How important is the cost of spaying and neutering a cat in tackling the so called “cat overpopulation problem” or the “feral cat problem” or the excess of community cats in the United States and in other countries? I ask because I was doing some research on the barn cat buddies programs (North America) that are run by some cat shelters. One of them is the Edmonton Humane Society. Great idea.
Then I visited another organisation, Barn Cat Buddies, who run barn cat buddies programmes and they said that they were pleased to have run a successful campaign to spay and neuter cats at a discounted cost. The funding came from the Best Friends Animal Society working in partnership with Petsmart Charities Lifesaving Grant. They received $9,000. Very generous.
Well, they started a “Fix for Fifteen spay/neuter program”. They don’t explain what this means but I am guessing that they advertised spaying or neutering for $15. I am interested to see that “..the phone calls poured in and our allotted funds were quickly exhausted..”.
$9000 at $15 per fix results in 600 cats being spayed and neutered. This is what apparently happened.
That got me thinking. There was an immediate and eager response to the program. There were too many applicants. To me that can only mean two things:
- There are lots of unneutered and unspayed cats in the area and (without this $15 service would these cats have remained unneutered and unspayed?)
- The usual vet cost of the operation is too high for a lot of people. It may not be that the cost is too high. It may be that the cat’s owner does not want to spend more that a certain amount on the operation. They have an idea about what they should pay and budget for that. That is, they have tight budgets.
I wonder how typical this is in North America or anywhere for that matter. There are a lot of subsidized neutering programs but are there enough and should there be some sort of coordination between organisers in an area? And I wonder if some of this should be funded by the taxpayer though local government funding or state funding.
Note: It is interesting to note that when doing a Google search for “cost of spaying cat USA” almost all the results relate to low cost spay and neuter services. There are lots of them, presumably provided by charities. Accordingly I don’t think taxpayer funding is necessary.
The enormous response to this cheap neutering program also makes me think that some people adopting cats are not really in a position, if they are honest, to care for them adequately on the budget that they have. Obviously a lot people have become poorer financially for reasons beyond their control. Fair enough, but it would be nice to have a financial profile of the typical person who uses the cheap neutering programs. How many people begin caring for a cat without really going into the detail of funding the whole thing?
People who want to get a cat should really work out what it will cost and ask whether they afford it. The costs are well advertised on the internet. It will be something around $10,000 (USD) or £10,000 (GBP) over the lifetime of a cat attaining 15 years of age. That works out at about $650 per year. Are potential cat caretakers budging for this?
What does it cost to get your cat spayed or neutered?
- USA – $50 – $100. Perhaps an American can update this figure.
- UK – Costs vary but typically — Spaying: £50 to £100 depending on circumstances. Castration: around £40.
- Greece (large feral cat problem) – 50-60 euros for castration and up to 100-155 euros for spaying.
I feel there should be some sort of people profiling going on if the cat overpopulation problem is to be dealt with properly. It may be for instance that 90% of the problem of failing to care for a cat properly which includes spaying and neutering come from the 10% of the population who are poorest people in a country. If that were true perhaps these people could be targeted in an education program and receive priority for cheap spaying and neutering.
By “education” I mean encouraging people through knowledge to have their cats spayed and neutered. In some communities and in some countries (for example Greece) it is considered “unnatural” and some people think that a female cat should have a litter before being spayed to preserve her true character. That attitude contributes to the feral cat problem. I understand that not spaying and neutering is not just about a lack of adequate funding. It is also about attitude.
Wonderful article, but that photo with the tech or doctor posing like it’s a selfie gives me the creeps.
The cost to spay a female cat in NC is 55.00. Males are 10.00 cheaper because they’re male and it’s less traumatic on the cat.
Thank you Angelica. It sounds like very good value to me.
No problem. Hope it helps!
Just can’t resist telling this true funny story about a hard of hearing old lady.
She ‘I wish my cat would stop having kittens’
Me ‘Why don’t you have her spayed?’
She ‘A SPADE A SPADE what do I want a spade for I don’t want to bury her just stop her having kittens’
Me ‘Spayed means neutered’
She ‘MUTED MUTED I don’t want rid of her meow I just want her to stop having kittens’
By then I was almost hysterical with laughing.
She ‘It’s not funny young lady’
Me ‘She can have a little operation to stop her having kittens’
She ‘Why didn’t you say so in the first place!’
LOL. A moral behind it too. Once again it is about education.
Neutering cats of either sex is so commonplace to vets and takes so little time, that they could reduce the cost and maybe more people would take their cats to be spayed or castrated.
I may keep harping back to when vets thought more about their patients than making money, but those days it took one vet and one nurse and the anaesthetic, suture thread and antibiotics cost very little and with keeping the price of neutering down the large number of cats spayed or castrated still made the vets a good profit.
Switzerland is alot more expensive. In the USA I think in most areas you can find a low cost solution. The interesting question you asked is not if the coast is usually necessarily too high, but if infact the average person wants to spend an amount which is usually necessarily too low – thats how I understood your question. Its a good one. Under normal circumstances it should not come into question, it costs what it costs, and as long as it is not extreme, then you damn well save up. Having a cat is not supposed to be free, nor cheap, and it was never meant to be. People who want to keep an animal on the cheap are themselves cheap of mind and spirit. Thats my opinion. Sorry.
Average cost of owning a cat in U.S.A amounts to US$ 10,000 over a 15 year life-span.The same statistics would hold true for other Country’s based on the Country’s cost of living and average per-capita-income.Ultimately, responsible cat-ownership means a high maintenance factor on your pet cats.Hence most potential cat owners or other pet owners should take a commitment of treating their pets like a member of their own human family otherwise the unavoidable fact of abandoning a pet due to high maintenance cost is a reality.
Well said, Rudolph. My exact thoughts.