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Originally Posted by bondai  That would be true if I were talking a bout a large scale breeding operation. I am actually talking about a family having a litter of pups, nothing sinister going on here. |
Someone gave the statistics at one time, and the number of dogs backyard breeders produce exceeds the number of dogs commercial breeders produce. There are millions of backyard breeders. The really bad thing is backyard breeders don't do health testing, at least some of the puppy mills because of lemon laws are doing health testing. It's in their best business interest to produce healthy dogs. Backyard breeders aren’t affected by lemon laws in most states, so they have little incentive to produce health dogs. Also, they tend to sell to other want-a-be breeders and they in turn breed more genetically sick dogs. Many genetic illness aren’t seen till after the second year and the byb’s have already produced a few litters.