The Unbelieveable Truth About Puppy Mills

The Unbelievable Truth about Puppy Mills

A Puppy Mill is a private home or farm where female dogs are bred over and over like a cash crop until their poor bodies can no longer take the exhausting toll of never being non-pregnant and then they are put to sleep when they can't possibly live through another litter of puppies. Have you ever wondered where those absolutely adorable puppies in the window came from? They begin an intolerable, severe puppy hood in what is called a puppy mill. There are countless, horrific facts about puppy mills that very few people are educated on. Take this shocking statistic for example: for every one puppy bought at a retail pet store in the United States, three dogs are euthanized because of it ("National AnimalÐ'..." 1).

It is extremely important for Americans to know what the cute puppy in the pet shop has endured to be sold. There are so many adoptable and wonderful pets at shelters and rescues throughout the country. The purchase of a puppy through a pet store is simply irresponsible. If someone wants a specific breed or a young dog, it's all available, especially with the help of the internet. (DeRose, Chris. National Animal Rights Expert)

Many, if not all puppy mill breeders know nothing about raising puppies (Reyes 1). They keep the animals in small, cooped-up cages that are stacked one on top of the other (2). Investigators have discovered that most of the dogs have open wounds and bald spots on their skin from sleeping on the metal wire cages that have no solid resting surface (Bell 72). The dogs also have to endure miserable sun and heat, with sometimes no water and when the seasons change, it is the unbearable cold wind, rain, and snow (72). When a female finally gives birth to her litter in these unbearable conditions, the breeders do not remove the puppies from her cage, making it more crowded (72). The cages are not moved or cleaned until the puppies are sold and the urine and waste from the puppies on the higher cages makes its way to the cages on the lower levels, the dogs have to live in their own excrement (72), raising the risk of disease to an unthinkable rate. (Reyes 2)

Now, as you may know, dogs are very social animals that is what makes them such wonderful pets. The breeders that raise these puppies tend to ignore this and don't give the animals the attention they need and deserve to become a good future pet. The puppies are kept in small stacked cages just like their parents(if not with their parents) until they reach the age of seven or eight weeks old when they can se sold. The puppy breeders do not sell their dogs directly to the retail stores, they sell them to brokers who then clean them up (but the puppies can still be sick) and sell them to the shops for two or three time what they paid for them (Reyes 2). But even before the puppies make it to the stores, they sometimes have to travel across the country in tiny quarters, and are handled a lot, which makes them mean and nervous (Bell 72).

The one and only thing that makes one feel as though the puppies sold at a pet store are better than the ones sold by animal shelters or private breeders are the so called "papers." "The truth is, "papers" only certify that the puppy is the offspring of dogs registered with the PCCI (Philippine Canine Club Inc.). Other than that, it doesn't say its health conditions, its quality, and its sociability" (Reyes 3). Often the puppies raised through the puppy mills are sick far beyond just living in their own excrement. Some breeders are so eager to make more money they become careless and they inbreed their dogs, this leads to the puppies having extreme genetic defects such as, hip dysphasia, blindness, and diabetes (Bell 72). And that is not the least of careless accounts;

"An investigation of Lancaster County puppy mills by the Philadelphia Inquirer found out that some breeders do not properly vaccinate puppies, leaving them at risk for distemper and other diseases" (Bell 72) .

And "Doctor Kim Hammond, a Baltimore veterinarian, estimates that sixty percent of the sick dogs he treats come from puppy mills" (Neill 67). "Animals bought in upscale shopping malls come to me with congenital heart diseases, skin problems, bladder problems, genetic deficiencies, it is much better to adopt from a shelter or buy from a responsible pet breeder" says Dr. Hammond (Neill 67).

According to the Humane Society of the U.S., 90 percent of the 500,000 dogs sold annually in pet stores are born in substandard puppy mills, where abuse, neglect, and disease are apart of the daily menu ("Dogs get theirÐ'..." 129).

Lately, a legislature from the state of Pennsylvania, Senator Stewart Greenleaf voted for a law that that will hopefully push his state's puppy mills out of existence (Perlman 1). This law basically states that if a consumer purchases a sick puppy from a puppy mill or store that carries puppy mill puppies the consumer can return the puppy and request to be reimbursed for the money spent on the puppy itself and the vet bills they pay to help it regain health (1). Greenleaf thinks that if the puppy millers find themselves in a financial bind because they are selling sick puppies they will begin to be more careful about the healthcare and well being of their puppies (1). He hopes they might decide to discontinue their illegal business (1). "The Humane Society of the United States estimates there are about four thousand puppy mills nationwide, and that as many as ninety percent of the canines sold in pet stores come from these places" (Perlman 1). The largest amount of puppy mills around the nation are located in the Midwest and there are six states that do the most puppy producing of all which are Arkansas, Oklahoma, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, and Missouri (1). Most of the time, if the police didn't receive complaints the mills were far away and very hard to suspect (1). In Mitchell, South Dakota that was very much the case the police had on their hands (1). There, Shirley Myers was managing a puppy mill.

"It was a horrible mess. There was filth, stench beyond words," says former Davidson County Sheriff Lyle Swenson. "It