Sometime last year, I caught an episode of
The Oprah Winfrey show which had me tearing up badly at the end of the show. They did a feature on
puppy mills. If you're a dog-lover (in fact, as long as you have a heart, it would really bother you too), you'd be angry at the thought of puppy mills.
Puppy mills are what you would call puppy factories, where they "manufacture" puppies for pet stores and breeders to make a very quick and easy buck. Dogs are acquired (many a time dog-napped from homes) for one purpose, and one purpose only, and that is to breed with other dogs. Female dogs are made to breed, give birth and nurse puppies almost every year of their lives (many of them do not live a long life, and are ridden with tumours on their nipples due to over-nursing). These dogs are kept in very small cages, often stacked on top of each other to save space, and most of them never had their paws touch the ground. There was a footage in the show where a dog, which was rescued from a puppy mill, could not even walk properly on the tiled floor. Simply because it had no idea how to.
You may not know this, but many pet stores acquire puppies from puppy mills. The pups may seem really adorable in the glass window, but many of them would suffer from psychological issues, and you wouldn't even know until you bring them home.
If you were to ask someone where the cheapest place to get a puppy, especially a pure-bred one, high chances are that they will tell you to buy from Thailand. Puppies from Thailand are notorious for being incredibly cheap. You can purchase a pure-bred Labrador at only 2000 baht, which is about RM200. Pet stores sell them at around RM1000.
I didn't think much of this until I saw how these dogs were sold. My cousin
Bea and I went on a holiday to Bangkok a few weeks ago, and when we were at Chatuchak Market, we headed to a section where people were selling pets and pet supplies. When I saw how the pups were caged and sold, it broke my heart.
Many of the sellers hold a hairdryer and a steel-toothed comb in their hands, blowing air onto the puppies, making their fur look cute and poofy.
See the golden Labrador pup on the right? He was quite the inquisitive and cheeky lil' fella. He was originally sitting on the left cage, but managed to walk over the rest of the pups and climbed to the right cage. He also managed to climb over the right cage, but fell onto the floor letting out a yelp. The guy who fed him water (see previous photo) yanked him back by his tail, causing the pup to yelp even more, carried him by the neck, and literally threw him back into the cage.
Even birds for sale are not spared. Look at the sheer number of them in just one cage. It's simply inhumane.
If you would like a puppy, kitten, etc why not adopt one from your local
RSPCA instead? You would be doing those poor fellas a huge favour by giving them a good home. The RSPCA neuters/spays and vaccinates them, so you wouldn't have to worry about it. When the dogs are not adopted after a while, they would, sadly, be put to sleep. After all, there is only so much room that the RSPCA can afford to accommodate the poor animals. You could also get them from reputable and trustworthy dog breeders. Just ask around.
I have a dog too, back in Malaysia. His name is Tiger, and I picked him up from the streets ten years ago when he was but a 3-month old puppy, wondering about near a market. He was part of a litter of stray puppies. He's probably not as smart as pure-bred dogs, but he's still pretty clever, loyal, and very lovable.
Tiger hates the camera, and never looks directly at it :P Help eradicate puppy mills. Please do not buy your pets from places like the above. When demand is low, supply will dwindle and hopefully, puppy mills will have no choice but to shut down.
These dogs deserve better.
Labels: Rants
