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We spayed our female Berner (age 4) when she was 6 mo and neutered our male Berner (age 2) at 11 mo. Our vet, who keeps himself well educated on the latest doggy medical research, told us recently there is growing evidence that it is actually better to wait until the dogs are 9 - 12 mo before spay/neutering them to prevent possible health issues. This is in direct conflict with many other articles I've read where the author says to spay/neuter as soon as possible after 4 mo. But, it kind of makes sense to me to wait a bit, so their hormones have kicked in. In any case, we haven't regretted either decision. We waited until we saw Leo lift his leg before we neutered him (we heard this was the way to go) and it's quite funny, but he rarely lifted his leg again until just recently and he is now just over 2. Both dogs are loving, gentle with children and very obedient, but both are also still very "puppy" like, doing bratty little things that puppies do.
About the bloat issue, we feed our dogs twice a day and never heavily exercise them after eating. I've never heard of doing any kind of surgery to prevent bloat...I think surgery itself is dangerous and something to avoid at all costs. We feed them 2 glucosomine and 4 wild salmon oil pills a day for joints and it also gives them super glossy coats, and the dog food we use is super-high premium. They only take about 3 cups of food per day with a tiny bit of "extra" like a tablespoon or 2 of leftover chicken, rice, cottage cheese etc, a tiny bit of hot water to make the dinner tasty, and that's it. They are both supremely healthy dogs.
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