How to check if a recently adopted female stray dog is spayed?

It is not always possible to know if a female dog has been spayed simply by examining them. Some spay scars are very small and cannot always be seen or felt. It is also possible that scars from incisions may have been from other surgical procedures, such as foreign body surgeries, c-sections, or bladder stone removal. The only surefire way of knowing if a dog is spayed is to perform a surgical exploratory to actually looking for the ovaries and uterus, or have an ultrasound performed by a boarded veterinary radiologist (although this often costs more than a spay surgery). I suggest discussing this further with the vet who performed Annabel's surgery if you have additional questions, but it sounds as though everything done was medically appropriate. As a side note, I can see in the picture that Annabel's incision is a bit red. Just be sure to keep an e-collar (cone) on her at all times for the next 10-14 days until her incision is fully healed. If she licks at the incision, it is likely to become infected and may even open. I hope that her recovery goes well!

With female cats it's very difficult, the best way would just be to wait and see if she shows signs of being in heat, which happens quite often in intact female cats, if she doesn't in the next 6 months or so, then she is most likely spayed.

Thanks for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach! You would usually be able to see a scar in the caudal ventral abdomen. If she was spayed at an animal shelter, sometimes you can also see a small tattoo in the ventral abdomen next to the spay incision. I would consider having her evaluated by your veterinarian as they can both check that but also check for possible reasons for the blood such as a urinary tract infection. Good luck and best wishes!

It can be difficult to know if they've been spayed or not if you don't have any medical records. You can request that the vet shave her belly to look for a spay scar, but they can be very faint if she was spayed at a very young age. If she still has signs of heat, then either she hasn't been spayed or there is some ovarian tissue still present inside her. You can have a hormone test (AMH) done to confirm that there still is ovarian tissue and then you know she needs surgery to remove it. Or the vet can just go to surgery to go look for it.

Hi. Without a hands on exam, it’s impossible to definitively determine if this cat is spayed or not. Your veterinarian should be able to determine this by shaving some hair away from the mid abdomen to look for a Spay scar and probably a tattoo that indicates she has been sterilized. Cats are only pregnant for 9 weeks. By 4-5 weeks, it is pretty easy to determine pregnancy during a physical exam. Have your veterinarian examine her and look for the scar and tattoo. Thank you

If you can I would wait until she does go into season. You will definitively see behavioural signs of it! I would consider a surgery just to check it rather invasive and expensive as well!!! Please do not hesitate to contact us again on the forum or by requesting a consultation (where you can post pictures ) if you have any more questions or to discuss it any further.

There is no sure way to know if a pet is pregnant through physical examination alone, especially in the 1st trimester. Most of the time you can palpate moving puppies in an enlarged belly during the 2nd trimester, but sometimes this can prove challenging in overweight or large breed dogs. Some common tell-tale signs that suggest you may have a pregnant dog are: swollen abdomen, weight gain, and enlarged mammary glands. Then you can confirm your pet is pregnant through x-ray or ultrasound (to detect fetal heartbeats). The gestation period (time that a pet is pregnant) in dogs is 58-72 days, an on average around 63 days. It is a good idea to get Martina spayed if she isn't pregnant, to not only prevent future pregnancies, but to also prevent other disease processes like Pyometra (acute infected uterus) and mammary cancer from forming later on in her life.