Did you read this thread?

Also, some people here seem to forget (or not care) that there are responsible breeders out there: some breeds simply can’t be found in shelters because their breeders do take responsibility for them. While there are exceptions to that rule in every breed undoubtedly, it is next to impossible to locate shelter dogs with some breeds unless you’re just plain lucky. I looked for a long time for a Bearded Collie for my mother after hers died (who had come from a rescue group after being mysteriouly abandonned) and she felt she was ready for another dog: the BCCA rescue groups didn’t have any dogs available; there were none in shelters (who weren’t snapped up as soon as they went online); and I was forced to look into similar breeds (which is where I found my own shelter puppy, an Old English Sheepdog / Aussie mix - mom didn’t want a puppy). Finally, I found a rescue group with a Beardie mix, but it a nearly impossible task.

Unless you’ve been in a situation, you have no business judging anybody. The President did what was best for his daughter and the rest of his family, which is all he should be expected to do.

I wanted you to know I very much appreciate your comments about applying systems thinking to the dog overpopulation problem. I can understand why people bristle at attempts to call dogs “commodities” that are “produced,” but when you are looking at it from a supply chain managemement perspective to FIX THINGS, I see nothing wrong with it.

I work in animal rescue, with several shelters, and I think about this issue a lot. I hate what I see.

I also work in business consulting. I wonder when the day will come that someone, somewhere will find a way to get a 30,000-foot perspective on this problem and give some workable solutions.

Nathan Winograd is off to a good start … if only I could read that book of his. I have tried and tried. I heard him speak, so that helps. I simply cannot get through more than three pages of his book.

Anyway, thanks Tom.

Amy G

Amy

Redding is another hot spot.

The Southland is well known for brokers and importers.

But the central valley has had the puppy mill rep for as long as I can remember. I think that many of the dogs acquired are then bred to “make back” the money spent, but if people actually calculated it out I suspect they’d find that they really don’t make much back!

The central valley’s reputation in some breeds re: puppy mills very poor, to the point that many reputable breeders are hesitant to place to homes there and view almost any inquiry on puppies or breeding with great suspicion. Not fair to the many nice families there but true.

They’re not the big 200-500 dog mills, and they are not licensed. They typically breed one to five breeds with a couple of dozen dogs. The ones which have been visited by people I know were not on the property of farmers or ranchers but in suburbia or even in town. Sometimes on a few acres, sometimes not.

Border collies are easy breeders and whelpers and generally very good moms.. They have a romantic/popular appeal to the general public. I could easily envision people having 3-5 litters a year from two or three breeding females selling pups for a few hundred bucks a piece.

Our breed rescue sees plenty of dogs from the region, both those purchased as pups and also cast off breeding stock.

The problem in asking the breed clubs to somehow control this “trade” is that virtually none of these breeders have ever even thought of joining a club, may use multiple alternate registries or none at all, and really are marketing and reaching a different group of puppy buyers than club members. Most breed club member breeders don’t advertise at all and rely on a network type system to place dogs through the breed clubs.

Our club has been placing ads in newspapers, national dog magazines aimed at the general public, and online to try to reach people before they buy a “bargain” puppy from the paper or on the internet or at a pet store. Education is key. The best way, probably the only definitive way to end the flow of poorly, casually and commercially bred dogs is to dry up the demand for them. If we can convince more people on the “puppy hunt” that they need to demand health screening, personal visits wherein they can view the facilities or home where pups are reared, take back-clauses etc… we can diminish the allure of breeding just a few or many puppies to sell.

Making people aware of what a great deal an already altered, vaccinated, chipped rescue dog is can help too. :)

I cannot speak for all breed clubs and rescues, but in California, ours is deeply concerned about the mass production, and relinquishment, of dogs, our breed or any other.

That is pretty much a given for the regular posters and commenters here. So much so that being lumped in with for-profit breeders never be taken lightly. But everyone here wants to see an end to the killing of adoptable, treatable pets.

It’s also interesting to me that some of the most innovative and successful breed rescues — like Homeward Bound Golden Retriever Rescue here in Northern California — have come out of the ranks of people who “just love golden retrievers,” not people who love them and are also involved in any aspect of competing with them.

To me, it doesn’t matter who helps, as long as we give people places and ways TO help. That, of course, is the central message of “Redemption.”

More later, perhaps … off to bed now.

I will ignore the smoking organics left by the likes of Lis, Jen and Susan, because frankly, they’re all heat and no light. I will say this, and then move on. You don’t know me, and I’m quite satisfied that if you did, you’d understand that your reflexive assumptions, generalizations and snark are misplaced and might better be returned to the respository from whence they emerged. The speed and vigor with which you humped my leg (to mix metaphors) suggests to me that a bit of self-reflection might do you good.

Thanks very much, Christie, for quoting the study findings — now that’s getting somewhere. I will find it online and look forward to the update. I’ll be interested to see how they did it, and how they define categories.

Thanks, too, to Nancy — you-all are ahead of us BC partisans here in the west coast hustings. Off-line, I would like to learn from you how you did your detective work. I will be surprised if we get a lot of “mill” dogs in this neck of the woods (but I’ve been surprised before in thhis work). We do have a lot of our “inventory” (oops! — that’s for you Lis) coming from Central Valley shelters — my guess has always been that there are some farms/ranches who supplement their crops of plants with crops of puppies.

My ultimate point is that shelter killing is a problem for all of us who love dogs. I hope the breed clubs are as involved as you say — although I haven’t seen a lot of evidence of it. And, consistent with Nathan’s book (you might be surprised to see who wrote the review of it in The Bark), it will take creepy systems thinking to get it solved.

There’s someone out there for every homeless adoptable dog but:

-they have to be kept alive and physically and emotionally healthy until their new person finds them, which can take awhile

-their existence has to be broadcast widely enough for their new person to find them (or they need to have an “in” with the Kennedys ;-))

-plus, they have to be protected from certain “elements” who want to kill them to save them

They are completely dependent on us for their very lives. And whether they are an AKC purebred or not is totally irrelevant.