Toronto Bans Sale of Puppy Mill (kittens and puppies) Pets

Footnote I myself have no problem with dealing with the public animal shelters however that should be a choice not ram down the citizens throats in order to aid the shelters in clearing their inventory and even allowing them to raise their adoption fees.

In my area the pound adoptions fees had gotten so out of line they just needed to cut them by 2/3 and private rescues groups are just as bad.

When I was looking for help from a private rescue group in finding homes for kittens that a stay mother cat decided to bring onto my property I was told by a rescue group head not to give them away for free as a fairly large fee indicate that person is going to take care of the animal!!!!!!!

Once more on it face this look like a government attack on private breeders to benefit the shelters using the excuse of fighting puppies mills.

Everytime we vote we manipulate democracy.
This arguement has been weighing heavily on me the last few days because I like to think I am open minded or then I would become like many of the people I have no respect for.
I read the want ads in our local and regions paper today. It was full of pets for sale. When I called regarding some of the animals and said I would be interested seeing the animals in it's living condition before I would think about purchasing I was told 99.9% of the time I would be able to see the animals in it's home environment. These were small breeders who are able to sell the animals they breed and several informed me they do not sell to pet stores because they cannot make sure the animal goes to an appropriate home or answer follow-up questions. The .1% who said they would bring the animals to a nearby Walmart are most assurely puppy mill breeders.
The point to the story is ban selling of animals except from shelter, rescue groups, or SPCA from does not mean the small breeder cannot sell their animal and will go out of business it just means they will continue to sell them the way they always do and puppy mill breeders cannot sell an animal to the public thru a legitimate source.
Commercial breeding has been done for centuries and when done correctly and humane way is an acceptable practice. It is only when greed overtakes compassion then intervention is needed to control abuse and if deny a form of access to sell the abused animal is needed then I am all for it.
Small breeder will continue to be able to sell their animals thru advertising, trade shows, internet, and word of mouth. Let's don't make this an arguement about people's when it really is about animal's well being.

Cities can't ban international imports. That's a federal responsibility.

They can control what happens to the imports once they're within the city's jurisdiction.

I've never known a serious breeder who would sell through a pet shop - in fact it's always been my experience that breeders 'vet' prospective buyers of their animals, and they have very high standards. They invariably have waiting lists.

Here's the Ontario law Walter mentioned - it doesn't mention puppy mills, it rightly focuses on the welfare of the animals regardless of the classification of the establishment.

this is a really great signal.

My dogs come from rescue situations. If I ever get a puppy, it'll be from someplace where I can check out its home environment.

Before Ontario made a big dent in the puppy mill system here, I spent some time being trained to become a foster for breeding animals rescued from the mills. Horrifying how lacking in social skills those little animals are (most of the puppy mills here were/are for small dogs - best cute factor in pet stores).

Once more my friend they had banned the sale of imported dogs in their pet stores and that what we been talking about not baning imports from crossing the border as that is two difference subjects and as I had address this more then once I question if you are being honest.

I suppose it's how you define your terms.

When we vote we practice democracy.

When legislators hide a desired outcome that they know they can't get passed in a bill which they feel sure they can, that's manipulating democracy.

I can't say with certainty that the Toronto ban is attempting to hide or pave the way for the real goal of outlawing breeding of any kind, but it's possible and certainly possible if similar laws are adopted elsewhere. What I do know is that there are a fairly sizeable chunk of "animal activists" who would like to put an end to all breeding, and that there are a sizeable number of "animal lovers" who would like to coerce people who are interested in a dog or cat to obtain them from shelters.

I don't question that these folks are sincerely concerned about animal welfare anymore than I would appreciate them questioning the sincerity of my concern for animals.

I believe that the large majority of small scaled breeders do not want to and would not sell their puppies through pet stores. I do not know that none would and neither does anyone elese who has participated in this thread.

I believe that most of the large scale breeders deserve the epithet Puppy Mill and employ irresponsible breeding practices and treat their animals poorly. I do not know that this is true of all large scale breeders nor do I know if all the large scale breeders in the Toronto area have failed inspections based on existing regulations. I don't believe you do either and unless I missed it somewhere, no one has provided evidence one way or the other.

I agree that it does not appear that the Toronto law can be used to put small scale breeders out of business but time will tell as will the drafting of similar laws in other locations. I think you will agree that the drafters of the Toronto Law would like to put all large scall breeders out of business and that if it cannot that is simply because they couldn't expand the scope to include all of the breeders' markets.

The issue and the associated argument is certainly about the well being of animals, but it is also about people and about government. You prefer to limit it to the well being of animals because that is your primary concern and thinking about the people that are affected by this law and the ability of governments to impose laws like this just complicates matters and stands in the way of your goal.

The simple fact of the matter is that this law has flaws that can adversely affect people and that it is not necessary to achieve the goal of providing protection for animals.

You don't agree. I appreciate that. I don't have anything further to add, but please feel free to if you do.

Thanks

Obviously I am opposed to this level of micro-management of the marketplace on the part of the government....We see here a government that needs to be extensively shrunk.

I didn't write this letter. I copied it from a site on facebook. It's worth reading and understanding why people are fed up with puppy mills and the stores that support them. This is where all these unwanted puppies/cats/pets end up.




A Letter from a Shelter Manager - anonymous in North Carolina

I think our society needs a huge "Wake-up" call. As a shelter manager, I am going to share a little insight with you all...a view from the inside if you will.

First off, all of you breeders/sellers should be made to work in the "back" of an animal shelter for just one day. Maybe if you saw the life drain from a few sad, lost, confused eyes, you would change your mind about breeding and selling to people you don't even know.

That puppy you just sold will most likely end up in my shelter when it's not a cute little puppy anymore. So how would you feel if you knew that there's about a 90% chance that dog will never walk out of the shelter it is going to be dumped at? Purebred or not! About 50% of all of the dogs that are "owner surrenders" or "strays", that come into my shelter are purebred dogs.

The most common excuses I hear are; "We are moving and we can't take our dog (or cat)." Really? Where are you moving too that doesn't allow pets? Or they say "The dog got bigger than we thought it would". How big did you think a German Shepherd would get? "We don't have time for her". Really? I work a 10-12 hour day and still have time for my 6 dogs! "She's tearing up our yard". How about making her a part of your family? They always tell me "We just don't want to have to stress about finding a place for her we know she'll get adopted, she's a good dog".

Odds are your pet won't get adopted & how stressful do you think being in a shelter is? Well, let me tell you, your pet has 72 hours to find a new family from the moment you drop it off. Sometimes a little longer if the shelter isn't full and your dog manages to stay completely healthy. If it sniffles, it dies. Your pet will be confined to a small run/kennel in a room with about 25 other barking or crying animals. It will have to relieve itself where it eats and sleeps. It will be depressed and it will cry constantly for the family that abandoned it. If your pet is lucky, I will have enough volunteers in that day to take him/her for a walk. If I don't, your pet won't get any attention besides having a bowl of food slid under the kennel door and the waste sprayed out of its pen with a high-powered hose. If your dog is big, black or any of the "Bully" breeds (pit bull, rottie, mastiff, etc) it was pretty much dead when you walked it through the front door.

Those dogs just don't get adopted. It doesn't matter how 'sweet' or 'well behaved' they are.

If your dog doesn't get adopted within its 72 hours and the shelter is full, it will be destroyed. If the shelter isn't full and your dog is good enough, and of a desirable enough breed it may get a stay of execution, but not for long . Most dogs get very kennel protective after about a week and are destroyed for showing aggression. Even the sweetest dogs will turn in this environment. If your pet makes it over all of those hurdles chances are it will get kennel cough or an upper respiratory infection and will be destroyed because shelters just don't have the funds to pay for even a $100 treatment.

Here's a little euthanasia 101 for those of you that have never witnessed a perfectly healthy, scared animal being "put-down".

First, your pet will be taken from its kennel on a leash. They always look like they think they are going for a walk happy, wagging their tails. Until they get to "The Room", every one of them freaks out and puts on the brakes when we get to the door. It must smell like death or they can feel the sad souls that are left in there, it's strange, but it happens with every one of them. Your dog or cat will be restrained, held down by 1 or 2 vet techs depending on the size and how freaked out they are. Then a euthanasia tech or a vet will start the process. They will find a vein in the front leg and inject a lethal dose of the "pink stuff". Hopefully your pet doesn't panic from being restrained and jerk. I've seen the needles tear out of a leg and been covered with the resulting blood and been deafened by the yelps and screams. They all don't just "go to sleep", sometimes they spasm for a while, gasp for air and defecate on themselves.

When it all ends, your pets corpse will be stacked like firewood in a large freezer in the back with all of the other animals that were killed waiting to be picked up like garbage. What happens next? Cremated? Taken to the dump? Rendered into pet food? You'll never know and it probably won't even cross your mind. It was just an animal and you can always buy another one, right?

I hope that those of you that have read this are bawling your eyes out and can't get the pictures out of your head I deal with everyday on the way home from work.

I hate my job, I hate that it exists & I hate that it will always be there unless you people make some changes and realize that the lives you are affecting go much farther than the pets you dump at a shelter.

Between 9 and 11 MILLION animals die every year in shelters and only you can stop it. I do my best to save every life I can but rescues are always full, and there are more animals coming in everyday than there are homes.

My point to all of this DON'T BREED OR BUY WHILE SHELTER PETS DIE!

Hate me if you want to. The truth hurts and reality is what it is. I just hope I maybe changed one persons mind about breeding their dog, taking their loving pet to a shelter, or buying a dog. I hope that someone will walk into my shelter and say "I saw this and it made me want to adopt". THAT WOULD MAKE IT WORTH IT.

Ok that letter and anyone who supports it is anti breeder period and supports my position that such laws are design to shut down not puppy mills but all breeders in the hope that it will reduce the population in animal shelters and increased the adoption rate from shelters.

The asshole who wrote that letter had no rights to claimed he care about animals more then people who do not agree with him and need to spend time in a shelter so they can reach his high moral position on the matter.

Sorry that is nonsense……….

I once found myself with no home and no shelter along with hundred thousands or so others. Google South Florida and hurricane Andrew.

That did not mean that I just turned my back on my dog and my cats because finding any shelter was a very hard task without having a dog and five cats along.

From the start my position was that if it would mean that we would be camping out that was ok with me we were all together in dealing with this problem.

Hell one of my cats got separated from me before the hurricane hit and I spend night after night looking for her around the ruins of my home and needing to explain over and over to the police and the national guard why I was breaking curfew.

I was willing to risk not only being lock up but perhaps shot by a nerve national guard kid.

So my attitude is the writer of that letter and anyone with similar opinion that they had the moral high ground can go to hell.

If anyone actually does need to be schooled on why so many people would like to see an end to Puppy Mills, I'm not sure how this letter from the Shelter Manager is going to do the trick.

Breeders that warrant the epithet "Puppy Mill," are primarily guilty of two significant transgressions:

1) They treat their breeding stock and puppy inventory inhumanely
2) They employ irresponsible breeding practices that lead to the perpetuation of genetic flaws - and here we are of course talking about heath and behavior problems not cosmetics

I wouldn't be surprised if they also cheated their customers, were late in paying their bills, and were lousy housekeepers, but those are all beside the point.

It is a thin chain that links them to the very serious problem of the excessive number of abandoned pets.

No breeder, whether irresponsible or not, is forcing or even tricking people into buying dogs or cats, and they are certainly not forcing the people who buy animals from them to abandon them at the drop of a hat.

If the fault doesn't lie solely with the owners, I'm having a real hard time figuring out with whom they share it.

I'm sure I would not want this guy's job, but it's hard to empathize all that much with him. He seems to view himself as almost as much of a victim as the animals and his rage and admonitions are misdirected.

Responsible pet owners have a right to buy and own dogs or cats. It would be great if they considered rescuing an animal from a shelter rather than buying one from a breeder, but the puppy or kitten they don't buy is still going to be out there; just not in their home, and there is no guarantee that they will not, in turn, abandon the poor animal they 'rescued." If you buy a dog or a cat, treat it well and provide it with a good home for all of its life, you are not part of the problem.

As for breeders, even the bad ones aren't in the habit of abandoning litters to the street. Irrespective of the harm it would cause, what possible incentive would they have to do it? I'm sure the bad ones couldn't care less whether the person who buys one of their animals keeps it for six weeks or six years, but they have a financial incentive to get them all placed with someone, ASAP.

Responsible, small breeders do, for the most part, seem to be interested in making sure their puppies get good homes, but it's ridiculous to think they can predict, with any accuracy, who will abandon a pet and who will not.

For someone in Shelter Manager's position who actually cares about animals, the chances of being consumed by despair are probably pretty significant, but despairing people are not known for their problem solving abilities.

I'm not sure there is a solution to the problem and if there is, I wish I knew what it was. I do know that the answer is not to outlaw the breeding of dogs and cats and/or to force everyone that wants a pet to obtain theirs from a shelter.

I have a feeling that a strong educational campaign directed at children could make something of a difference, but I’ve seen nothing like it in my neck of the wood or on a national scale.

To the extent that any effort is made to make it more difficult or costly to leave a pet in a shelter, I think the reaction would be an increase in the number of animals left in fields or on the side of the road, rather than a decrease in the number of abandoned pets.

It’s hard to measure the totality of good that comes from a practice and tougher to weigh that good against the inevitable downside, particularly when the downside involves suffering.

If there is a problem with people treating dogs poorly for the purposes of breeding and selling (which I dont know for a fact that there is) then deal with the people who treat dogs poorly, there have long been laws on the books to deal with that....using this alleged mistreatment of dogs as an excuse for the state to decide who can take part in the transaction of the sale of a puppy is abuse of the citizens at the hands of the state. Now that we are all big into scapegoating again to justify over the top abuse from government what is next, are we going to start getting told that the Jews are responsible for the Great Recession and require being rounded up so that they can not continue with their treachery? Just saying....

My "solution" is for the government to offer dirt cheap or better yet free spaying and neutering of dogs and cats. Oh and in the case of dogs no question should be ask about the dog having a dog license or not having a license at the clince when the dog is taken in for that purpose.

Right in my area it is not all that cheap even at the pound and a lot of the over population of pets have nothing to do with puppies mills but people like my mother neighbors who are too cheap and to lazy to spay their two female dogs and they then end up having one litter after another.

I spend a fortune myself at one time or another having neighborhood stray cats spay.

Hawkeye, you have weird ideas about government. It's made up of your fellow citizens and if the government, or the man, in other words the big collective, us, as in you and me think puppy mills suck, it's up to the government to act. Plain and simple.
Finn, you're right. This wasn't a good argument to close puppy mills or disallow stores to sell their animals. I shouldn't have said it was. It is an argument for over breeding and for spaying and neutering your pets. It is a good letter to perhaps give to prospective pet owners or for trying to stop the horror of killing so many unwanted pets, everywhere.
However, there is one thing I would like to pick apart, if I may.
2) They employ irresponsible breeding practices that lead to the perpetuation of genetic flaws - and here we are of course talking about heath and behavior problems not cosmetics
Sadly, the worst offender of the above are the kennel clubs. They also need a good slap upside the head and for perpetuating the idea that they are somehow the paragon of good breeding.

I also don't think this by-law has any intention, or an attempt to limit people from breeding pets. It think it is what it is. A rule to leave breeding to people who do it well and leave stores to sell merchandise. Hopefully, though it will give some people pause before they do decide to breed, as the product is a living breathing thing and shouldn't be treated as if it's a spare tire. Breeding is something that should be well planned for and breeders should feel/has some responsibility for their charge..



By the by, I don't read the twisted shite Bill writes. I haven't for months. So, if he's hoping for a reply from me, it ain't gonna happen. Sorry to disappoint. As I've told him before, I can't understand what the hell he's on about most of the time, I won't beat my head against a wall and I'm not into self flagellation either. Find another victim. I'm not interested.

That the government is the solution to every problem is the liberal ideology. The rights says that government is the cause of almost every problem. The truth is probably in the middle some place....I most certainly dont think that government is of the people by the people anymore, it has been thoroughly corrupted by the corporate class and much of its work has been contracted out to people who are not accountable to the citizens. That government must be shrunk and brought back under the control of the citizens should be something that both the left and the right can agree on.

Frankly I don't know enough about the involvement of of breed organizations in irresponsible breeding practices. To arrive at a settled opinion.

It they are involved, to the extent that you suggest, then they do deserve a slap upside the head that can best be delivered to them by the people who buy their services, for it is a service that they provide.

Unless they have actual breeding operations, I don't think they present a issue that must be or should be addressed by government.

They themselves are not governmental agencies and cannot impose breed standards on anyone. If the standards they propose are harmful to the breeds to which they are dedicated, breeders and owners of their breed should reject them. If I understand the problem well enough I realize that prestigious prizes, reputations and livelihoods are at stake for breeders who take on a "kennel club" or breed organization, but if they love the breed as much as they all say they do, and they care as much or more for their profession than their current jobs, they need to take a stand and fix the problem rather than calling for a government "solution" that will only make it worse.

I guess I'm going to have to do some research into this area, because it seems certain that there must be an opposing viewpoint, and when we start agreeing, I get nervous

This particular law may not be intended to outlaw breeding of any kind, but it's pretty clear to me that there are a fair number of people who believe that would be a good result, and will work towards it.

I live in Olympia Washington and I have heard several local "Greeners" (basically organic brown rice and granola liberals) say that pure bred dogs should be illegal, as breeding them is an abuse of animals. All dogs should be mutts according to them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedigree_Dogs_Exposed
This article on Wiki is pretty good overview of what was exposed and what the kennel clubs had been grading as top in show. It's pretty disgusting.

I am not against private breeders. I bought both my dogs from private breeders. One of my dogs is a pure bred, the other is a half/half. I had wanted a second dog from a shelter but my husband gave me two pups for xmas instead. I had to sell one, as I just couldn't deal with three dogs. I made sure he went to a great home. In fact my husband checked out both birth homes and I was at the first. All the pups came from good homes. I was happy we were able to check out these homes. I won't breed my dogs because I don't want to bother with all the fuss or problems. I salute most who do.
My sister on the other hand.. bought a pup. She was told it was a tea cup breed. It turned out to be a mixed breed of unknown origin. She's so NOT a teacup anything. This dog was abused and not in great health. Mine were awesomely - if that's a word - healthy and I got exactly what I was sold.
I'm glad my sister got her dog, rescued her, however if she had done her due diligence this dog would probably have ended up in a shelter. Thankfully the shelter here is a no-kill zone.

It works like this: dachshunds have long backs and floppy ears. If judges in major shows start awarding best of breed for longer wiener dogs, breeders tend to breed for longer backs. The dog suffers back and maybe hip problems. Other breeds are favored for wrinked faces. Go too far with it and you will see dogs with such a weight of wrinkles their lower eyelids droop to the point the eyes don't completely close. You breed to what the judges demand, or you don't sell a lot of high dollar pups.

The biggest problems of that sort tend to lie with the "cute" breeds. Most of the others work out pretty well, if we're only talking about serious breeders. Any way, there are breeds known for a combination of temperment, intelligence, and yes, even appearance. You may not get what you expect from a shelter. Getting what you want in a dog can be very expensive. Some that are prone to hip dysplsia are x-rayed and even certified as coming from a line known to be free of the condition. Most of us cannot afford that kind of dog, but they are out there.

You will start at $2K for a Newfoundland that comes from good parents, is registered and has a couple generations free from dysplasia, but I dont think anyone will give you a guaranty. Their hearts will also have been checked but that only means that they show no signs of trouble at time of sale, it does not mean that they will not develop a bad heart.

A bit of aside story....we got a Newf around 1990 that six months after we got her began to show dysplasia...we put her on Glucosamine for 3 months which at that time was new and very expensive in Germany, and she lived to a very old age with no further troubles.