Puppy Mill Front Stores of
I HEART PUPPIES AND RUSSO'S
What The NEWPORT CITIZENS Needs To
Know About Puppy Mills
Puppy mills have been
around for decades. They continue to thrive because they prey upon unwitting
consumers who are smitten by too-cute-for-words puppies in pet store windows
and on legitimate-seeming websites. Puppy mills house dogs in shockingly poor
conditions. After their fertility wanes, breeding animals often are killed,
abandoned or sold cheaply to another mill to try to get "one more litter”
out of the dog. The annual result of all this breeding is millions of puppies,
many with behavior and, or health problems
For starters, all puppy mills have
breeding bitches and stud males and the only role they ever have in life is to
reproduce. The don’t play, they’ve never known the warmth of a home, the gentle
touch of a human hand, do not receive veterinary care when they are injured or
sick and many die of disease and exposure.
Puppy mills are famous for creating
mutts that they pass off to the public as designer dogs such as the Cocker-Poo,
Maltee-Poo, Yorkie-Poo, among others. None of these breeds are recognized by
the American Kennel Club and are a way to make a quick buck by selling mutts
that people normally would give away for free. Breeding pedigrees, however, is
what accounts for the bulk of their success. Puppy mill pedigrees often have a
multitude of inherited behavioral and medical issues, which these animal
assembly lines care little about. Their only goal is to produce as many puppies
as they can, in as little time as possible, and sell them as quickly as they
appear.
Bitches are neglected, have festering
wounds, fleas, ticks, mange, lethal forms of dermatitis, round worms, tape
worms, giardia from drinking foul water and many die whelping their young.
Deceased bitches and studs, or those too old to reproduce are killed and
disposed of in garbage dumps, freed to fend for themselves on the streets or
sold cheaply to other mills in an effort to get one last litter out of them.
Breeding bitches are malnourished or
forced to consume low-grade dog foods or their own feces and that of other
animals to survive. As a result, their milk quality is poor, denying pups
proper nutrition. Poor nutrition during nursing and after weaning affects brain
and muscle-skeletal development, is suspect in the development of neurological
disorders and more.
Puppies, adolescents and adults are
housed together in wire crates often stacked one on top of the other. Most
crates don’t have solid liners and feces and urine rains down upon those
stacked below. Wires cut into paws causing sores and infections. In efforts to
keep clean most dogs eat their own excrement. These learned poor elimination
habits are suspect in the development of coprophagia — eating of stool, which
is classified by some veterinary behaviorists as a form of obsessive compulsive
disorder.
Two popular areas of the United States
are home to puppy mills — southern states and the mid-west. Those located in
the south house live merchandise outdoors where animals are exposed to rain,
thunderstorms, wind, hurricanes and extremes in temperature. In the mid-west
the same conditions exist, but dogs are commonly housed facilities located in
warehouses or small buildings.
Pregnant females often are quite fearful
and under tremendous stress during gestation. As a result many of their
pups develop into stressed, fearful or aggressive adults when they mature(1).
Early weaned pups and those removed from
their mother and safety of their litters suffer psychologically as adults so
they can have a longer shelf life in puppy stores. Since they are shipped as
cheaply as possible, transport can take several weeks. This means most pups are
removed from their litters as early as 4.5 weeks of age so they can arrive in
pet stores by 8-10 weeks of age — denying them a crucial socialization period.
This may explain why so many pet store dogs develop dog-on-dog aggression or
fear-related issues.
During shipment at this crucial period
in their lives they endure weeks of rough handling by scary strangers, may miss
out on meals and access to clean water, subjected to temperature extremes and
frightening sounds without the comfort of mom or litter mates to help them
cope. During this socialization period puppies learn how their world operates
and what they should expect from those living in it including other dogs, and
humans. If their world is harsh and unfriendly it directly and adversely
affects this learning period.
What puppy mills and pet stroes count on
is most pups don’t display behavioral issues during puppyhood despite aversive
early life experiences and remain cuddly, friendly creatures for up to 12-14
weeks of age. By this time they’ve already been sold and return policies have
expired.
While puppies may begin exhibiting
problem behaviors at 14+ weeks of age, the average age owners report behavioral
issues to their vet or begin the search for professional help is around 3.5
years of age (adulthood). Issues may include, growling, snarling, resource
guarding, aggression toward strangers, fear of new people, places and
experiences (neophobia), eating its own or another dog’s feces (coprophagia),
house soiling, aggression toward conspecifics (dog on dog aggression), fearful
behavior toward owner (often misdiagnosed by vets as dominance aggression),
sound sensitivity, separation anxiety, isolation anxiety, timidity, handling
issues, excessive licking, spinning, obsessive disorders, neurological issues
and more.
Medical disorders may include, but are not limited to,
“weak” stomach with bouts of diarrhea, allergies, early onset cataracts,
deafness, hypertropic osteodystrophy (sudden lameness, or growing pains)
bladder issues, skeletal and neurological abnormalities, congenital defects,
hip dysplasia, epilepsy and more.
While behavioral issues may be related
to early life experiences in mills or even inherited from a litter from a
reputable breeder, the difference between the two is a good breeder will take
the dog back at any age, care for it the rest of its life, and offer you a
complete refund. Most pet store return policies expire after 30 days, at which
time the reported problems are yours forever.
Anyone involved in the sale of
domesticated animals are required by federal law(2) to retain a copy of a
health guarantee. When buyers purchase their pup they receive a copy of this
guarantee. So if your pet store is attempting to dazzle you with a health
guarantee as proof they somehow stand out from the rest in their line of
business, don’t fall for it.
Under the federal Animal Welfare Act (AWA), the U.S.
Department of Agriculture regulates commercial breeders, kennels, and brokers
who sell dogs through wholesale channels and sets standards for the use of
animals in biomedical and product research, circuses, zoos, and other public
animal displays. Amendments to the AWA crop up in many sessions of Congress. In
2002, a proposal to allow federal oversight of breeding and socialization
practices in regulated kennels was tacked onto the agriculture bill in the
Senate but not the House of Representatives and was dropped from the final
version of the bill.
Currently, the AWA applies only to
commercial kennels that sell puppies to pet stores, but a lawsuit by the Doris
Day Animal League (DDAL) could result in the addition of all breeders who have
more than three intact female dogs to the law. DDAL won a court decision in its
favor, but the US Department of Agriculture has filed an appeal. The AWA
standards are written for commercial kennel buildings, but if the decision is
not overturned, these standards will be applied to homes where puppies are
raised as show dogs, working dogs, and performance dogs and for sale directly
to the public as pets.
Unfortunately, regulations in the AWA
are quite vague. For example, the AWA states that the animal needs to be
evaluated by a veterinarian certifying that he inspected the animal on a
specified date, and when so inspected, the animal “appeared” free of any public
health disease or physical abnormality, etc.
The law does not specifically require
the vet to run certain tests and relies on the appearance of the animal. This
means anyone with a veterinary license can walk through a puppy mill to look at
dogs and say they all “appeared” free of any public health disease of physical
abnormality. On that end, a health guarantee isn’t always a guarantee that the
animal is not diseased or doesn’t have the propensity to develop chronic
behavioral/medical issues.
When searching for a particular breed
prospective dog owners are better off purchasing their pup from a reputable
breeder who cares about the welfare of their puppies as well as their
reputation in their line of business — one who stands behind their pups and
cares about their future throughout their entire lives.
