayed females have a much lower instance.

A lot of people have sugar gliders s/n, especially breeders because sugar gliders tend to live in bonded pairs and it is hard on them if they are separated once they are done breeding. Having the males neutered is a lot more common than females because it is a less invasive surgery. Sugar Gliders live 6-10 years though, longer than a lot of small pets.
I have heard of guinea pigs being neutered as well for companionship reasons.
As others mentioned it is also common to neuter male rabbits, for health/temperament reasons. The two males I fostered never had aggression issues but were always housed separately as a precaution.

As far as hamsters and gerbils, it is not common. People usually just house them in same-sex groups or singly to prevent breeding. However I've heard of shelters/rescues who do s/n their hamsters to prevent future breeding.