I don’t like people who keep dogs like this:
People who mass produce dogs for the pet market are scum.
One can mass produce eggs, dairy, or meat, but one cannot mass produce quality pets or working dogs.
You just can’t.
To produce quality puppies of any sort, one must slow down. One must be selective in planning breeding and careful in rearing puppies.
You cannot do this at the volume that many mass producers breed.
I hope everyone understands these simple facts.
If you truly want a dog, don’t buy from a pet store or an online broker. Those entities prop up the mass production industry.
The mass production industry would die if people just stop buying puppies from pet stores and online dealers.
That would solve the problem.
However, whenever authorities raid particularly egregiously cruel mass production facilities, there are always calls to “end puppy mills.”
And the way they intend to do it is through law. Various states, including my own, are considering legislation that strictly limits the number of intact dogs a breeders has. These laws have regulations about puppy rearing that are not based upon any careful consideration about socialization. They almost always require that puppies be kept separate from other dogs, which is not wise.
Breeders with established breeding programs are punished. People who actually have well-thought out breeding plans are penalized.
Penalized because we simply want to stop cruel breeding practices.
I would be the first to tell you that domestic dogs, from a population genetics perspective, are very much in trouble. We need more dogs breeders, and more dogs being bred.
These laws are a direct affront to this necessity.
For that reason, we should oppose the mass puppy production industry, but we should do it by drying up the demand for these dogs.
Don’t be a stupid dog buyer.
How many times have you heard or read that dogs that come from pet stores or online brokers have health problems? How many times have you heard that dogs kept in these facilities are not treated well?
I have heard these claims hundreds of times.
I’m sure you have, too.
But we should not cut off our nose to spite our face.
We should simply our powers as consumers to put an end to puppy mills.
We don’t need to punish thoughtful breeders. We don’t need more stumbling blocks that prevent more people from getting in the game.
It is easy to say “There oughta be a law.”
But laws often have unintended consequences.
And sometimes, when we consider the total ramifications of a bill in question, we come to the conclusion that maybe there oughtn’t be law after all.
I think that this is the case with many of the HSUS-backed puppy mill laws.
We should enforce laws against animal cruelty to stop the bad guys.
But we also have responsibility in this matter, and that responsibility is that we must carefully consider the sources we use to procure dogs.
It’s just that simple.
***
This post was inspired by this wonderful piece at DesertWindHounds. This is an example of an ethical, well-informed, conscientious breeder whose program will be ended if HSUS-backed legislation is passed in Texas.
Wonderful post! Mind if I link to it?
Go ahead and link to it.
Thank you!
I recently heard the phrase “salvation through legislation”, and the light-bulb went off. That is exactly what it is – let’s wait for the government to fix all of our problems, since it’s easier than doing it ourselves, and then we can sit back and complain about how badly they screwed up.
Want an idea of crappy government solutions? Apparently now, any puppy imported into Canada from the USA had to be from a USDA inspected breeder. Yerp, we now HAVE to buy puppy-mill puppies. And for someone like me, who is interested in a rather rare breed, there are exponentially more breeders in the USA that in Canada. I guess I need to bone up on my smuggling skills ;)
Many of these legislative initiatives are aimed at eventually ending all dog breeding. Well-funded animal-rights organizations such as HSUS and PETA are using the puppy mill examples to sway legislators (and voters) to pass such laws, which will also (oh, just incidentally–?–) affect responsible breeders. According to the ARs, all dog breeders are “puppy millers” and there is no such thing as responsible breeding.
A pox on them.
What a good post. I shared it on my Facebook page. As an amateur dog trainer and dog lover, we must police ourselves and keep the government off our backs. Otherwise we will not have good dogs or any dogs in the future. Elice (CDX on my Standard Poodle)
You haven’t got any rude comments for linking to my post? According to that woman vet on Pet Connection, cross-breeders are The Evul, you know.
No rude comments at all.
None of the cutesy dog people have attacked it either.
I assume “that woman” has a name. It’s polite to use it, even if you disagree with her.
I just saw a web site today, where you can buy “sheltipoos” with a click of a Paypal button. Want to defend that “cross-breeder”?
You know what’s interesting? When I was libeled by certain individuals in the Saluki or Gazelle Hound Club magazine, the Saluki, they never used my name. They never talked to me at all. Just printed my e-mail address and blog address, as a cross-breeding purebred hater.
My point, which you quite obviously missed, is that you cannot tar all breeders with the same brush. Just like every show breeder is not a ribbon chaser that uses their dogs as ego props, every cross-breeder is not making ‘poos’ or ‘doodles’ and selling them for big bucks to whoever has the cash. And not every veterinarian is a money grubbing cheat.
And no, I didn’t want to bother with clicking back on Pet Connection to copy her name down. Especially considering the low quality of both of her articles that I read today.
Want to grow up now?
Jess, I think it’s you that needs to grow up, and stop insulting people to try and make your point.
What gets me about the entire dog community is the vitriol and hatred that ALL sides are guilty of. What that magazine did was wrong, but that doesn’t excuse impolite behaviour on your part.
And yes, I missed the point in your original, two-sentence post. It’s amazing how much clearer your second attempt is. Perhaps less snark is the way to go?
And who, pray tell, did I insult? The vet? Because I used a perfectly applicable descriptor? If I’d meant it in an insulting way, I’d’ve said “that woman vet on Pet Connection that is critical thinking challenged”, or “that woman vet on Pet Connection that has drunk the AR Kool-Aid.”
I have never attacked another kind of breeder. Ever. I may call treasured superstitions into question, but I really don’t care how other people breed their dogs. They’re grown-ups, they can decide whether their behavior is ethical or not. But when the very fact that one crosses breeds completely negates any other aspect of their breeding, the brain dead idiots that publish these ridiculous, unthinking articles are frankly deserving of a little vitriol. Let’s see, do you think it’s ethical to actually breed CKCS? A breed riddled with problems? What about Dalmatians? Thirty-some-odd percent chance of developing urinary problems for a male, and no way to tell which ones are going to have issues. And PC has the gall to publish an article that states that *simply* crossing two breeds is the mark of a bad breeder, a breeder deserving of the contempt of their so-called peers? How about the puppy buyer do something novel, like use their brains and do some research into the breed(s) involved to decide whether a breeder is ethical or not.
You attacked and challenged me. Or is this not a challenge: “I just saw a web site today, where you can buy “sheltipoos” with a click of a Paypal button. Want to defend that “cross-breeder”?” Well?
And my original comment that you evidently took so much offense to? That was to Scottie. See, that’s my blog linked at the bottom of the post, and I am an Evil Crossbreeder(tm). The clue there is my original statement: “You haven’t got any rude comments for linking to my post?” Scottie moderates his comments, so I was curious as to whether he’d been attacked for linking to an Evil Crossbreeders(tm) post.
When you regularly get hate mail, attacked on mailing lists, libeled in print, and harassed so much that you need to file reports with your local sheriff because you honestly fear for the welfare of your dogs, you may tell me tell me how to behave. That woman vet’s little article only perpetuates the beliefs and attitudes that make the people who harass me feel that it’s perfectly okay to do so. After all, I’m an Evil Crossbreeder(tm). I deserve it.
There is a difference between calling out someone on their rude behaviour, and a challenge. I wasn’t debating your points, merely your way of getting them across.
Sorry you don’t see the difference. As for “drinking the kool-aid”, I “challenge” you to read this, then to continue to use the phrase:
http://www.elsewhere.org/rant/koolaid.html
And if I wanted to get into a debate about breeders and breeding practises, well, here is not the place to do it. I will say this though: A lot of the audience on this blog, and especially, on the PC blog, is made of or “pet” owners – people how aren’t that savvy about breeding nuances – they just want a dog. Now, if you were in their shoes, where would you prefer to get that information? From a blog that is professional, well-run, and moderates the comments? Or from a snarky, insulting comment? And yes, it was insulting, as you meant it to be. To more than “that vet”.
Jess – you can make your argument without fighting off those you wish to convince. Otherwise you are wasting your breath.
If you truly want a dog, don’t buy from a pet store or an online broker. Those entities prop up the mass production industry.
I think if this message is to spread less nebulous alternatives to the above will have to be provided. I suppose the various “bad guys” have all the money and organization-sort of like DC.
There are less nebulous alternatives. I am not opposed to “backyard breeding,” which is when a person breeds from their pet dogs. It can be done correctly, and if you look at the study on Scottish terriers, these dogs actually wound up being slightly healthier than the show dogs.
http://www.tartanscottie.com/pages/GSM_2005_Health_Survey_Report_1column.pdf
This is like buying a used car. You can go to someone with a good reputation or you can go to “Honest John’s Used Car Emporium.” And you know when the owner uses the term “Honest” in his name that he has to be on the level, right?
One thing about backyard breeders is they haven’t learned to inbreed or tightly linebreed, so they are often unintentionally selecting for a low COI. No pet breeder wants to inbreed, that’s just gross in the eyes of the average person.
It doesn’t mean it’s foolproof of course,
And I what I just said is essentially heresy.
But so be it.
Over and above the endless arguments over “who is the most moral breeder” is that, historically, giving a Government entity power to enforce morality usually ends badly. It’s a common human failing – if people don’t do as you want them to, why MAKE them. And nothing seems to trigger this more than “morality” issues. Unfortunately, Governments in charge of morality almost always end up abusing that authority. Currently, we have cases of whipping women and executing them for adultery in the Middle East. But there’s the Inquisition as an example in Europe. The Salem “witch” trials executed a Quaker – they weren’t the “right” religion. When there is power, prestige and money to be gained by enforcing a “moral view”, it tends to attract the fanatics in the crowd and giving people like that power – again, a reading of the Inquisition is insightful as to abuses. Crossbreeding is sometimes viewed as a destruction of breeds that came in Noah’s ark. Conversely, breeding a purebred is sometimes viewed as the “destruction of the canine species”. Neither case is true. And in the interim, people mistakenly put power in the Government to enforce laws that are often poorly written. Right now, there’s a bill in CA that proposes that if animals are seized under a search warrant, the owner forfeits them – even if there are no charges levied, the search warrant were determined based on false/bad information, the person determined innocent. How anyone could understand the reasons behind the 4th and 5th Amendments and support such a thing is beyond me.
Peggy Richter