The fellow breeders that belong to my club say that if they keep it quiet and you don't jump to try to get a license, you'll be fine. The truth is that USDA knows where everybody is and if you don't believe me check who has been in your website. Look for the USDA department of operations. Yes, they have been to your website and they know what dogs you have and how many litters you breed. If I'm not mistaken, this is getting into a harassment issue. Sounds familiar???? yes, pretty much like the IRS scandal.

For all of you who are so against any new legislation, (I am too, by the way) what are your thoughts, suggestions for the overpopulation of dogs in this country???

I am on the other end of this mess, doing more rescue than I would like, can afford or have room for!! And wishing that I had more time and more money for my Labs.

I am very involved in rescue, education of children and policy writing for our local shelter and we've been at this for years with no huge change!! So I'm asking, what do you all suggest?? It's a sad, expensive problem and perhaps responsible breeders have an answer?

These laws are being written and pushed into legislation by people who are holding litter after litter after litter of unwanted puppies while they are euthanized! Believe me when you have done that, you stop and think, it's heart wrenching!

Anyway, constructive thoughts and ideas only. Bitching between "sides" doesn't work so don't bother venting.

Thanks for your time.

There are no easy solutions. Even the best dogs sometimes find themselves homeless due to financial or legal circumstances. Here are a few thoughts, a start on this issue.

Both the puppy buyers /adopters and the breeders or rescues have to be aware that keeping a dog in its home forever involves making the right choices and commitments. Puppy buyers or adopters cannot adopt with the idea that the dog is disposable and manage to keep down the number of dogs needing rescue. It does no good to go adopt a puppy farm "Lab" to be a house dog if the pup was raised in a dark bark stall, even seeing people or the sky or hearing household noises. Although the pups can adjust, even the pup raised in a run with a dog house and no grass, just concrete, is developmentally disadvantaged compared to a puppy with plenty of enrichment.

Breeding a dog with a bad temperament, one that is not friendly to dogs and people, is bad. Temperament and behavior are not just environmental but also hereditary, to a great extent. How many of us see a puppy from our line elsewhere, even just from a shipped collection, and see the behavioral quirks of a sire or great grandsire, hopefully a heart warming quirk?

The vets and rescuers who mouth the platitudes that it is not the breed but the owners, in the case of fighting bred dogs, are not engaging their brains. I have a real problem with the vets who think that. I remember a nursing pit puppy rescued with his dam from an inner city shelter. When he grew up, he first killed one household cat, then another, then the other house dog. The owners wisely realized that they or their kids were next, and they euthanized him, to the rescue's horror. They were not bad owners, and not all pits are aggressive but this one was probably from generations of psychopaths or at least very aggressive dogs who wanted to kill. Conversely, I have seen the dogs with whip marks on them dumped because they would not fight, even when whipped so badly that they had permanent scars down their bodies--those pits are more the old style Petey in temperament.

We as breeders of Labrador Retrievers need to remember that even a Lab can be aggressive with dogs and people, and we should not excuse true aggression. Believe me, as a rescuer, a champion or FC Lab with aggression issues is even more dangerous than a street-bred fighting pit because he will not be treated with the caution needed to handle him safely around people or dogs.

The rescuers shipping temperamentally defective and developmentally delayed puppy mill survivors around the country are not helping, but these dogs get recycled if they come off the transport and don't make it in the mail order or internet adopting home. Are they counted twice or three times in the revolving door of rescue? Trucking dogs around isn't good rescue, but holding in a foster home and evaluating, much as the rescue of the Potomac seems to do, is the way to go. That way a square peg is not put into a round hole or wrong home, or at least the chances of it are decreased by a great deal.

Thanks, Rescue mom, for the questions. Who else wants to jump in with thoughtful points? I don't have the answer. Education of owners and their children helps. A disposable society, where even children are thrown out, doesn't help.

The over population problem in the country as a whole is a myth. There are shelter over population problems and many times these shelters are horribly mismanaged or there are other factors in that specific community that needs to be addressed. The economy also plays a big factor as well.

The numbers of shelter animals dying each year has gone down considerably in the past few decades while the number of pets and available homes in this country has risen. It was estimated in the 1980s that as many as 20 million dogs and cats were euthanized. Today that number is only 3 to 4 million. Then you must look at the type of animals euthanized. The majority of them are feral cats. Feral cats do not make good pets and can be a problem if they are not controlled as they breed litter after litter without interference from humans. Trap, neuter, release (TNR) are very effective programs if you have the volunteers and the funding to allow the cats to be handled. If not many are just trapped and euthanized. Other animals that are included in the numbers are old, ill, or aggressive animals that owners can not afford to have put down or treated by a veterinarian. So that leaves less adoptable pets that are put down. Back to the shelter problems and the economy. There is a huge feral dog problem in Detroit as many of the residents who left the dying city also left their animals behind as well. In Los Angeles, a recent documentary estimated that there were 30,000 feral dogs that run the streets of South Central (very poor community). There are volunteers that help with outreach and try to educate and spay/neuter in these poorer areas. But it is truly a regional thing and this is where many of the problems are. It's not every shelter, every city and every state that has a huge over population of adoptable animals as some lead us to believe. If this was true why are shelters importing hundreds of thousands of street dogs from other countries each year? (CDC estimates between 300,000-500,000/per year)

And back to blaming breeders for this problem, just look at the majority of animals in the shelters. Cats? There are not that many purebred cat breeders (and less than 2% of purebred cats are commercially bred so they don't really add to the problem either for those who want to blame commercial breeders) and last time I went to my shelter, there were no purebred cats there (I rarely see a remotely purebred cat so the 25% of shelter animals are purebred don't apply here).

So where do these animals come from? There are many reasons and sadly not an easy solution, but for all those humaniacs that cry stop the breeders, stop the breeders, they truly aren't interested in fixing the problem. They'd rather blame than come up with solutions. BREEDERS ARE NOT THE PROBLEM! Many small breeders do rescue as well as breed. This is across the board for ALL breeds. I have done rescue for my breeds and helped out with other breed rescues from time to time. I always call giving back. I do not blame the former owner. Situations change and I'm always happy to be there for a dog to help rehome it if necessary. This is and always has been the main reason of what shelters were for to begin with.

Spay/neuter programs work (but not mandatory spay/neuter). The ASPCA estimates that 78% of dogs are already spayed or neutered. That's pretty good and that is the main reason why the euthanasia numbers plummeted.

We've also seen a rather sick turn lately in that the promotion of owning and adopting a dog and it has become morally superior to that of owning a purebred. I, like so many others, own purebreds for many reasons that a shelter a dog would not fit. But now the Animal Rights are running off and closing down legitimate businesses in favor of opening stores that sell only shelter dogs. I thought this was America? Where is our choice and our rights? In Los Angeles, they passed mandatory spay/neuter but gave a breeder exemption. The breeders who showed or worked their dogs probably thought the exemptions were fair in that you had to prove you belonged to a club, your dogs were registered, you earned titles, etc. Five years later and your exemptions are gone along with your right to breed. The Hollywood crowd, lead by Animal Rights, said do away with the 3 legitimate businesses in town that sold puppies too. No purebreds are now allowed to bred or sold in the city of LA. But get this, with a large street dog population, the new director of Animal Control says if we get in pregnant females, we will let them have puppies and sell the puppies to increase revenue.

Yes, it's happening folks. The puppy buying public can no longer have a choice of what breed of puppy they'd like to buy in Los Angeles. It's a shelter puppy or nothing. Talk about creating a monopoly for the shelter industry. And it's not just LA anymore, San Diego just passed a ban and Oceanside is next. Now that the APHIS rules have been so prominent and in the forefront. Our classification as a retail pet store will fit nicely into the bans on pet stores selling puppies. Think about that for a while.

The solution is to ban the big breeders; the ones that have 200 dogs and produce 100 litters a year, internet only sells, and pet shop sells, not regulating them. What good does it make for the overpopulation to make sure the parents are in a clean human environment. If any they are going to produce more unwanted puppies because the moms are healthier.

There are two things to consider here, one is regulating how people treat their breeding dogs (which is what this rule does) and another thing is controlling the generation of thousands and thousands of puppydoodles that will end up in a shelter.

I breed 5-6 litters a year and I will take any of my puppies back and keep or re-home if needed. None of my puppies shall ever end up in a shelter; neither I need to be regulated to keep my dogs happy and healthy.

This new rule is affecting the small/medium size breeders. The big breeders (over lets say 50 dogs) are unaffected and so are the backyard breeders that breed substandard puppies. Those are the ones that need to be banned.

One way to indirectly affect the big puppy farms is to ban pet shops, as in places that re-sell animals. These places aren't residential/agriculture properties where the breeder sells what they breed.

Eliminate re-sale of pets and pet brokers and the problem is gone, but no one seems to think that that is the problem or they don't want to touch the big money generators for uncle Sam.

Unfortunately the title "breeder" seems to be a romantic notion for those who have no business doing it. So, yes, breeders are the problem. In this tight economy Mr. Joe Anybody can fancy himself as a breeder, breed whatever comes in his yard, do little or nothing to increase the health and well being of his litters, advertise them as some kind of exotic dog, charge top dollar to Mrs. Anybody who wants a puppy to shut her kids up for the weekend, care not a bit where that puppy ends up and if it is eventually spayed or neutered!!!! Multiply that by a million and bam.........

Perhaps responsible breeders need to be a bit more judgmental about who should be breeding rather than worry that legislation designed to go after the crappy breeders will eventually shut them down too? Somewhere along the line, the knack of breeding needs to be left up to those who know something about it. And I don't know how you would go about doing that. I think that educating the public far more about responsible breeding and not being afraid to compare yourself to Mr. Anybody in an effort to illustrate the differences might be a start.

The problem of homeless pets is a complex problem; economic, lack of education, yes, shelter mismanagement, being members of a throwaway society etc. But when we are euthanizing puppies who haven't even had the chance to be screwed up by some idiot, that's a whole other problem!!!!

Homeless pets is NOT a myth. In my small county alone, over 4,000 dogs were euthanized in 2012!!

Still don't know the answers but thanks for great thoughts.......

You do realize that commercial breeders only account for about 5% of all the purebreds produced in this country right?

You do realize that less than 25% of all shelter dogs are even remotely purebred?

You obviously did not read my posts. You are really out of touch with your blame breeders for the pet over population myth. Me thinks you are not a breeder. And if you are and you breed 5-6 litters a year, what if some people think that's too many and make it a law where you can only breed 1 or 2?

We really need to stop cutting off our nose to spite our face. We are all breeders. We breed according to what *WE* feel is moral and ethically correct. It doesn't make *us* right and it certainly doesn't mean we have to force our morals and ethics on other people. After all, isn't that what the Animal Rights nuts are doing? They want all breeding to stop. They feel that breeding is morally and ethically wrong period!

Believe me I'm really worried with all these rules and anti-breeding legislation. I'm a breeder and I'm the first to go and sign all the petitions and follow legislative alerts. I'm trying to make sense of the sight unseen rule, or there is no sense to it at all?

I hate putting numbers, but it is the only way I can see to separate the purpose of breeding. notice I don't say breeders.

To make my point then, the overpopulation has nothing to do with breeders? I don't see feral dogs breeding by them self, so who is breeding the thousands of dogs that are at the shelters? Somebody has to breed them?

I don't want to get into the very few feral dogs or imported dog theory. where is the big mass of mix breed coming from?

Is USDA/Peta/AR making the for profit shelters a new way to get money? That is sick!

How about applying common sense to this, yes the elusive common sense! IF the problem is shipping sick/ill/defective puppies sight unseen to unsuspecting pet owners who are then stuck with no recourse, and a sick puppy, why not legislate a required contract with a significant penalty for non-compliance?

Suggested contract language that must be signed by both parties prior to sale could read something like this ~> "IF the puppy is shipped, not picked up in a face-to-face transaction, the Seller of puppyX guarantees puppyX to be healthy and supplies Purchaser with a veterinary certificate of health done within 24hrs of shipping, Purchaser of said puppyX agrees to take puppyX to veterinarian within 24hrs of shipping for a wellness exam. Should puppyX fail the Purchaser's Veterinarian wellness exam, ex a genetic, congenital issue or disease is observed, then Seller guarantees return shipping back to Seller at their expense with full purchase price refunded by FedEx Bank check within 48hrs of receiving puppy back."

This wording would be REQUIRED in all contracts of sale and the penalty to the person who does not do it would be substantial, say $10-20K for a first time offender? Yes, got your attention didn't it!!

It could potentially accomplish a variety of things, starting with making people responsible for what they produce, make a veterinarian (not an untrained pet owner) responsible for determining health of puppy, and the penalty is steep enough to get people's attention, the penalty is a contractual issue which then becomes a court issue. APHIS does not have the capacity/personnel to inspect and enforce and with government cutbacks this takes the need for hiring additional people away, but does not put the animal in jeopardy.

Just my 2cents.

So in this country, the land of the free and the home of the brave, you feel you should take people's rights away? The right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?

I have to laugh because the type of people you describe don't consider themselves a breeder to begin with.

Please show me statistics on how many of this type of breeders do this? How many puppies they produce on purpose? How many of them end up in the shelters? I feel there may be some oops breeding and lack of knowledge about canine reproduction. Many pet owners don't have a clue about how dogs reproduce. But regardless of if they are breeders or have a purebred litter, studies have shown that people who pay over a certain amount for their dogs are more likely to keep them.

Forcing your biased opinions on the general public hurt the good people because those who don't follow the laws already are not going to follow more.

And you're biased because you work in the shelters. I will give it to you that it is not an easy task, but blaming breeders is just plain wrong. Blaming irresponsible dog owners or even those who are not knowledgeable about canine reproduction just shows the need for more education, not laws.



Um, no, we are not the ones who need force our often times narrow views on all. There are good breeders of all size and scope and purpose.

The Animal Rights Groups love to say this as it keeps us judgmental and fractured into our own little groups, thumbing our noses at others who do things differently. You want more rules because you want to try to legislate responsibility. Guess what? Legislating responsibility DOES NOT WORK. It only hurts those who are already responsible. There are plenty of laws on the books now that can't be enforced as it is. Adding more only bogs the system down even further and it won't stop people who are irresponsible in the first place.

And what is your definition of a crappy breeder, an irresponsible breeder? I would imagine that this would be different depending on who you talk to.

Breeders need to unite. We are in the fight to preserve our rights. Dogs are still our property and we own them. What we want to do with them (within the existing laws) is our rights. When you start taking away those rights from some, pretty soon the rest of us will be swept right along with it. PLEASE SEE WHAT IS HAPPENING IN LOS ANGELES AND SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA!

Dogs are not humans, they are not furkids, four legged kids. We are not their parents. Animal lovers have humanized them far too much, but they do not get human rights! They are still dogs and they are just as happy living in packs in kennel situations.



And yes, it's sad that puppies are dying. But whose responsible? Why aren't they being placed, marketed? Sounds like a shelter mismanagement/lack of volunteers, etc. But you're becoming bitter and emotional over this (rightly so) and this is how bad laws get passed. I do not know where these puppies come from. The street? An irresponsible owner whose dog got out or a dog came under the fence? A breeder who couldn't sell a litter? I don't know. Show me stats on where your puppies come from? I remember a shelter in Idaho (if I remember correctly) who had an ad on Craigslist asking to buy puppies!! They did not have enough puppies already and were paying $25 per pup. What law would you pass that would stop this? Any? Feral dogs and cats breed regardless of laws and without any human oversight. All too often we see something that pulls our heartstrings and we say this needs to stop and that's how bad laws gets passed. People don't think, they don't see where the problems are. They don't work with the people in that community to help fix it. But it's also life. It's not always fair and it will continue to happen regardless of laws.



I didn't say homeless pets were a myth. They exist every where. I stated the country's pet over population was a myth. And I have the facts to back that up.

One thing you failed to mention is the break down of dogs that were euthanized in your shelter. I look at the break downs of why these dogs are put down. In my county, they put down 50 dogs due to space for the entire year! The numbers of dogs euthanized overall was a bit higher but the breakdowns were telling. Some were euthanized because they were came in or were brought in with illness or injury or due to age. Some were euthanized because they were too aggressive to place. Same with the Los Angeles numbers I looked at. When you look at the bigger picture, numbers aren't always as they seem. It also doesn't take into account the hundreds of thousands of imported strays brought into this country from outside the US. San Diego alone imports more than 10,000 dogs a year from Mexico.

It is a complex issue. Great strides have been made, but there will always be a need for shelters. People's situations change, they move, they die, they get new jobs. But as of late, sheltering is becoming a big business is certain parts of the country. They are setting up shop in parking lots, importing dogs, take their money and hand them off to their new owners, and are gone. If the dog, that hasn't had time to be properly screened, doesn't work out, they are taken to a local shelter. Some shelters are opening pet stores and selling puppies and kittens there. Where they are coming from who knows? Rescues drive them across country where the animals stay in small crates in their own filth for several days or more. How is that better than the substandard breeders? There is no easy answer, but it seems that the breeders are the ones who are getting all the blame.

How much does the dog over population issue have to do with the Human over population issue? Do they go hand in hand? Lots of insightful information being shared here, I hope it is heard beyond this message board. I for one breed and believe in good breeders. How do other countries deal with this issue and what are the success there?

Susan, thank you for your insight and common sense. The problem is there was no common sense used when writing these rules. They were 10 years in the making by the radical animals rights groups. The Doris Day Animal League sued the USDA to force them to pass more rules in the AWA.

If common sense was used, they would have looked at statistics. Very few were used. It was based on a few anecdotal, oh I bought a puppy online and it was sick kind of thing. I've shipped a few dogs/puppies and they were always healthy. I'm sure many other breeders do as well.

The ironic thing about the rules is that dogs/puppies being shipped must have a health certificate signed by a veterinarian. Where as in a face to face sale, it does not. So please tell me, who is better qualified to determine the health of a puppy, a veterinarian or a pet owner? I rest my case.

We should all be worried. This goes way beyond just passing laws to try to eliminate a country wide myth. It is about controlling and eliminating all breeders.

The HSUS holds workshops and legislation days where they teach people who to better advocate for these overly restrictive laws. They go to the state capitals and even county lawmakers to lobby for their new laws. The language in these laws are very detetrimental and appeal to emotion rather than logic or actual facts.

To know what's going on, you need to know the tactics of these groups. They are well-organized and well-funded. They appeal to the emotion of all animal lovers (including some breeders). All under the guise of helping animals. But make no mistake. They lump all breeders together. They don't say I know there are some small breeders who are responsible and reputable so these laws won't hurt them. Nope, to them we are all those nasty substandard breeders they show photos over and over of. They work by passing more and more restrictive laws that make it harder to breed by taking away choice and making it more expensive. Sound familiar?

We also can't forget about the PUPS bill that is still looming that targets breeders that have even one litter. Is this what we want?

I am already regulated and inspected as a hobby breeder. I don't need federal oversight. In fact I don't need any, but when this permit system went into effect a handful of elitist breeders got together and agreed with the growing animal rights movement at the time. We wanted to stick it to those bad breeders right? All it got us was fees, fees and more fees. To have my 5 dogs it costs me $65/year per dog plus $275/year for the permit. I don't even hardly breed. My dogs don't get loose. They don't cause a nuisance in the neighborhood. I don't need the animal control for anything. And yet I pay $600 a year just to have my dogs. Does this seem fair?



Wait you haven't see feral dogs breeding? I have. No one owns them, they reproduce just fine without us. I know some people still haven't spayed or neutered their dogs and those dogs have puppies. They can't give them away in public here any more so what else do they do with them? Most of the dogs in the shelters that are up for adoption are young adult dogs that haven't been trained and are relinquished for a variety of reasons. The number one reason is the owners must move. But the majority of dogs in the shelters are not purposely bred. I prefer the term random bred. This is why it is difficult to ascertain what breed or mix they are. So many haven't seen a purebred in its background for generations. And then back to my theory of the poorer areas have more dogs because they can't afford to or in some cultures/mentality, you ain't cutting my dog's balls off!



And why not? It's becoming a big part of the equation. With less and less of local shelter dogs available and more and more demand, they have to bring them in from somewhere.



It's not these groups that are making the profit, it's the shelters themselves. The Animal Rights Group help feed the demand by vilifying all breeders and pushing shelter animals. With slogans like, "buy one, kill one", "adopt, don't shop" garbage, shelters are opening stores and allowing pregnant strays to have puppies so they can increase their revenues.

I did read once that the pet over population has dramatically come down in the last 20 years. I do also believe that there is no pet overpopulation any more. There can be some counties that have too many unwanted pets, but it is not the general rule.

Nathan Winograd, founder of the No-kill movement, has a book out called "Redemption, The Pet Over-population Myth." And while Nathan is no friend of breeders (he prefers mixed breeds and doesn't care of breeds are maintained), he does present some very good perspectives of what is now going on in this country with sheltering. He has taken high kill shelters and turned them into no-kill shelters while maintaining open doors.

The big spay/neuter push and better education has definitely brought down euthanasia rates. There is still work to do, but with the hijacking of the animal rights movement, the push is now to do away with all breeding. They say we exploit our dogs, force them to breed blah, blah, blah and therefore it is ethically and morally wrong.

There is some hope. There are some good groups that are forming to teach us how to fight for our rights and counter-act the animal rights and their propaganda. NAIA (National Animal Interest Alliance) and other owner rights groups are growing and holding workshops to teach us how to protect our rights. The AKC has a Government Relations Department that will speak at your Kennel Club meetings as well as other workshops in conjunction with these groups.

Letter writing campaigns are great, but if we continue to use the same language as those in support of anti-breeding laws, the message will get counted as the same. This is why we need to learn to fight. Stop the infighting with each and learn how to fight the animal rights groups. But it goes much deeper than just letters.

NAIA has a huge conference coming up in FL this year. I hope it is well attended. The one from last year was most informative. We need to become more proactive. Got to legislation days. Meet our elected officials and discuss with them why these laws will hurt us and educate them about the animal rights groups. NAIA needs funding though and this is where we fail as compared to animal rights groups. We just aren't that well funded or organized. I see it changing though and I see us finally standing up to them and putting them out of business!

I loved your post! Well done.

Another two great posts! We needed to all unite and stop tearing down the designer breeders and other breeders. Divided we fell.

If ALL people shipping puppies had done this or we wouldn't be in this situation. The puppies should also have a mandatory fecal and a good vet check for hearts, eyes, ears, condition and joints, not just fill out paperwork.

This is the law the USDA should have passed if they wanted to stop the sale of sick puppies and it is too late.

These so called "radical animal rights groups" are NOT talking about responsible breeders and you all know it!!!!!!!

When have you EVER seen a picture of a clean whelping box full of well fed puppies laying with a well fed mama in a clean kennel, quiet outbuilding or someone's dining room?????? NEVER!!!! The pictures are of sickly puppies and poorly fed mamas in filthy, isolated conditions!!!

And no, these groups do not want all breeders to go away! Rescue groups have an invaluable resource in good, open minded breeders. FAR more than 5% of the dogs in the shelters are "purebred" according to the "breeders" who dump them because their "situation changed", they got sick of the puppies, didn't have buyers, ran out of money for food etc....... And yes, irresponsible breeders DO fancy themselves as breeders! They have a captive audience in an uneducated public and they aim to capitalize on that. Just because dogs don't come into a shelter or other dumping ground with all the necessary paperwork doesn't mean that someone didn't purposely breed them as "purebreds".

The breakdown of dogs who were euthanized in my shelter in 2012? Only 7% of them were deemed unadoptable due to illness, injury or behavior!!

Saying we have no right to police our own is a crock of crap!!! Because we haven't, others have, and now we're unhappy about that!! Perhaps if we had offered the legislation, we wouldn't be at this point.

Where are you Rescue Mom? Are you in the southeastern US or where that your shelters are like this?

I wish it were that easy. A number of years ago, I was talking to a guy about proposed legislation in NJ. I said this sort of legislation was the work of animal rights groups and it needed to be stopped. He replied, "Well, this is not all that bad. If we let them have this, maybe they will be satisfied and this will end." Wow! Nice guy, but very naive. As I have stated in the past, this is one small step, not the ultimate goal.

Giving up our rights in the hopes of controlling others is foolhardy.

Yep, NC!

Let me remind those who are thinking it is not so bad, the rule will have those of us who occasionally breed but mostly rescue reconsider taking in other folks' problems or castoffs. All we'd have to do is have an extra girl here before she gets spayed and there is an anonymous complaint, even if we never ever ship, except that one time maybe we give a pup to a relative. SLAM! Our little tiny breeding program is gone, decreed in violation and not for preservation of our breeding line not accepted by that one inspector. If Rescue Mom thinks it is bad now, it will get worse when the northern breed rescues stop helping, stop even sending rescue funds, let alone taking dogs. Some of us have already cut back and do more "virtual rescue" than taking dogs in, because we can't risk an extra dog at home.

Thanks, Rescue Mom, for sharing your perceptions. They are the reality I know, too, from being involved in rescue work.

I've owned both purebred Labs and rescue Labs. And while, generally speaking,
the purebreds have been easier to handle, justice demands that we
give the increasing number of rescue dogs our homes and our attention. Agreed - we cannot turn a blind-eye to these animals simply because of their problems.


Agreed - more importantly, we need ideas on how to end poor dog breeding practices. How can this issue be resolved outside of the Federal government?

Food for thought and thanks to all for sharing!

This is not true, the number of homeless dogs at shelters has dramatically decrease in the last 20 years.

This seems to be your mantra, excuse for looking away, don't know....... But we are still euthanizing FAR too many dogs in this country and a HUGE part of those dogs are coming from irresponsible breeders!!!

Sad....... Wish I had the answers......

Maybe this is a dumb idea, but I have wondered what would happened if ALL breeders simply had to microchip all of their pups and register them with HomeAgain or whatever agency in their own names. Then when a puppy/dog is found as a stray, the chip is scanned and the breeder has to take the pup back. They could then locate the owner. There would be no shelters, breeders would have to do their own sheltering, no matter what kind of breeder they are. Local counties would continue to do kennel inspections for health and basic care, they also would give the fines or whatever as needed. Maybe this idea is simplistic, but breeders have to be responsible for what they produce. Over the years, I've taken 3 pups I've bred back to our home and found great homes for them. The situations were allergies, job loss, and a divorce. I as the breeder was responsible.

I agree about a more thorough vet check prior to shipping, but ultimately, it's between the buyer and breeder, not the government.

Wrong again, The hundred of pets that are still coming to the shelters every months are coming from irresponsible owners. You are punishing breeders for irresponsible owners that dump their dogs, no matter where they came from.
It is like blaming Ford or Toyota because somebody hit your dog, or a gun manufacturer because a crazy man shoot a bunch of innocent people.

I like this idea best of all!

Actually, it's both irresponsible breeders AND irresponsible owners. The breeders need to be sure the owners understand (e.g. sign a contract) that if they cannot keep the puppy/dog FOR ANY REASON AT ANY AGE, the puppy/dog goes back to the breeder to be re-homed. Period.

Dogs that are not being actively shown in conformation or actively competing in performance events should be spayed/neutered.

Those two actions could help significantly reduce the number of dogs in shelters.

I found the following article that makes a TON of sense:

http://www.pet-law.com/articles/36

A couple of observations while reading it:

1.) There are no REAL national statistics on animals euthanized in shelters (Why not? If this is such a problem, shouldn't we be tracking the numbers? How can we say there is a problem, or how big the problem is without any data to support it? I can't believe that lawmakers are passing laws based on "observations" with no data to back them up!)

2.) Lays out the case pretty well for where the pets come from that are found in shelters and what has worked to reduce the numbers in the past

3.) Actually provides solutions to the problem that have been proven to be effective and shows why laws DO NOT WORK. It is very hard to argue with the information presented in this article.