Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have a question or two. Maybe this is not the right place to do it I am not sure. Anyone who knows me, knows I am an avid supporter of adopting dogs from Humane Societies. The pet store we have in our small city refused to sell dogs and cats, puppies or kittens because she too supported adopting animals from the local humane society. She just recently sold her pet store and the new owners, I am disappointed to say, have started selling puppies and kittens. When we asked them where they got these animals from their reply was "from local farmers that are giving them away for free" and then they are selling them for a profit. They have in the store a Puggle. Now I understand this is a mixed breed that has become very trendy. But at the end of the day - is it not just a mixed breed dog? Same with the labrdoodles - now we have people, all kinds of people, breeding mixed breed dogs and selling them for $800.00 - $1400.00. I don't care if you have a registered beagle and a registered pug and you breed them - you still end up with a mixed breed. Am I missing something? If that is the case, I got a real bargain when I found my "Chi-T" (chihuahua terrier cross) which I gladly adopted from the spca for $40.00 and the cost of fixing her. By the way I named her the Chi T just to prove my point! Can anyone offer any kind of explanation for the new trend of selling mixed breed dogs for an obscene amount of money when we have perfectly good mixed breed dogs at the humane society?

People always complain that you don't know what you are getting when you adopted a shelter animal - but with all the puppy mills and backyard breeders out there you don't know what you are getting either. I am not saying all breeders are bad because I know there are some really really good ones with only the best intentions and professionalism of any business owner.

I am just looking for some information about this - am I missing something?

This is one trend I just don't understand myself. If someone could explain it to me and sound logical about it (there's the catch) I'd like to hear it.

I've had mixed breed dogs most of my life before my last two and they were wonderful, but they had more health problems than my two purebred dogs combined. Hybred vigor doesn't pan out in my experience, but many claim that's why they are doing it. They even site OFA's website as a way of verifying their claim. Well, that just means the dogs are not reported it doesn't mean the problems don't exist.

Nope- can't convince me this is a good trend. Not when the dogs are being bred intentionally for a profit. Worst kind of puppy mills- can't even breed the right breed together. Can you imagine what other details are missing out of their breeding program if that isn't even important? sigh
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Chelle and the rest of the crew including, but not limited to Kita and Taiko (the shiba inu wrestle maniacs), Adi (reserved and dignified tabby cat), and all 28 reptiles

My husband, who is very supportive of me and my endless quest to help animals, asked me today what exactly it was that bothered me about this subject. I told him that what bothered me, and I can only speak of the area in which I live, people, farmers, etc. are looking at this as a lottery if you will. "Heh, we can buy a beagle for $400.00 and a pug for $400.00 (who cares if they are purebred or not - because they wouldn't know the difference anyway!) and if we make them have sex, and they have a litter of 4 or 5 dogs (at the least) at $1,000.00 each - we would make $4 - $5 thousand dollars and if we breed her more than once a year - we could pay off the truck in no time!"
And when I say we - I am speaking as the person breeding these animals. It angers me so much because these people that are doing this do not even know what they are doing most of the time. They don't understand basic health standards and most of all genetics - because before you know mom and son and brother and sister start doing it and then what? But I suppose until the laws change we can't stop it either - so people like us take these little dogs in when all of a sudden they get sick or are deformed and no one wants them - the shelters bear the brunt of the ugly side of this type of breeding. Thank you for your comments - I would like to sit down and ask some of the breeders of these dogs how to justify what they are doing.

We knew of a couple that owned Jack Russell Terriers. They bred her too many times in one year and she died - and they were crying about it. It took all I had not to say something at that point.

Any time humans exploit animals to make money, I have problems with it. Of course, many think I'm nuts to spend the amounts of money I've spent on my animals to maintain their health and training.

I try to educate people, one at a time, and hope some day I can just reduce the problem. It won't ever go away completley, but small changes still help.
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Chelle and the rest of the crew including, but not limited to Kita and Taiko (the shiba inu wrestle maniacs), Adi (reserved and dignified tabby cat), and all 28 reptiles