I wish I could answer your question. I looked around for a few minutes and this is one thing I found. Later, I'll see if I can find anything else. However, I will say I'm a bit dumbfounded by this article. Out of our five lil girls since I was a lil girl myself
we did not register one of them, even though they all came with papers.
Breeders, Brokers And Puppy Mills
by Tom Crowe
For the last several weeks I have been doing a lot of research on the above subject. I am finding out about things I never knew existed. I guess I may have had my head in the sand or, more likely, I’ve been unable to see the forest for the trees. I have had a rude awakening and I intend to do something about what I have discovered. First let me bring you up-to-date with some of the research.
For years I have been aware of puppy mills but never had much thought about their extent until recently. When we first started InfoDog our intentions were to furnish a service to all dog clubs concerning dog shows and other related matters. We soon found ourselves spending a lot more time on the other related matters than we had originally estimated. And now we find InfoDog in a position to be really meaningful as a top website devoted to dogs.
Are you aware there are untold registry bodies for dogs? Organizations providing registration certificates on beautiful parchment paper in gold ink, etc., aside from the AKC and the UKC? To name a few:
CKC - The Continental Kennel Club APR - America’s Pet Registry NAMBR - North American Mixed Breed Registry IAR - International Animal Registry NAPDR - North American Purebred Dog Registry
DRA - Dog Registry of America APR - American Purebred Registry ABDA - American Dog Breeders Association USKC - United States Kennel Club WWKC - World Wide Kennel Club WKC - World Kennel Club
And I don’t know how many more there are out there, but I’ m sure you get the idea. This is big business. Altogether there are millions of dogs registered each year. If your qualifications don’t match the registry to which you apply there is certainly another that will, for a fee of course, that is usually less than the AKC. Mostly they accept whatever the applicant submits.
Wow! The puppy mills can produce whatever kind of pedigree they like. Who cares? The consumer has “papers” and maybe they can start their own breeding kennel. I will tell you straight out I think the purebred dog business as we know it has been “going to hell in a hand basket ever since the end of World War II”.
Tom Crowe is an alarmist. He’s trying to sell something. You bet I am. Listen to this: The setup is the title of this article. The potential breeder is approached by a nice person (the Broker) and assures the breeder that he can sell all of the puppies the breeder can breed at a nice price. The Broker then approaches the pet shops and offers to supply puppies with pedigrees as long as your arm at his price (the broker’s fee). The breeder is now part of the puppy mill triangle.
This nonsense that puppy mills are ALL dirty kennels, with terrible living conditions and starving puppies is not entirely true, BUT, the handling of this cash crop is as matter-of-fact as a field of corn or a pen of hogs. Consider this actual happening. At a Parent Club National Specialty in Eastern Pennsylvania, three seemingly Amish ladies in full Amish dress, were standing at ringside admiring the dogs and chatting with other ringsiders. A short time later they were touring the site trying to buy bitches at a good price. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out their possible mission. They were farmers; that’s their role in life, and they were buying the seeds of a cash crop. It’s easier than plowing. No worry about rain or cold or lack of sunshine or whatever. What could be a better way for a farmer’s wife to supplement the family’s income? The triangle is complete the Breeder, the Broker and the Pet Store. There are hundreds of these Breeders and Brokers, some good and most bad without compassion or regard for the animals. They are just a cash crop.
InfoDog has pledged to fight these injustices to our sport. Registrations are down at the AKC. Magazines are denigrating the finest registry of dogs in the world. Television programs are aimed at the AKC for accepting falsified records and there are insufficient personnel as representatives to check all of the suspects let alone the non-suspects. What are we going to do before owning a registered purebred dog becomes meaningless?
Get involved. We are going to fight to correct the wrongs being perpetrated against our Sport, our Registry and our Puppies. If we join ranks and fight together we can cripple the miscreants. Get on InfoDog’s website and see where you can fit in at
http://www.infodog.com 24-hours-a-day every day of the week.
http://www.infodog.com/news/NewsAug99.htm