Many breeders of pure bred dogs pump out puppies for a dollar and house their breeding dogs in disgusting conditions...check out how many offer puppies over the net. Pure bred means nothing anymore, you still have to do your homework and that means truly knowing (not over the net), how the dogs are REALLY cared for and bred.
Breeding to improve the breed is the execption these days. Very few breeders breed for those reasons and even fewer dogs are actually doing the work that they were bred for.
I totally agree with this, it's something I've been thinking about a lot lately. As dog lovers we want to help and protect the dogs, but the problem runs so deeply that there is little we can realistically do, than stay aware, support rescues and shelters, and hope the love of dogs will motivate people to be educated about their care and well-being... and of course, love and care for our dogs to the best of our ability.
It is truly sad the conditions that some breeders keep their animals in, even small-time breeders who might only have a few animals. Pure bred really can mean anything from the healthiest, most pampered pups you could hope for to the sickest, most neglected... it's really sad. Dr2little I've seen a lot of what you described with the chihuahuas, I think the majority of dog breeders in KS run a fairly filthy operation, but there's so much land and farms and good ol' boys that it's just way more uncommon to see a breeder who does all the health testing, asks a lot of questions of the family the dog will be going to, etc. More often than not the dogs live outside, people come by and see them, say "aww how cute", the money changes hands and that's that. Not the best way to do things, but I can't say that I hate all breeders who run things this way. I got two wonderful dogs from two bad breeders. I wouldn't trade them for anything. I reported neglect on Midas' breeder because he was being neglected, outside all day alone in a concrete pen being eaten alive by ticks. He was an "AKC purebred lab" with papers, but it took hours of tweezing, bathing, and a couple good douses of vet bug-killing stuff to get all the creepy crawlies off him. Moro's breeder is a friend of mine's relative and she was healthy and vermin-free, but that doesn't mean he was a good breeder either. She was an "ad puppy", the local classified was for "$50 wolf hybrid pups for Valentine's day"...when we looked at the number, we realized that we knew the guy selling them, went out there and got her. He had another female pup that looked just like her... his son tells me that he never ended up selling that one, and she still lives out on his farm. He only has litters every once in a while, I don't think more than once a year. I know now that buying a dog this way is not a good way to go, but I'm not gonna say that I hate the guy for it or that I think he's pure evil for breeding wolf hybrids and selling them through the paper. It is not the best situation, but I have a lot more problems with puppy mills and huge breeding operations that dole out puppy after purebred puppy for enormous prices, with little attention to their care.
Still, that is the situation that so many puppies end up in. Why does it happen? Well, it's a combination of the exploitation of humanity's love for dogs, and greed, plain and simple. People see their gorgeous dream of a purebred dog, they think, "I have to have it!", they find someone with an advertisement for it, they buy it and they don't want to think about where it came from. As long as that type of demand is there for dogs, there will always be people willing to do whatever they can to fill the supply and make the money, regardless of the effects on innocent dogs. It's sad but the world works this way again and again. It's just like if I sat here and started thinking about my clothing, and how much of it was possibly made by underage workers in some third-world country because it can be made cheaply there and brought here to be sold for huge prices... I'd just get really depressed because there's little I can do, short of making all my own clothes.
What really upsets me is people who see their dog as kind of a fashion accessory, or an afterthought to their life. People who are like "oh yeah, I have a pit bull/poodle/rottweiler/dalmation/insert breed here", and it's kind of like their only use for the dog is the bragging rights to say "I have this"...and in reality the dog sits outside in the yard and never gets played with, or is chained up, or the owner loves the dog at first when it's small and cute, and then gets bored with it as it gets older and it's just kind of "there". It's amazing to me that some people would spend thousands on a purebred dog from a crappy breeder or a pet store, only to get tired of taking care of it in a few months.
That's why I think sites like this are great...it encourages people to think about their dogs and talk about them, share ideas for the best ways to take care of them, and it gives new owners a wealth of information to help them raise their dog to be happy and healthy. That's why the world needs more dog people like us... people who don't just see their dogs as something neat they bought. People who see their dogs as their true friends, companions, even their children
(I know hubby and me call ourselves 'mom' and 'dad' around the dogs, hehe) The world is a better place for dogs cause of you guys!!!
