[ausnash]

Hello everyone,

My name is Austin and have a 2-year old Shetland Sheepdog who is about to be neutered. He has had a problem with licking the vulva of female dogs upon meeting them for quite a while. It got worse recently however. He gets completely distracted at that point, not even listening to me with his favorite tennis ball (unheard of any other time). I know that neutering won't solve behavioral problems. Only training can truly change that. Yet, I've heard that problems which are purely hormonal based will be altered, such as dominance fueled aggression. I figure that licking females is hormonal. Has anyone experienced this with their dog? Did anything change?

Please help me. Thanks!

[Alty]

Neutering should definitely help with this issue. I say should, not will, because at this point there will have to be training involved as well. This is now an unwanted behavior. Some of it is most likely fueled by hormones, but some of it is also fueled by repetition. In other words, he has now learned to act this way.

Teaching him to stop this behavior will be easier once you take away the hormones that likely caused this behavior to begin with. You have nothing to lose and so much to gain by having him neutered.