Males and Breeding
 

So, I heard a person at the vet one time say something about how their 8 month old male had gotten their two year old female pregnant. How young can a male be and still get a female pregnant?

About 7 months.

They are sexually mature at 6 months of age but their sperm count may be low and some registries have a minimum breeding age requirement of 7-8 months.

Thank you, Sunflowers.

"Bethany" - have you participated on this board under a different username? knwilk44?

6 months old is when a male can start mating with females

Five months is the first big testosterone surge - I would be watchful of intact males around unspayed females at that point easily.

In fact, call me cautious, smart, paranoid, or whatever, but if I had a young male pup around unspayed females in season, I would separate.

I know people on this board have dogs that are well behaved or don't show interest, but I have 2 male mixes here who were hyper aware of females, their urine, etc, from a very young age and I am sure if they were around a female in heat, a breeding would have occurred - whether or not their sperm was ready prior to 5 months, I don't know, but they were ready to roll.

I'm with Jean. The rescue I foster for knows not to send me any females older than 10 weeks or so, unless they are spayed. Being a rescue, the females often get spayed at 4-6 months so thus far, I've only had one female foster and she was 6-7 months when I got her. Better safe than sorry!!

A Norwegian Forest cat breeder I spoke with some yrs ago said that sexual behavior presents earlier when intact animals are raised together. Given this, anyone with an intact male & an intact female should err on the side of extreme caution & not assume they're too young or not interested.

Are you the same person?

No I'm not and the fact that my identity would even be questioned IMO speaks volumes in of itself about this board. I'm really disappointed.