Puppy Mill Awareness Day

by | Monday | September 21, 2009 | 24 comments

Saturday, September 19th marked Puppy Mill Awareness Day.

I know people are generally aware of what puppy mills are, but is everyone aware just how deplorable these operations are? To say it’s heartbreaking is an understatement.

At a previous job, one of our duties was to inspect the animals that a local mall pet store acquired from a, erm, “breeder” as they arrived from the airport. They were always sick. The pet store owner always got mad when I documented their maladies. Eventually he started requesting a vet other than me to do the physical exams, a vet more conducive to his sales environment. And I would invariably see them again after they were purchased, a few weeks later, with illnesses including but not limited to kennel cough, distemper, and parvo. Which they couldn’t afford to treat since they had just spent $2000 on the malti-poo-tzu-apso.

I know everyone here knows this, but it bears repeating. NO REPUTABLE BREEDER sells their pets to pet stores. If you see a puppy in a cage in the mall, it is from a puppy mill, and by purchasing it you are supporting more of this:

PuppyMillMaltese1

I know shelters and rescues aren’t for everyone, for a variety of reasons. Buying a pet is a choice many people make, and that is fine too. This post isn’t about the plight of pet overpopulation, which is a story for another day. This is solely about the horrific reality of commerical breeding operations which is allowed to perpetuate by an understaffed USDA, and more importantly, by all the people who buy from pet stores and keep these mills in business.

I have a client, and I love her dearly, but she keeps getting dogs from the local pet store. She says she walks by and feels sorry for them, and worries about what will happen to the dog if she doesn’t get them. “Well, hopefully they will go out of business,” I tell her, and she laughs. Then she gets out her wallet, because let me tell you I have never seen a list of maladies like the ones affecting her dogs. An incontinent Great Pyrenees. A boxer with luxating patellas. A bulldog with…well, all bulldogs are a mess so it’s hard to say if this one is any worse than all the rest, but still.

Resist the urge. Don’t do it.  I know you won’t, but tell your mom not to either. And your neighbor. And your mailman. And your hairdresser. And all the people milling about the front of the pet store, but if you do choose to do that make sure you’re quiet about it and don’t do it for more than 5 minutes, because that’s about the time the employees notice you and have you escorted from the premises. Not that I would know from experience or anything.

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  • Wade

    Eep! I’m not sure if the same sort of thing happens in Australia, but the fact it happens anywhere is terribly sad :( . Still thanks for sharing some more of your wisdom Doctor V :) I’ll be sure to check where my first puppy comes from when I’m finally able to adopt one.

    • http://www.pawcurious.com Dr. V

      That’s a good question. I wonder if puppy mills are an American thing or if they are widespread.

    • ShadowBunny

      sadly, yes, there ARE puppy (and kitten) mills in Australia. it isn’t as widespread as in America, but they do exist. Pets Paradise is an offender as are quite a few smaller “local” pet shops. basically any of the so-called “designer dogs” for sale in Australian pet shops will have come from back yard breeders or puppy mills.

  • Rachel

    Thanks for this post Dr. V! I didn’t really understand how awful puppy mills were until last week when I went to a volunteer orientation at a shelter. I think this is a really important message to spread to the general public–and I think it is important to talk about it in a non-abrasive/confrontational way like some animal rights activists might do.

    • http://www.pawcurious.com Dr. V

      Thank you Rachel. :)

  • Megan

    I’m the proud momma of 2 puppy mill rescues (one is my avitar over there, her name is Ruthie—->) so I totally understand where you’re coming from. Our clinic has the unfortunate location of being right next door to a puppy and bird store. Fortunately our day practice doesn’t see dogs and cats, so I don’t see a lot of them coming over with maladies every day, but sometimes our emergency service does. I try to educate clients as much as possible on why they shouldn’t buy from a pet store for the reasons Dr. V mentioned above.

    My kids are relatively ailment-free, both have mild luxating patellas (a problem in a lot of toy breed dogs), and my oldest also has heart disease (another common problem in little guys). What most animals DON’T have, though, is a dead fetus floating around in their abdomen. That’s basically what happened to my oldest, Hopper, when I adopted her. She had an open pyo (bad uterine infection) which had ruptured her uterus, and the dead fetus still left inside her (why? not sure, at the breeding facility I got her from, they do lots of C-sections, so how they missed a puppy I’m not sure). The ‘rescue’ I got her from told me when I adopted her that she wouldn’t be able to be spayed because of adhesions between her intestines and her uterus from previous c-sections; I laughed at them and scheduled the surgery appointment with the vet I was using – before I was in vet school – to have he spayed as soon as I got her from the adoption group. I brought her in the day of surgery and told the staff to have fun because I knew she had a uterine infection (I used to work there), and when I called back to check on her that afternoon, they were still in surgery because when they got in, they found her uterus had ruptured and the dead puppy had adhered to almost all her internal organs. She had to have her spleen removed, a portion of her liver removed, and parts of the dead puppy had adhered to many of her internal organs, such as her abdominal wall, her kidney and her intestines, and had to be painstakingly removed. Miraculously, she quickly made a full recovery, but to this day, she doesn’t trust people. She looks at me with eyes that so much “want” to trust me and be touched and cuddled, but she will always be a partially feral dog because of the cruelties she knew growing up in a puppy mill. She was touched only when she needed to be moved from her breeding harem to the whelping barn to give birth, or to be carted off to the local “veterinarian” to be sliced open in a long line of factory c-sections so her puppies could be sold to pet stores. The reason they gave her up for adoption wasn’t the fact that she had a uterine infection (no one knew that until I got ahold of her), it was because she wouldn’t breed back and was therefore of no use to the breeder anymore. At one time she would have been killed (maybe she would have had the blessing of euthanasia, but a lot don’t – they face shotguns, bludgeoning or worse), but at least now, there are rescues in place to get a lot of these breeders out of these situations.
    Sorry for stepping on my soapbox, but puppy mills are something close to me, and I’ve been very affected by owning puppy mill rescues. I’ve had 3 so far, and I’ve loved them all dearly. They make good pets, but you definitely have to work with them and their timid nature a lot of the time. Think of Hopper the next time you see a cute Chihuahua puppy in a pet store. There’s probably a momma dog behind that little ball of fluff who lives in squalid conditions, with no positive human contact.

    • http://www.pawcurious.com Dr. V

      Wow. What a story. That is an incredible process to survive.

      Thank you for sharing.

  • http://www.kindredcanines.org Kindred Canines Dog Rescue

    Great post Dr.V, You are so right. If we (those of us who know we woundt buy from a puppy mill) tell everyone else we know why they shouldnt then they might tell a few people who tell a few people…and maybe, just maybe we can put a couple of these pet stores out of business.
    I know here in Modesto we were able to Get Pet Barn to close there doors. Word of mouth spread of puppy mill horrors and it took a few years but sure enough, they closed.
    Thanks for the post.

    • http://www.pawcurious.com Dr. V

      Good work and good riddance to Pet Barn!!

  • Jamie

    As we were waiting on Akira (our Husky) to be old enough to come to us from our reptuable breeder, last year, we happened to walk in to a pet store while wasting some time waiting for a movie to start at the movie theater next door. They had a husky, who I assumed was maybe a month or two older than Akira, at the time, obviously barely old enough to even be apart from it’s mother. I look at my Husband and said “Watch this”. Since we had my 2 neices with us, aged 5 and 3 at the time, the sales person was all over us. (obviously thinking these were my kids) He said “would you like to get the Husky out to play?” I agreed, just to see how much I could inquire about this poor dog. Come to find out, it was 4 months old, and oh… only $2,000 and NO AKC papers of course. Yeah, we got Akira for way less than half of that from a reputable breeder and we have AKC papers, champion bloodlines, and her pedigree back for generations and generations. I blurted that out to the pet shop employee and he didn’t believe me! He told me that I was getting ripped off and that my puppy would end up not being what I believed she would be. (the nerve) Sigh. I feel sorry for all of those poor animals in the Pet Shops.

    • http://www.pawcurious.com Dr. V

      Wow, the irony of him telling you that!
      And ITA buying from a pet store is no cheaper than finding a good private breeder.

  • http://twitter.com/AboutVetMed AboutVetMed

    Awesome, awesome post, Dr V! Well said and something that needs to be said over and over again. Heartbreaking photo. Thanks for posting.

  • PeggyNC

    thanks very much for the article, Dr V! I have seen puppy mills first-hand and they are every bit as bad as you say. In addition to selling through pet stores, they also pose as “breeders” and sell over the internet…if you must buy a puppy, please buy from a breeder who will show you their dogs and their facilities by appointment. Please be willing to follow any requests they make from you to protect their animals from disease.

    • http://www.pawcurious.com Dr. V

      That’s a really good point. Thank you for reminding us that the internet is also full of this kind of stuff.

  • Shannon

    I was ‘escorted from the premises’ of Petland when I was in 9th grade (15 years ago). I was not-so-quietly telling people who were looking at the dogs that they were from puppy mills. I also pointed out that the dogs were most likely sick, and that they should take their business to the local shelter. I’ve never stepped foot in a Petland again.

    • http://www.pawcurious.com Dr. V

      LOL we are cut from the same cloth. :)

  • http://www.paulswarthout.com Paul Swarthout

    Nice post. But there are often other issues besides educating the would-be pet store customer. As much as we would like to see people steer clear of pet stores that sell puppies, reputable breeders (http://www.akc.org/breeders/index.cfm?nav_area=breeders) and rescue groups are, at least in a small way, contributing to the demand for pet store puppies.

    Many, if not most, reputable breeders thoroughly check out the home and family into which their puppy will be adopted. Many rescue groups, including the one I work with, also require applicants to submit to a phone interview, a home visit, and finally an introduction to the dog matched to the family’s lifestyle, personality, etc. At any step along the way, a potential adoptive family can be rejected due to a variety of issues. Unfortunately, once a family has been rejected, their search for a particular breed of puppy, doesn’t end there. They happily walk into the nearest pet store, or go directly to the puppy mill breeder and lay out their cash and walk out with their breed-of-choice puppy, without any further questions being asked. They want a puppy, and being rejected by the groups that we declare are the right way to get a puppy, isn’t going to stop them from obtaining a puppy.

    Convincing the public to not buy puppies from pet stores hasn’t worked, and likely won’t work. Continuing to implore the public to avoid patronizing these stores is a waste of the consumer’s time. The final solution to this problem is going to have to be placed upon the individual states, to enact laws which 1) give authority to immediately close any pet store which cannot provide accurate information showing that their stock only came from licensed breeders, and 2) give authority to license breeders that meet a certain level of care and cleanliness in their facilities. Additionally, citizens must be held responsible for any animal which has not been spayed or neutered beyond a particular age which gives birth or sires offspring. Citizens which fail to prevent this unlicensed breeding must be fined.

    While this might sound a bit harsh, puppy mill activity is not limited to breeding facilities which are associated with the horrific conditions that we have seen on television. In rescue we use a broader definition of a puppy mill… one that includes indiscriminate breeding and over-breeding regardless of the care or cleanliness given to the puppies. Few puppy mills actually recognize themselves as a puppy mill. Many puppy mills are backyard breeders who simply want to make a few extra dollars by selling their dogs’ puppies.

    • http://www.pawcurious.com Dr. V

      Thank you for your thoughtful and well informed response. You bring up a lot of excellent points, not the least of which is that this issue is much more complicated than it seems on the surface.

      I hope we are headed in the right direction, legislatively. It’s a process. We have a long way to go.

  • http://www.3beards.net Lisa

    Thanks Dr. V! Education is a huge part of the rescue work we do and whether it’s the 8 yr old little girl explaining about why their dog is special because it’s a rescue or hawking our fundraising cookbook at events, educating the public about the pet store puppy is the most important, well, ok, second to finding our little charges the right home thing we can do.

    I’ve been to a couple of puppy mills. One of them could be classified as a byb per Paul’s definition. She’s classified by Missouri Dept. of Ag as commercial kennel because she had a license to sell the puppies. Anyway, she was a breeder with a conscience and wanted the best for her dogs. She sold what she had to to pay the bills, gave us puppies and adults that she didn’t have to. There’s another mill that I hope to never visit because she has a history of keeping too many dogs that she can’t feed, indiscriminate selling of the puppies and dogs that have been so traumatized that even at 8 mos. old, he was too far gone mentally to bring back. For him, being put down was the relief he looked for.

    • http://www.pawcurious.com Dr. V

      Mentally destroyed at 8 months. How sad. :(

  • http://yahoo Jeannette Shaw

    I hate the fact,that there still puppy mills outhere,how wolud they feel if they had too live the same way?

  • http://freeforged.com/ Kristin

    I was happy to see that most of the local pet stores here now only carry dogs and cats from local shelters for adoption.

    • http://twitter.com/AboutVetMed AboutVetMed

      Wow – now there is a pet “store” that I could support – one that showcases shelter dogs. I hope this is a trend…

    • http://www.pawcurious.com Dr. V

      I love that they are doing that. :D Our “big box” pet store chains have areas for local adoption groups, but I haven’t seen that in the smaller pet stores.