Kitty Tatt

People were wondering what Jade's spay tattoo looked like so I took a picture of it today.



It's the little green line that seems to extend her newly healing scar.

I noticed lots of spay tattoos at the grooming shop. but my spayed dog isnt tattooed! I guess only some vets do it?

We got it done through a low cost speuter program and they work with a loooot of ferals. I think they tattoo in case someone brings in the same feral twice, they and all other shelters will know it's been done.

That's actually a really cool idea.

but why am I seeing this on pure bred bichions, poodles, Lhasas, shih tzus, etc?

I really wish more places would do this. When we adopted Falafel, we couldn't find even a hint of a spay scar (assume she was done very young when spayed or just heals spectacularly well) so they ended up going in for surgery, only to discover no uterus. Thankfully she healed up nicely from that surgery, minus a bit of suture reaction

Dab: I couldn't tell you why honestly. Maybe your area has a high number of dogs going through their shelters and wouldn't know if the same dog came through twice so they tatt? Maybe there is a similar speuter program in your area that happens to mark and they all got it done at the same place? Lots of possibilities.

Yeah, I thought it was a pretty awesome thing when I found out they did that. I remember I had only read the day before about someone's newly adopted pet being opened up and closed up because there was no uterus! (It may have been you I was reading from Grab!) Hopefully this catches on to prevent unnecessary surgeries and by proxy saving rescues/shelters money on doctors.

DAB: probably because a vet heard about it from a similar program and figured it was a good insurance policy in case that dog ever ended up in the shelter system.

I got Jasmine through the Humane Society and they gave her a little female symbol tattoo when they spayed her. I can't see it anymore though, maybe if we shaved her belly.

Patches has one from when she was spayed it was the female sign as well.

I do think it's funny they do female signs. I mean, I assume it's more clearly stating that she's spayed, not a female.. That should be easy to tell lol.

Izzy doesn't have a tattoo which answers my question about whether her rescue used the same low cost place. You can see a faint scar on her tummy though.

Enzo and my brothers dog, Remo both have a green line from their spay. They were both done at the same low cost place as well.

Was it called SNAP?

around here the shelter vets and low cost clinics are SUPPOSED to tat id on altered cats, its a number, when entered into a shelter or veterinary database comes up with the animals info. this is primarily for the feral control program in the area, there were a number of accounts of recapture on ferals who had already been spayed and it was costing money to put them all under and open them up only to find they were already done...
they do the tat inside the ear though so its realy easy to spot.

they also use it to track the movment of feral populations.

my fave so far was a vet who always wanted to be a tat artist growing up, he dabbled for a long time but whent into veterinary medicine as a career instead of tattoo...
whenever he did a spay or neuter (with the owners permission of course) hed do little pretty and unique ones) like a heart, or a star...they take just as long as a regular tattoo to heal so why not.

of course i wouldnt have my animal put under FOR a tattoo...but if there already under for a spay/neuter and were going to be tatted for id anyway, why not make it something cute?! lol