pet connection

I don’t know how many times and in how many ways we have to say this:

If you buy a puppy from a pet store, you are supporting a system of cruelty that has been well-documented again and again and again for more than 50 years. You, yes you, are making puppy mills possible.

Grow up. Take responsibility for your actions. And say NO to puppy mills by buying directly from a reputable, ethical breeder or adopting from a shelter or rescue group. There is no excuse for supporting cruelty with your puppy-mill retail outlet purchase.

This year’s first installment of No Christmas Puppies (click for all our past posts, going back for years), courtesy of MSNBC.com:

After an eight-month investigation, the Humane Society of the United States accused Petland, the national pet store chain, of selling dogs bred under appalling conditions at puppy mills around the country.

The animal protection group made the charges at a news conference in Washington Thursday. The investigation involved 21 Petland stores and dozens of breeders and brokers. The Petland stores are being supplied by large-scale puppy mills, although customers are routinely informed that the dogs come only from good breeders, the Humane Society said.

We write about this every year. Nothing will stop this sick and cruel mass-production of puppies except for customers to not support this industry. No reputable, ethical breeder sells through a third party. Not ever. And no reputable, ethical breeder ships from Internet sites to people who place an order with a few clicks and a credit card. Not ever.

Talk to me about how you love your pet-store puppy and you’d better stand back because I am going to singe your eyebrows off.

I’m glad you are taking good care of your puppy-mill purchase. I’m glad you love her. I’m glad you haven’t had the health and behavior problems that are rampant in these carelessly bred, unsocialized dogs. How nice for you, and for your one dog.

But don’t expect me to sign off on your behavior, because I will never let you off the hook for dooming thousands of dogs to a brutal lives in crap-filled wired cages exposed to the elements because you wanted that puppy in the window. Not ever.

People who run puppy mills are heartless bastards. And they wouldn’t be in business without buyers.

If you’re one of those buyers, shame on you.

Update: More from the HSUS on their Petland investigations. If you are thinking maybe it doesn’t matter where you buy a puppy, you are wrong.

Every animal-advocacy group in the country put out a media release yesterday asking the new president to address the issue most critical to our nation’s very survival:

What kind of dog the first family should get.

For the record, I hope the Obamas get a nice little shelter dog, maybe some kind of mopsy, fuzzy-faced terrier mix. An adult, not a puppy, because a well-chosen adult dog often fits in better and more quickly into busy households, especially those with little dog experience.

Yes, it would be a good thing and a good example. But honestly? I don’t much care beyond that they get a nice dog who fits with their family and brings joy to their lives.

See, the Obamas choice of a family pet ranks about 1,074,037th on my list of things that it’s important for President Obama to be thinking about.

In my own Top 10? Along with the economy, the wars, healthcare and energy independence, I would put food.

Food.

Food.

and then, Food.

To say we are vulnerable to terrorist attack though our food supply is to state the absolute obvious. We don’t even need to have people want to hurt us: It’s already happening, just because of corporate greed, corruption in China and shoddy work from a government that’s supposed to protect us, not industry profits.

Melamine. In pet food, livestock feed, infant formula and heaven know what else. Salmonella, from the over-industrialized food system. Antibiotic resistance, from factory farming.

These issues are so much more important to me than getting the politically correct dog for the adorable Obama daughters.

I’m disappointed with the animal advocacy groups . With the lone exception of the Animal Poison Control Center of the ASPCA (hat tip to the courageous Dr. Steve Hansen of the APCC), they were mostly silent during the pet-food recall and they remain so on the issue of food safety still. A safe food supply effects us all, pets included, and I would hope to see some of them step up and say so.

So let’s all enjoy the photo op moment of the Obamas getting their family dog. And then, let’s move on to something that really matters.

Two years ago, a couple days after Christmas, a girl of 11 or so approached me as I was coming out of Petsmart.

“Do you want a free baby bunny?” she asked. She had been crying, and she held a tiny brown bunny. I talked to her for a few minutes, and figured out — a little reading between the lines — that non-custodial dad had decided at the last minute to give his kid a baby bunny, without a shelter, food or dishes. Custodial mom had nixed this idea, and had driven the kid to Petsmart parking lot to dump the bun.

“If I can’t get rid of it,” said the kid, “mom says to just turn it loose in the parking lot.”

I took the bunny. I didn’t take the urine-soaked cardboard box he’d been living in or the wilted iceberg lettuce that had been standing in for food. Instead, I put the soft little guy on my shoulder and drove home, assuring the girl that her rabbit had found a good home. I’m not sure she really cared, and I am quite sure neither of her idiotic parents did.

Velocity is still with me. I had him neutered and he lives happily on a healthy diet of grass hay and fresh greens.

Heaven knows how many throwaway pets that family has gone through since. Honestly, it makes you wish people had to pass a test to be parents.

I’m thinking of that story because he’s happily munching his favorite meal — beets with the greens left on them — and because over on Lassie Get Help, Luisa has a good post on the same subject, albeit about dogs in particular. Go over and see what the U.S.D.A. believes is a space large enough that “breeding stock” need never leave it. What she says about people not knowing about puppy mills is sadly quite true. Christie and I have both been stunned to realize that many people have no idea. (That’s like how when the Michael Vick thing first broke, a guy I work with said, “I don’t see what’s the big deal. When I was growing up our dog would fight sometimes. Dogs fight, right.” He didn’t realize that this wasn’t a couple of dogs scrapping at a dog park, and he was blissfully unaware of organized dog-fighting.)

None of the regular readers here would buy a pet without any planning — and I surely hope none would support a puppy mill by buying from a pet store or direct-sale Internet puppy site — but if your Web browsing has brought you here because you’re looking for for a last minute gift … please stop and think.

Better you should teach your child compassion and responsibility than that living, feeling animals are something to toss into a parking lot because you can’t be bothered. Because it seems to me that a child who grows up with such an attitude isn’t going to look too kindly on the needs of aging parents.

Just saying.

… and don’t buy from a pet-store or direct-sell internet puppy site. From Newsweek:

Some of [the dogs] live in rabbit hutches with no heat, no air conditioning, no protection from the elements. Sometimes they don’t even have a roof over their heads. I’m thinking right now about the puppies in Oklahoma, with the ice storm they’re having. There are dogs right now in puppy mills there that are shivering and huddling close together, trying to stay warm. But as long as they are alive, and producing more puppies, the people running these places don’t care about the suffering.

They don’t care about the suffering. Do you? When you buy a puppy from a pet store or Internet puppy site, you’re making sure this industry continues.

The power to stop puppy mills in in your hands.  Don’t support this cruel industry.

This morning  just after dawn I slipped on the ice in my backyard. Ice. In California. Slipped, fell and landed with an embarassing and somewhat painful splat on my wood deck.

Why was I out on my wood deck in a nightgown, coat and clogs without socks at a little after dawn?

I was waiting for Otter to pee.

Of course, she wasn’t about to do that with me on the ground, and soon I was covered with sweet puppy kisses. I stood up as quickly as I could — not easy, since I was sure I had broken something — and then tried to encourage her to take care of her business.

Please, Otter. Please. Please. But oh no: She had found a leaf instead, and happily retrieved it for me. See? I’m a good puppy retriever? See? See?

What could I say? “Good girl, Otter,” I told her, taking the leaf she offered me. “Now puppy go potty before I freeze to death.”

Why would anyone want to raise a puppy in the winter? Even in California? I’ve long advised against the whole Christmas puppy thing for many reasons, key among them that Christmas puppies are usually available only from puppy-millers (either through pet stores of direct-sale Internet sites) or careless and clueless backyard breeders.

Aside from the philosophical reasons for not supporting such sellers, these puppies are often ill-equipped to be good pets: They’re often unsocialized and more likely to have congenital defects that will plague them throughout their lives. Do you need a neurotic pet with expensive health problems? If that’s no what you want, why not take the trouble to find a shelter or rescue dog from a group with an active foster program, or from a reputable, ethical breeder? No, you can’t whip out a credit card on a whim with these folks, but isn’t getting a pup with a head start worth a little research, effort and patience?

Seriously.  Think about it.

But the practical matters are important, too: It’s flat-out more difficult to raise a puppy when the nights are cold and the days are short. You don’t just throw a puppy outside, after all, you have to house-train them — note the use of the term “house-train” rather then the ill-informed concept of house-breaking. To train, you limit their territory in the house, manage their timing and take them where you want them to go and praising them for getting it right. To break, you punish a puppy for making a mistake she doesn’t understand. How bloody unfair!

And what about the all-important socialization? That’s so much easier in the summer, too, because you can always find people at outdoor tables willing to pet a puppy. (I always take my puppies where people, not dogs are. Socialization needs to be safe before puppy immunizations are complete.) When it’s 40 degrees outside, you’re going to find many people at those outdoor tables. And you can’t take the puppy inside the Starbucks.

Longer days are better for training, too, even though some of that can of course be done inside.

But we’re coping, Otter and me.  It’s just more work and more effort on my part. Otter isn’t really a “Christmas puppy” and she’s not even mine. I’m raising her for a friend, and she’ll go to that friend in April. That’s a lot of responsibility!

But when she does leave me, she’ll have all the basics covered, be healthy, well-trained and well-socialized. No matter how cold it is outide.

Given my druthers, I’d rather raise a puppy in the summer. And so should you.