What do “spay” and “neuter” mean?
Why Abandoning Pets Has Serious Consequences
B1 English listening practice · American English · Picked for people who know some
In this student’s talk on pet abandonment, the fix she urges is a vocabulary lesson in itself: «adopt a pet from a rescue organization and get it spayed». To spay (a female animal) or neuter (a male) is to operate so it can’t have babies, the standard advice for cutting the number of stray and shelter animals.
The pair is everywhere in American animal-welfare culture, from shelter posters to the famous sign-off “spay and neuter your pets.” A “rescue” here means a rescued animal, and a “shelter” is where strays wait for homes. Practical vocabulary for anyone adopting a cat or dog in the US.
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Source: wordfreq 3.1.1 (general) · SUBTLEX-US 2012 (spoken). These numbers are close, not perfect.
- ▸American animal-welfare groups like the ASPCA and the Humane Society.
- ▸US pet-adoption and rescue-shelter content online.
- ▸In American vet clinics explaining the routine procedure.
- ▸The classic talk-show plea to “spay and neuter your pets.”