When Terisa Acevedo’s house burned down, it wasn’t the loss of her belongings that broke her heart – it was the loss of her one year old Dachshund, Lola. Acevedo was sure that Lola had either burned to death in the fire, or had escaped and was wandering, lost, in her Hyde Park, Massachusetts neighborhood. In the freezing cold February weather, that would have been a death sentence for a little dog like Lola.
Dinglehopper was sold by Hunte Corporation to a Toronto pet store
I’m working on a multi part series on definitions of common terms used in ‘the dog game’.
Today’s definition: Puppy Brokers (sometimes colloquially called ‘dog dealers’)
A puppy broker is someone who buys puppies, either individually or entire litters, and then re sells them at a marked up price. For example, a broker might buy a puppy from a small town Penny Saver for $50, and then re sell it through their website for $350. At the height of demand for European bred French Bulldogs, some brokers were buying puppies in Eastern Europe for as little as $300, and re selling them for as much as $2,500. Being a broker can be a very lucrative business.
Brokers can be huge commercial outfits, like The Hunte Corporation.
Hunte is estimated to supply 80% of North American pet stores with their puppies (85,000 sold in one year alone). Hunte breeds no dogs of their own, but purchases them from primarily mid western commercial dog breeders, Missouri in particular. They then are vetted at their main facility, and shipped out across North America, to stores like PJ’s and Petland. The AKC, by the way, just loves Hunte Corporation. The CBC did a great expose on the pipeline that got a puppy named Dinglehopper from Missouri to Toronto, where he was purchased from PJ’s Pet Store.
Brokers can be shady, like the ones who buy up the puppies Hunte and other big commercial brokers don’t want.
These outfits buy ‘second class’ puppies, also known as “B” grade puppies, either directly from the breeders or sometimes through a contact at the big brokers. They then re sell these puppies through penny saver ads, or at flea markets, or from Walmart parking lots. Some of them have a new twist to this – they market their “B” grade puppies as ‘rescues’, charging ‘adoption fees’ higher than they could get at flea market, and with the ‘adopter’ having signed away any expectation of getting a healthy dog.
Brokers can be importers who buy foreign litter lots of puppies, mainly from Eastern Europe.
Since whelping costs are MUCH lower there, and puppy prices very low as well, import brokers can purchase an entire litter of puppies and then re sell them at inflated American prices. Some import brokers don’t import the puppies until they have ‘orders’ for them. Many of them have slick looking websites, some of which will make claims about “FCI” puppies being miraculously healthier than North American bred ones.
Brokers can be small, and claim to be ‘Finders Services’.
These people claim that they have a secret pipeline to all of the “most exclusive” breeders in North America – breeders that you, Joe Public, couldn’t possibly qualify to purchase a puppy from. Some of them offer all kinds of bells and whistles – they’ll hand carry the puppy to you, they will stay in your home for a week and do puppy ‘nanny’ duty. These places, generally run by just one or two people, will claim that they’re doing buyers a service by pre screening puppies and breeders, so you don’t have to.
Here’s what you need to know – NO reputable breeder will EVER knowingly sell a puppy to a broker of ANY sort.
A good breeder wants to meet you. Scratch that – a good breeder will INSIST on meeting you. They want to make sure you are a good home for the puppies they’ve raised and loved and looked after. They want all of your contact information. They want you to keep in touch, and send photos, and let us know if something goes wrong.
NO good breeder would ever turn a puppy over to strangers, to be sold to strangers. The very idea is repugnant. We need to know that our puppies are safe and loved and being cared for.
There is no ‘secret puppy pipeline’, like the “Finders Services” claim there is. They find puppies primarily by calling ads from the Penny Savers, or looking for local back yard breeders – the only kind of breeders willing or clueless enough to sell to them.
ANYONE can get a great puppy, from the best breeder in the world, if they’re willing to do their homework, and show some patience – and you don’t need a broker to be your middleman.
Puppy was euthanized on Saturday, but found alive i Dumpster on Sunday.
It’s bad enough that there are still shelters euthanizing dogs for ‘space’, but it gets a lot worse when the shelter staff can’t even tell the difference between a live dog and a dead one.
From the New York Post:
A puppy euthanized by veterinarians has risen from the “dead.”
The black-and-white pooch was one of five young dogs “put to sleep” Saturday at a shelter in Sulphur, Okla., News 9 in Oklahoma City reported. Each dog was checked and confirmed to be dead, then the 3-month-old and his four siblings were placed in a trash bin.
On Sunday morning, an animal control officer looked into the bin and discovered that the one pup somehow survived.
“He was just as healthy as could be,” Scott Prall told News 9.
The puppies were selected to be euthanized because of illness, as well as overcrowding due to limited shelter space in the state, said Amanda Kloski, a veterinarian in Oklahoma who has been caring for the puppy since his resurrection.
Kloski created a PetFinder.com profile for the small dog, named Wall-E after the Pixar film character. A woman in Pennsylvania then took up the cause, working to find the puppy a home.
“He is a delightful Pup, about 3 months old, is surprisingly healthy except for a heavy infestation of Hookworm for which he is undergoing treatment,” Marcia Machtiger wrote in a special website she created for the animal.
She stresses that if a home for Wall-E isn’t found soon, he could wind up back at the shelter — where he very well might end up being euthanized again.
Mindy Holmes, of Maplecreek Corgis
I sometimes feel like I’m spending a lot of my time defending my fellow breeders, in large part because almost all of the breeders I know personally really are ethical people who love their dogs and their breeds. I also defend conformation showing, which I know seems trivial and superficial to anyone outside of the fancy. It’s a sport I have mixed feelings about, but at its best I enjoy it as a fun way to meet with friends, have a look at their dogs, and maybe take home some ribbons.
At its worst, however, showing becomes a world filled with shady, amoral behavior, none of which seems to have anything to do with the well being of the dogs, and most of which has to do with greed, ego and money. When at its worst, it becomes hard to defend either showing, or the breeders involved in it.
This would be one of those ‘worst’ situations.
A recent criminal case based in Venice reveals a darker side of the $330 million American dog show industry where greed and ultra competitiveness can lead to allegations of cheating, corruption and vindictive acts.
Venice dog breeder Melinda “Mindy” Holmes, 48, was arrested this month on a felony extortion charge in the falsification of a champion show dog’s veterinary records and demanding money to keep those records hidden.
The allegations have rocked the Greater Venice Florida Dog Club, of which Holmes was a member in good standing for several years.
“I’m just in shock,” said Rita Figg, a founding member of the Venice dog club when she learned of Holmes’ arrest on Feb. 12. “I’ve never heard of anything like this happening before.”
According to sheriff’s reports, Holmes in 2009 first threatened to release damaging documents about a Pembroke Welsh corgi, named Ty, bred by AKC judges Rutledge and Nash Parker of North Carolina unless they paid Holmes $18,000.
The Parkers claim Holmes fraudulently changed Ty’s veterinary records to show the dog had been cosmetically altered through surgery, which would prevent him from competing and could permanently damage the Parkers’ judging and breeding careers.
The Corgi involved in this case, Champion Happiharbor Saddle Lane Ty, is not just any show dog, either – he’s the number four ranked Pembroke Welsh Corgi in the country. Ty was exhibited at Westminster this year, but while Ty didn’t place in the ribbons this year, he has numerous prestigious wins in his past, including Best in Specialty Show.
The article doesn’t specify what surgery it was alleged that Ty had had performed on him, but it’s possible that none of his wins would have been awarded if it was proven that Ty had received cosmetic surgery.
The Pembroke Welsh Corgi breed standard states –
A dog must be very seriously penalized for the following faults, regardless of whatever desirable qualities the dog may present: oversized or undersized; button, rose or drop ears; overshot or undershot bite; fluffies, whitelies, mismarks or bluies.
I assume that Holmes was threatening that Ty had one of these ‘serious’ faults corrected. Holmes, who breeds Corgis under the “MapleCreek” prefix, was the breeder of Ty’s dam. She and the Parkers had apparently done breedings together in the past.
More from the Herald Tribune:
The Parkers, according to arrest documents, paid Holmes $3,000 to keep the falsified records private, but refused to give her $15,000 more she demanded.
Then, a month before this year’s Westminster show, Holmes reportedly e-mailed Ty’s vet records to the dog’s handler to discourage her from showing the dog. Breeders often own the dogs, but handlers are the ones who present the dog in competitions.
….
Reached for comment in North Carolina, the Parkers would not discuss specifics of the incident beyond what was in the police report. But Rutledge Parker said he and his wife fear further retaliation by Holmes.
“I’ve never dreamed of something like this happening. I don’t know how to react to it,” he said. “This was all about money, and that’s clear from the police report.”
Read the rest of the article here.
Memphis Shelter Does Dog Death Song and Dance
As a reasonable, logical human being, I expect most people around me to act in reasonable, logical ways. As you can guess, this has caused me no end of disappointments in my life, but I keep on hoping, because hope springs eternal.
For example, if an Animal Shelter was responsible for the death of my pet, there are certain ways I’d expect them to respond. An apology, perhaps. A review of the procedures which allowed the dog to die. I might even, since I am not without cynicism, expect them to get their lawyer to issue some sort of statement shirking blame.
What would I not expect? In fact, let me clarify that. What would I not even be able to imagine the shelter doing in response? Have their shelter director dress up in a dog suit and lock himself in a cage, emerging only to do song and dance routines to “Who Let the Dogs Out”.
Read the rest on YesBiscuit – but put a drop cloth over your monitor first, because I guarantee there will be some head explosions occurring.