When you buy your puppy in a pet store, probably most of you don’t question where the cute little fluffball came from. You might assume that the pet store buys from breeders or maybe a local family had a surprise litter.
Pet store puppies are rarely bred by reputable breeders, they are sourced from puppy mills. Most people won’t have heard of a puppy mill. Soon, you will probably wish you hadn’t.
Puppy mills are canine intensive breeding plants, where literally thousands of puppies are bred to supply the pet industry. It’s a sad life for a puppy mill puppy, from the very start.
Poor health, temperament issues and hereditary diseases are often the legacy of being bred at a Puppy Mill. Socialization rarely occurs as the puppies are taken away from their mother early, thus depriving them of these skills.
Add to this negative early start poor feeding and possibly inadequate water, coupled with miserable living conditions with no room to move and little contact with humans, before being taken often incredibly long distances to the pet store, during which many die.
Usually when breeding dogs, breeders will study the blood line of each of the parents to check whether there is any risk of inherited diseases, so that they breed a healthy puppy. Medical and vaccination programs will also be adhered to, until the time they are released to a loving home.
A good breeder will have spacious, clean and humane premises, and should voluntarily be able to show you the bloodline of your puppy. A breeder ALWAYS gives a guarantee (although details may differ), tips on care, and would never make you return the puppy if dissatisfied, as they would have properly interviewed the family.
The situation is very different at a puppy mill, where the main aim is profit rather than animal welfare. Their goal is to produce as many puppies as possible to turn over the greatest margin. This means often poor breeding, where animal unscreened for hereditary diseases are used, or possibly even interbreeding which can lead to no end of health and temperament issues.
Breeding dogs are kept in miserable conditions, without proper attention to their diet, health or exercise regime, and forced to breed every time they are in season, physically exhausting the dog, and leading to weaker puppies. At the end of their breeding life, the dogs are often killed or abandoned.
There is legislation in place but puppy mills still exist. Consumers can help stamp out these intensive dog breeding plants buy only buying puppies from reputable breeders ( visit the premises, get recommendations), consider adopting ( this is the most humane way to stop the industry and to help rescue a dog who has been abandoned), refuse to buy from pet stores ( many of them do not know or mislead their customers as to the origin of the puppies).
Don’t buy a puppy mill puppy just to save him. You will just create the market for more puppies to be produced. The best thing to do if you see puppies being bred or kept in inappropriate conditions is to inform the appropriate animal protection authorities who will be able to take action.
Puppy mills are a sad fact of supply and demand, so don’t add to the problem by buying puppies of which you do not know the origin.