HUFFINGTON POST – Pet Store Puppies Targeted By Animal Welfare Groups – Newportbeachpuppymill.com
HUFFINGTON POST –
Pet Store Puppies Targeted By Animal Welfare Groups
LOS ANGELES — More puppies are sold atpet stores during the holiday season than any other time of year. Now theAmerican Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and other groups arestepping up efforts to stop these sales, saying many of these dogs come frompuppy mills.
Forty billboards in Los Angeles thismonth encourage people to fight puppy mills by boycotting pet stores andwebsites that sell puppies. More than 50,000 people have signed a pledge on theASPCA’s website vowing to uphold the boycott, and the ASPCA has an onlinedatabase of targeted stores at nopetstorepuppies.com encouraging consumers toshop elsewhere. Consumers can also report a store to the ASPCA, and theorganization will verify the source of its puppies, Menkin said.
“We are not just saying `Don’t buya puppy,’ but `Don’t buy anything in a pet store that sells puppies,” saidCori Menkin, senior director of the ASPCA’s anti-puppy mills campaign. “Ifpet stores are not able to turn a profit, they will stop selling puppies.”
The Humane Society of the United States,Best Friends Animal Society and many other groups are promoting similarinitiatives.
As malls and chains drop the commercialsale of puppies, one change for consumers is an increase in convenientlocations for shelter adoptions.
In October, Jack’s Pets announced theywould no longer sell puppies at their 27 stores in Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana.They are working with shelters to offer in-store adoptions instead. Majorchains like PetSmart Inc. and Petco Animal Supplies Inc. stopped selling dogs andcats several years ago, partnering with local shelters and rescues on weekendadoption events. Best Friends has helped several traditional pet stores convertto shelter sales.
Macerich Co., a regional shopping mallcompany, recently announced a ban on traditional pet stores at its 70 malls.Instead, at the company’s mall in Lakewood, Calif., shoppers will find a storecalled Adopt & Shop, which gets its animals from the Southeast Area AnimalControl Authority shelter. On Nov. 25, the store celebrated its 500th adoption,said Aimee Gilbreath, executive director of Found Animals, the organizationthat runs and subsidizes Adopt & Shop.
Some pet store owners say they’re beingunfairly maligned.
Jens Larsen, who owns Perfect Pets inLittleton, Colo., is on the ASPCA list and says it’s not right. He has been inbusiness for 18 years, sold 1,600 puppies last year and has an A-plus ratingwith the Better Business Bureau. He gets 80 percent of his dogs from commercialbreeders in Nebraska, 10 percent from breeders in Kansas and Oklahoma and 10percent from two Colorado breeders, he said.
Some animal activists are “radicaland fanatical and want to put me out of business,” he said. “I obeythe law. So do my breeders and the kennels I deal with,” Larsen said.
Larsen says that when you are selling100 puppies a month, there will occasionally be a case of kennel cough or aparasite, and every once in a while, something more serious. But he believes ifhis dogs were continually getting sick, word would spread and he’d be out ofbusiness.
About 2 million puppies are sold onlineand in U.S. pet stores every year, said Menkin.
The ASPCA and other animal welfaregroups have popularized a negative image of commercial dog breeders in recentyears, claiming that poor breeding practices and substandard conditions leavesome animals with chronic physical ailments, genetic defects or fear of humans.
Whether it’s the impact of bad publicityor the recession cutting into purebred dog sales, the number of commercial dogbreeders licensed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture is declining, from3,486 in 2009, to 2,904 in 2010 and 2,205 in 2011, according to USDA spokesmanDave Sacks said.
Licenses in Missouri, with three timesmore breeders than any other state, dropped from 1,221 in 2009 to 745 thisyear, Sacks said. Iowa, Oklahoma, Kansas, Arkansas, Ohio and Indiana havebetween 100 and 300 licensed breeders. Sixteen states have none. Sacks says theUSDA protects animals by making unannounced inspections of breeding facilitiesand by regulating food, care and housing for the animals.
Serina Brant believes her goldenretriever, Ali, was a puppy mill dog. When Brant bought the 4-month-old pup 10years ago from Perfect Pets for $400, Ali’s papers had numbers instead of nameslisted for parents. Her first trip to the vet cost $800 to treat giardia, fleasand eye infections, said Brant, of Littleton, Colo.
Two years later, the dog startedlimping. X-rays showed hip dysplasia. Surgery, at $12,000 for both hips, was anoption but came without guarantees, so Brant chose to medicate the dog instead.Then Ali got arthritis.
For the last six years, Ali has to stopevery 50 feet to rest. Because of the medication, “we don’t think she’s inpain,” said Brant. But over the years, the medicine has totaled $8,600.
“I am not going to put a dog downjust because she’s defective. We have the money to provide for her so wewill,” she said.
But next time she gets a dog, Brantsays, she’ll adopt one from a shelter.
LOS ANGELES — More puppies are sold atpet stores during the holiday season than any other time of year. Now theAmerican Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and other groups arestepping up efforts to stop these sales, saying many of these dogs come frompuppy mills.
Forty billboards in Los Angeles thismonth encourage people to fight puppy mills by boycotting pet stores andwebsites that sell puppies. More than 50,000 people have signed a pledge on theASPCA’s website vowing to uphold the boycott, and the ASPCA has an onlinedatabase of targeted stores at nopetstorepuppies.com encouraging consumers toshop elsewhere. Consumers can also report a store to the ASPCA, and theorganization will verify the source of its puppies, Menkin said.
“We are not just saying `Don’t buya puppy,’ but `Don’t buy anything in a pet store that sells puppies,” saidCori Menkin, senior director of the ASPCA’s anti-puppy mills campaign. “Ifpet stores are not able to turn a profit, they will stop selling puppies.”
The Humane Society of the United States,Best Friends Animal Society and many other groups are promoting similarinitiatives.
As malls and chains drop the commercialsale of puppies, one change for consumers is an increase in convenientlocations for shelter adoptions.
In October, Jack’s Pets announced theywould no longer sell puppies at their 27 stores in Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana.They are working with shelters to offer in-store adoptions instead. Majorchains like PetSmart Inc. and Petco Animal Supplies Inc. stopped selling dogs andcats several years ago, partnering with local shelters and rescues on weekendadoption events. Best Friends has helped several traditional pet stores convertto shelter sales.
Macerich Co., a regional shopping mallcompany, recently announced a ban on traditional pet stores at its 70 malls.Instead, at the company’s mall in Lakewood, Calif., shoppers will find a storecalled Adopt & Shop, which gets its animals from the Southeast Area AnimalControl Authority shelter. On Nov. 25, the store celebrated its 500th adoption,said Aimee Gilbreath, executive director of Found Animals, the organizationthat runs and subsidizes Adopt & Shop.
Some pet store owners say they’re beingunfairly maligned.
Jens Larsen, who owns Perfect Pets inLittleton, Colo., is on the ASPCA list and says it’s not right. He has been inbusiness for 18 years, sold 1,600 puppies last year and has an A-plus ratingwith the Better Business Bureau. He gets 80 percent of his dogs from commercialbreeders in Nebraska, 10 percent from breeders in Kansas and Oklahoma and 10percent from two Colorado breeders, he said.
Some animal activists are “radicaland fanatical and want to put me out of business,” he said. “I obeythe law. So do my breeders and the kennels I deal with,” Larsen said.
Larsen says that when you are selling100 puppies a month, there will occasionally be a case of kennel cough or aparasite, and every once in a while, something more serious. But he believes ifhis dogs were continually getting sick, word would spread and he’d be out ofbusiness.
About 2 million puppies are sold onlineand in U.S. pet stores every year, said Menkin.
The ASPCA and other animal welfaregroups have popularized a negative image of commercial dog breeders in recentyears, claiming that poor breeding practices and substandard conditions leavesome animals with chronic physical ailments, genetic defects or fear of humans.
Whether it’s the impact of bad publicityor the recession cutting into purebred dog sales, the number of commercial dogbreeders licensed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture is declining, from3,486 in 2009, to 2,904 in 2010 and 2,205 in 2011, according to USDA spokesmanDave Sacks said.
Licenses in Missouri, with three timesmore breeders than any other state, dropped from 1,221 in 2009 to 745 thisyear, Sacks said. Iowa, Oklahoma, Kansas, Arkansas, Ohio and Indiana havebetween 100 and 300 licensed breeders. Sixteen states have none. Sacks says theUSDA protects animals by making unannounced inspections of breeding facilitiesand by regulating food, care and housing for the animals.
Serina Brant believes her goldenretriever, Ali, was a puppy mill dog. When Brant bought the 4-month-old pup 10years ago from Perfect Pets for $400, Ali’s papers had numbers instead of nameslisted for parents. Her first trip to the vet cost $800 to treat giardia, fleasand eye infections, said Brant, of Littleton, Colo.
Two years later, the dog startedlimping. X-rays showed hip dysplasia. Surgery, at $12,000 for both hips, was anoption but came without guarantees, so Brant chose to medicate the dog instead.Then Ali got arthritis.
For the last six years, Ali has to stopevery 50 feet to rest. Because of the medication, “we don’t think she’s inpain,” said Brant. But over the years, the medicine has totaled $8,600.
“I am not going to put a dog downjust because she’s defective. We have the money to provide for her so wewill,” she said.
But next time she gets a dog, Brantsays, she’ll adopt one from a shelter.
City of Newport Beach Pet Store Puppy Mill Cruelty 