This past weekend, it was Puppy Mill Awareness day on Saturday! Just because the day has passed, doesn’t mean we can’t still learn about them. Here are some facts to raise awareness.
- A puppy mill is a commercial dog-breeding facility that focuses on increasing profit with little overhead cost. The health and welfare of the animals is not a priority.
- Female dogs are bred at every opportunity with little to no recovery time between litters. When, after a few years, they are physically depleted to the point that they no longer can reproduce, breeding females are often killed.
- Every year in Ameica, it’s estimated that 2.11 million puppies are sold that originated from puppy mills, while 3 million are killed in shelters because they are too full and there aren’t enough adoptive homes. Act as a publicist for your local animal shelter to encourage your community to adopt shelter pets.
- In puppy mills, dogs can spend most of their lives in cramped cages, with no room to play or exercise.
- Often times, the water and food provided for the puppies is contaminated, crawling with bugs. Puppies can even be malnourished.
- Puppies in mills are found with bleeding or swollen paws, feet falling through the wire cages, severe tooth decay, ear infections, dehydration, and lesions on their eyes, which often lead to blindness.
- In most states, puppy mills are legal. It is important that future pet owners seek rescue dogs from their local shelter or buy pets from a trusted breeder in order to put mills out of business.
- It is estimated that there are at least 10,000 puppy mills in the U.S. Fewer than 3,000 of these are regulated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
- Most puppy mills have no veterinary care, climate control, or protection for the animals from weather (hot, cold, rain, or snow).
- With limited or no regulations or enforcement, puppy mills have no cleanup control. This means that dogs can be living in urine and feces for indefinite periods of time.
- It’s common to find dogs in puppy mills with collars that have been fastened so tightly that they have become embedded in a dog’s neck and must be carefully cut out.
Puppy mills are only concerned about profit. Speak out about them to celebrate this pet holiday!
If you have any questions or need to come in with you pet, you can find us here in the Deep Cove/Seymour area of North Vancouver, and you can also call us at 604-929-1863 for Parkgate Animal Hospital’s veterinary services.
