CONCERNING PUPPY AND KITTEN BREEDING MILLS
Dr. Michael W. Fox *
Commerce in purebred and ‘designer’
(cross-breed) dogs, and
purebred cats has expanded in many farming states since my first investigations
of commercial dog breeding facilities, so called ‘puppy mills’ in the Midwest
in the early 1970’s. Brood-bitches, stud dogs and litters of puppies were
generally treated like commodities; no different from other livestock, such as
pigs, chickens, and fur-ranch foxes and mink.
Even then, inhumane breeding practices and conditions were widespread,
and they have not been improved upon over the intervening years in spite of
government (USDA/APHIS) inspections and licensing schemes and purported AKC
(American Kennel Club) inspections. Most state authorities see nothing wrong
with applying the same standards, if any, for how producers should treat their
livestock and poultry, to puppy and kitten mill commercial breeding facilities.
But there is one huge difference between traditionally
farmed animals and cats and dogs. Dogs and cats are so much more domesticated
in terms of their need for human contact during their first formative weeks
(called the critical period for socialization), and throughout their entire
lives. On large commercial breeding facilities there is inadequate human
contact and socialization of mass-produced puppies and kittens, leading
potentially to emotionally unstable, unreliable, even unsafe animals. Their
parent ‘breeding stock’ can suffer their entire lives from lack of consistent
and caring human contact. This is compounded by living in a literal prison cage
or wire run, often in extremely noisy and crowded conditions where sanitation,
clean water, and adequate food and shelter may all be deficient to some degree.
All this means animal stress and distress, which
impairs
their immune systems leading to increased susceptibility to diseases. Some of
these are transmissible to humans, including round worms (Toxacara) that can
cause blindness in children, to ringworm that can ravage a family and
Toxoplasmisis that can cause human fetal abnormalities and birth defects. .
Other diseases that can take hold in unsanitary facilities and stressed animals
and be transmitted from infected puppies and kittens to humans (children, the
elderly, and others with impaired immune systems being especially vulnerable),
include: Salmonellosis, Campylobacter enteritis, Leptospirosis, Blastomycosis,
Histoplasmosis, Giardiasis, Echinococcosis, and Sarcoptic mange.
Pups and kittens whose mothers were chronically
stressed
during pregnancy, and environmental influences, especially diet, and quality of
human contact or lack thereof, during their first few weeks of life can
suffer alterations in the ‘wiring’ of
their nervous, endocrine and other body systems. This is called epigenetics, a
recent branch of human and veterinary medicine and that was an integral aspect
of my first doctoral dissertation (published in 1971 by the University of
Chicago Press, entitled Integrative Development of Brain and Behavior in the Dog.).
This in part accounts for the high veterinary bills people find themselves
paying because of the chronic health problems that result.
Another reason for the plethora of health problems
in
pure-bred animals is because of the low ‘hybrid vigor’ and higher incidence of
genetic and developmental abnormalities, hereditary diseases, and behavioral
problems ranging from extreme shyness to unpredictable aggression and
hyperactivity syndrome. Large scale commercial breeders---anyone with say more
than six breeding animals---cannot follow up through the marketing matrix to
determine the quality of their produce. They have no system of progeny testing,
which means keeping records of all the health and behavioral problems of the
puppies and kittens that they are marketing that could be traced to a
‘defective’ bitch or stud dog. It is
inexcusable that the AKC, that opposes any legislation like this Bill, should
actually profit from selling pedigree
registration papers to the unwitting purchasers of puppy mill puppies.
Additional stress is placed on the offspring
when they are
shipped out, shortly after the stress of being weaned that is coupled
additional stress on their immune systems of being wormed and given a cocktail
of vaccinations. Such treatments can
lead to life-long sickness and suffering. Kittens and puppies should not be
shipped any distance more than a two-four-hour journey in a climate-controlled
vehicle and then only after they have passed the sensitive period of
development that in the dog is around 8 weeks of age, and possibly one or two
weeks later in kittens. ‘Locally bred and locally purchased’ animals could be
sold at an earlier age, around 6-7 weeks of age for puppies, and 7-8 weeks for
kittens, provided the distances they must travel are within the two-four hour
range.
The ‘breeding stock’ not only suffer
a life of extreme
confinement on the typical puppy and kitten mill facility: They also suffer the
stress of repeated pregnancies one heat cycle after another with no rest and
recovery after raising a litter, many being bred, for cost-saving, on their
first heat, at an age when they are not yet even fully grown and
physiologically ready to bear offspring.
No conscientious hobby breeder would ever consider adopting such a
stressful practice. Nor would anyone who respects the nature and beauty of
cats, or appreciates how dogs have contributed to the well-being of humanity
since before the beginning of recorded history, give nothing less than
unequivocal support for legislation as is being proposed that would help reduce
the suffering and improve the health and well-being of dogs and cats used for
commercial breeding purposes, and their helpless offspring.
* Writing, consultations and lectures/seminars
in companion
animal behavior, communication, health and well-being; veterinary and global
bioethics; humane, sustainable agriculture and nutritional health. For details
go to www.doctormwfox.org
