(To the tune of "The Rain in Spain" from Lerner and Loewe's "My Fair Lady")
Ready? All together now:
The dogs from Spain come mainly in by plane.
By George she's got it! By George she's got it!
The dogs from Spain come mainly in by plane.
In Hartford, Her-e-ford and Hamp-sheer?
Hoarding hardly ever happens!
How kind of you to let me come! Now once again, where's it insane?
On the plane, on the plane!
And where's that crazy plane?
From SPAIN. From SPAIN!
The dogs from Spain come mainly in by plane...
"Dozens of dogs rescued who have never been out of their cages! Film at 11!"
Over forty beagles have been "rescued" from a research lab in Spain, and flown to Los Angeles for adoption. The first problem with this scenario is, in order for an operation to be a "rescue", there would have to have been some sort of resistance to the confiscation of the dogs. These dogs were voluntarily handed over by the lab as they were closing down their business.
The cost of the operation? CBS reported that in excess of $100,000 was spent to relocate these dogs. Wouldn't that money have gone a long way toward helping animals in need right here in the US? The animal shelters in Los Angeles claim to not have enough homes for the animal sourced locally. Aren't there people in Western Europe who would have been glad to adopt these cute beagles, instead of relocating them thousands of miles away?
Naturally, the news painted a gloomy picture about how mistreated the beagles were; how they had never been out of cages, how they were in poor condition. Yet when seen on the news program, the dogs appear to be in fine condition and weight, walking perfectly normally, wagging their tails, happy and friendly. Not exactly the picture of abuse and neglect.
But yeah, we've got it. We've really got it! Rescues need plenty of cute purebred dogs to satisfy demand from their customers. And the sadder the tale of woe, the bigger the sensationalism and the quicker they move out.
We Americans are living in a state of moral panic. The general consensus is that PUPPY MILLS are a major problem today. Animal rights groups have whipped up a frenzy of hysteria against the perceived proliferation of abusive breeders. Ostensibly, they must be on every corner!
Oprah has produced a television expose to uncover "puppy mills". There was another recent feature called "Madonna of the Mills" intended to raise awareness on the issue, in case anyone might have missed the Gospel According to St. Oprah. The Oprah show also presented the president of the HSUS as a presumed authority on the topic.
The Humane Society of the US is so tuned into righting the wrongs of dog breeding that they now have a toll-free hot line for the express purpose of reporting of "puppy mills" by the public. [1] No description or definition is offered for that "PM" term, but hey, lets not let a little thing like knowing what we are talking about stand in the way of our hangin' fun times.
Now the HSUS is in no position to sit in judgement of anyone else, with their fraudulent fundraising, and their illegal and immoral abuse of their tax-free status in lobbying for legislation to squelch animal ownership. They even promote policies that result in the killing of more and more animals in shelters. Nevertheless, the HSUS seems hell-bent on sitting as judge, jury and executioner of breeders, wherever they can find them. And now, they hope the public will make that discovery phase quick and easy for them.
Not to be outdone, the Canadian SPCA is also urging the public to rat out the mills that they claim are "widespread". The definition used by the Canadian SPCA seems to be those who are unlicensed, or who sell for a profit, rather than those who are abusive and cruel. Again, just what exactly is a "puppy mill"? Depends on which way the wind is blowing. (2)
The public is bombarded with media propaganda produced by big national animal groups screaming inane slogans like "puppies aren't products" and "pets aren't presents"; we must "adopt not shop" and other lame, anti-consumerist messages. One might even be the target of righteous indignation should he <gasp> DARE to buy a puppy or kitten from a breeder or a pet store. Let's not forget the "hoarders" who may not actually breed but who need to be stopped nonetheless, and of course those ignorant "backyard breeders" too. We can lump those under the "puppy mill" umbrella if need be.
Of course, these tips to hotlines are meant to result in seizures of as many animals as possible. The AR groups love to seize animals and sterilize the lot of them. Even if the raids are eventually declared groundless or illegal, they will have achieved the goal of breaking the breeding cycle and bankrupting the owner, thereby destroying his or her life. Getting rid of a breeder....what a feather in the cap of the morally superior! And less births means less animals around for us cruel humans to abuse. The anti-breeding campaign will be relentless until people just plain no longer have animals in their homes.
AR mob leaders incite panicked townsfolk to lynch suspected witches. Can you survive the hysteria? Can they manage to find an actual witch?
From Wikipedia:
Witch hunt - A search for witches or evidence of witchcraft, often involving moral panic, mass hysteria and lynching, but in historical instances also legally sanctioned and involving official witchcraft trials.
From Cambridge Dictionary Online:
witch hunt - an attempt to find and punish people whose opinions are unpopular and who are said to be a danger to society
From Your Dictionary:
A witch hunt describes a situation where accusations are made freely, especially against someone or something that is not popular with the majority.
From Answers.com;
An investigation carried out ostensibly to uncover subversive activities but actually used to harass and undermine those with differing views.
So if we don't agree with the extremists' views that breeding should be stopped, I suppose we have to expect the witch hunt. The majority view these days is that dog breeding = abuse. After just about any "rescue", you will read in a press release:
"She won't have to have any more puppies ever again."
The horror of it all! Breeding! Reproducing! Did we mention that the attitude is puritanical?
More than 10,000 large, substandard mass producers of puppies, often referred to as puppy mills, house 200,000 to 400,000 breeding dogs that produce 2 million to 4 million puppies a year, estimates HSUS' Stephanie Shain, senior director its Stop Puppy Mills project. [1]
Ever wonder where in the world they pull those numbers from? Just out of thin air, or out of some orifice filled with hot air, anyway.
Don't put those pitchforks and torches away just yet, there's definitely a 21st century witch hunt in progress. Lynchings continue as they have for centuries. The script has been slightly rewritten, but the overall storyline remains unchanged. Today's witches include those vaguely described puppy mills, hoarders and backyard breeders. We don't know exactly who they are and what they do, but one thing we do know; there are thousands of them and they must all burn at the stake!
Despite record low shelter numbers, and thousands of dog smuggled across the border into San Diego County each year, the city of Chula Vista is considering a mandatory spay/neuter ordinance
by Geneva Coats, R.N.
Secretary, California Federation of Dog Clubs
According to the latest US Census, San Diego County is home to over 3 million people. And, by my calculations, there are approximately 2/3 of a million owned dogs in San Diego County. And close to that many owned cats, as well.
How do we arrive at this figure? Over 39% of US households own at least one dog, according to the latest American Pet Products Manufacturers survey. Further, 40% of dog-owning households own multiple dogs. San Diego County contains over a million households. Crunching the numbers, the estimate is that San Diego County is home to at least 625,000 dogs.
Further, shelter numbers in San Diego County (as available on the website of the California Department of Public Health) reveal that, in 2009, for the entire county, there were 371 dogs killed in San Diego shelters. That's less than 0.06% of all the owned dogs in San Diego County.
In 2010, less than 1% (0.78%) of all the dogs in the county, or 4869 total dogs, were killed in San Diego shelters. The exact number of dogs who were truly adoptable, and not ill, injured, aggressive or otherwise not adoptable, is not known, but of course would be even lower than that 3/4 of 1%.
From "Maddie's Fund" website:
"Saving all of our healthy and treatable shelter dogs and cats by 2015 is more than possible - we're almost there!"
Not many when put into perspective, right? Of course, there is always room for improvement. And, none of us want to see any adoptable pet killed unnecessarily.
In fact, no shelter in San Diego County should be killing any adoptable animals. There is a huge market for dogs in San Diego County. Those hundreds of thousands of dogs have to come from somewhere. If the average lifespan for a dog is about 10 years, then San Diego County will need over 60,000 new puppies each year. Demand far outstrips available supply. At least one shelter in the County, Helen Woodward Humane Society, imports dogs from other states, and sometimes from as far away as Romania. When it was noticed that a proliferation of sickly puppies were being smuggled in from Mexico and sold to unsuspecting consumers in the greater San Diego area, a US Border Patrol survey was conducted in 2005. The survey concluded that, each year, nearly 10,000 dogs and puppies are brought into San Diego County from Mexico.
The City of Chula Vista is the second largest city in San Diego County (after the City of San Diego), and is situated about 10 miles from the Mexican border. Chula Vista undoubtedly absorbs thousands of smuggled puppies each year.
Ignoring the existing market demand and lack of locally-sourced puppies, Chula Vista City Councilman Rudy Ramirez has decided that a mandatory spay-neuter law is needed. Now perhaps we can't blame this gentleman for believing such a law might be necessary. On the City's animal control website, we find this:
The Chula Vista Animal Care Facility encourages owners to always spay and neuter their pets. There is a serious pet overpopulation problem in San DiegoCounty that has resulted in thousands of euthanizations each year.
The fact is that euthanizations in San DiegoCounty are down significantly. The number of dogs euthanized in 2010 is down by 70% over the numbers killed in the late 1990s. Remember, some of these euthanized animals were severely injured, sick, aggressive, or otherwise not savable. Clearly, great progress is being made in the reduction of shelter intakes and deaths. And, this success was achieved without the use of coercive legislation.
"A serious pet overpopulation problem in San DiegoCounty"? There is absolutely no evidence to support that assertion. Let's put the figures into perspective. There are over 3 million residents in San Diego County. Last year, one animal entered a shelter for every 63 county residents. One dog was killed for every 637 county residents. One cat was killed for every 327 county residents.
When animals are killed in shelters, it cannot be reasonably blamed on "overpopulation." The number of puppies smuggled in to San Diego County is more than DOUBLE the number killed in shelters. There is a market for pets in San Diego. Spaying/neutering all the local dogs and cats will remove the best sources for healthy, well-bred and well-socialized animals. People won't own fewer pets; they'll just get them from somewhere else. A mandatory spay/neuter proposal would only serve to increase the black market demand and to promote the breeding of dogs in foreign puppy mills.
While the goal of reducing shelter deaths is laudable, mandatory spay-neuter laws don't help. In fact, the opposite is true. Every locale that has enacted a mandatory spay/neuter law has seen a RISE in shelter admissions and killings.
San MateoCounty's Peninsula Humane Society spearheaded the nation's first mandatory spay/neuter law. They did not have the expected success with that approach. In the areas of the county where the ordinance was implemented, dog deaths increased by 126 percent, while cat deaths went up by 86 percent. Licensing dropped by 35 percent.
Fort Worth, Texas repealed their mandatory spay and neuter law as licensing and compliance plummeted, and cases of rabies increased.
Memphis, TN passed a mandatory spay and neuter law last year. Since then, shelter intakes have risen 8% in that city.
Los Angeles is another case in point. After decades of steadily declining shelter numbers, LA reversed the good trend in one fell swoop with enactment of a mandatory spay and neuter law. Intakes and deaths immediately rose by over 30% and continue in an upward spiral.
Lake County, CA has has a mandatory spay-neuter law. Their shelter killings are now four times higher than the state average.
Montgomery County, MD repealed their MSN ordinance after there was no improvement in shelter deaths, but there was a 50% drop in licensing compliance.
Aurora, Colorado, also has had a dramatic drop in licensing compliance since their mandatory spay-neuter law passed.
No mainstream animal welfare organization supports mandatory spay and neuter. The American Veterinary Medical Association opposes it. So does Best Friends Animal Society, American Humane Association, Maddie's Fund, Alley Cat Allies, the American Kennel Club and the No Kill Advocacy Center. The ASPCA also opposes mandatory spay neuter, saying:
"The ASPCA is not aware of any credible evidence demonstrating a statistically significant enhancement in the reduction of shelter intake or euthanasia as a result of the implementation of a mandatory spay/neuter law."
Mandatory spay and neuter does not work because it does not address the reasons that animals enter shelters. Those reasons are varied, but they have nothing to do with births. Animals enter shelters due to social problems like loss of a job, home foreclosure, or divorce or death of the owner. Mandatory spay/neuter does nothing to help pets remain in their homes. Ownerless cats make up a large portion of shelter intakes and spay-neuter laws won't reduce the numbers of feral cats.
Sometimes there are behavioral issues for which training programs might provide a useful solution. To help get more animals adopted, shelters could implement more proactive ideas like extended hours, foster programs and off-site adoptions. Advertising campaigns can help educate prospective pet owners to consider a shelter animal when they are thinking of getting their next pet. Trap-neuter-release programs are proven methods for feral cat population control.
Besides, a recent national pet population survey reveals that 78% of owned dogs and 88% of owned cats are already sterilized. The public is cooperating with voluntary spay and neuter...in droves!
Education coupled with voluntary, low-cost sterilization clinics, has been very successful. Collaborative, supportive programs always outperform punitive and coercive programs like forced spay/neuter. Such laws do not serve the best interests of pets or their owners.
Community programs in our California cities should be based on education, science and fact, and modelled after programs with proven success. Mandatory spay-neuter is a proven failure. Chula Vista officials should reject this cruel and counterproductive policy.
Please attend Rudy Ramirez's "town hall meetings" and make your voice heard on this issue.
Chula Vista City Hall
276 Fourth Ave.
(Fourth and F St)
Chula Vista, CA 91910
Monday October 17 @ 6 pm
Thursday October 20 @ 1 pm
Saturday October 29 @ 9 am
And now, for a glimpse into the crystal ball:
Dear Abby,
Recently my city forced me to have my dog Chipotle neutered. Chipotle was my best friend! I took him wherever I went. Unfortunately, Chipotle was a tiny Chihuahua who barely weighed three pounds. He died during his neuter surgery. I am devastated. What should I do?
Signed, "Chumless in Chula Vista"
Dear "Chumless",
First, I'm very sorry about the loss of your Chihuahua "Chipotle". There is no sense suing the veterinarian when the City of Chula Vista is clearly the responsible party. Get a good lawyer and take them for every gold Chip in their treasure Chest.
October 3, 2011. I corresponded for a brief time with one of the main Aussie Labradoodle breeders. As I recall from my correspondence, the F1 cross inherits the lab type coat so you have to back cross the poodle or breed to another F1 to get the non-shedding coat. In the first case you get a 3/4 poodle in the second you would need to have two different relatively unrelated labs and poodles to get decent genetic diversity in the F2's and of course only 1/4th of the F2's would have the desired non shedding coat.
Once you start breeding poodle coat to poodle coat you will keep it, of course, as it is recessive. Still, in order to have a viable breed, you should start with something like 20 lab - poodle pairs of relatively unrelated dogs or you are going to have an even more inbred "new breed" than the most inbred of the foundation breeds.
What prompted my correspondence with the lady in Australia was that the local rescue I help with was encountering some very aggressive male labradoodles. What is not appreciated by the general public is that some male standard poodles can be rather dominant and aggressive on maturity if not raised by a fairly strong minded, pack leader type owner.
Well, it seems that rather than getting the trainability of the poodle and the laid back (although full speed ahead energy) personality of the lab, many of the Labradoodle males were showing the strong, dominant personality of the poodle and the full speed ahead high energy personality of the Labrador. Just what you do not want in a dog that may be going to some owner who is attracted to the dog because it has a cute name.
As a dog trainer I have had two instances of personal experience with very strong-willed Labradoodles. In the right home they would have been fine but neither of them were suitable for the soft-tempered people who were their owners.
I have also met delightful Labradoodles. When I talked to the different owners of those dogs, all of them were Australian Labradoodles and had many generations of breeding for working seeing eye and assistance dogs behind them. These latter dogs represent "a breed in the making" - not first and second generation crosses made for the cute dog market without selection for suitable temperament and trainability.
My impression is part of the marketability of these inter breed crosses is that the name needs to have double vowels in it or have a diminutive form to make it sound appealing and cute.
Around 20 years ago a close friend of mine who bred bearded collies and afghan hounds died rather unexpectedly of ovarian cancer. One of her best Afghan bitches was pregnant at the time and I promised to help find homes for the pups when they were an appropriate age.
When the pups came it became obvious as they matured and turned out to have mustache faces that they were bearded collie - afghan crosses, so at an appropriate age we advertised to find pet homes. I called them "Culligans". The cute label helped and we did find good homes for all but one of them. More about that one later.
These dogs were actually part of a traditional "gypsy dog" cross which is called a "lurcher". Note this is not a cute name so people do not fall all over themselves to get or breed lurchers. Lurchers are the cross between a sight hound and a herding dog (specifically a drovers dog - one that moves the flock) or a sighthound and a hunting terrier.
The aim - which does show up in the first generation of the cross - is to get a dog which is a keen hunter but is highly biddable (that is pays attention to what the owner commands). If you breed a greyhound to a border collie and you have your prize lurcher you would breed it back to one of the parent breeds for the next generation and then after that to the other parent breed or to a small terrier. Back and forth between the parent breeds. And since they are bred for hunting (specifically poaching) you only breed from the ones that are good workers.
How did a gypsy or other person hunt with a lurcher? Until a few hundred years ago in England it was illegal for anyone lower in aristocratic rank to own a full-blooded hunting dog such as a greyhound. And anyway, all the game belonged to the aristocrats (remember Robin Hood).
So you strolled along the main road and sent your lurcher into the lord of the manor's fields to fetch you a fat hare (the poorer people were always protein deprived in their diets) and if the dog was returning with the hare and the gamekeeper came up to converse with you - the dog had been trained to hide with his prize in the bushes and not be seen.
A full-blooded greyhound would have caught the hare and perhaps eaten it or charged back to you with the hare no matter who was with you, and then things would have gone very badly for you - a mere peasant or a gypsy.
A number of or modern sight hound breeds have lurcher heritage - whippets are the most obvious, but the Borzoi goes back to crosses between Saluki (Tazi) from Turkey bred to native winter hardy Russian herding dogs with an infusion of the husky-like hunting Laika of Northern Russia. Even the aristocratic English Greyhound had a documented cross in 1770 to the ancestral bulldog. According to Lord Orford who was responsible, the intent was to improve the pluck and courage of the greyhound. As far as I can determine, all modern greyhounds have some ancestors that trace back to this cross because a 4th generation dog from the cross was a highly successful coursing hound.
This is basically a discussion of how a new breed can be formed by crossing breeds. It is important to know how things are inherited. Of course, breeding to select for specific functions not seen in breeds that are otherwise available is very important. In addition, having a number of healthy, vigorous and temperamentally fit dogs from the founding breeds present as parents of the founding population is necessary in order to avoid founding a breed on too small a population and producing dogs in which health is at risk due to inbreeding depression.
Simply doing F1 crosses to produce cute dogs with cute pseudo breed names to appeal to novelty owners in order to make money is against the long term well being of dog breeds as such.
Dogs deliberately bred for specific purposes need to be selected from parents talented for those purposes. This includes breeding dogs to be pets. One selects for a loving pet personality as well as general health and vigor in order to have puppies that will be successful as pets and companions. This is why the parents of dogs bred to be pets and companions need to be integrated into a home where their ability to function as pets and companions can be observed.
Especially with small-breed dogs, dogs that are kept crated as breeding stock all their lives have never been "tested" in the pet and companion venue. Could they be house trained? Will they be comfortable with visitors? Will they be trustworthy with children? Will they easily allow you to groom them and care for them? Who knows if all that was experienced by generations of their ancestors was sitting in a small cage.
Bonnie Dalzell, MA
mail: 5100 Hydes Rd PO Box 60, Hydes, MD,USA 21082-0060
PETA is using the White House petition website in an attempt to push their radical "no more pets" legislative agenda. Nearly 10,000 people have signed their petition, (including over 5,000 signatures in the first 24 hours) which calls for a nationwide mandate that all dogs and cats be sterilized!
Well, since PETA kills over 94% of the dogs and cats that they claim to "save" I guess it's not surprising that they are proposing a nationwide pet extinction bill. Bob Barker, the unqualified simpleton celebrity "expert", is also acting as the mouthpiece to popularize this horrific idea.
Pet "overpopulation" has been thoroughly debunked, and without breeders, there would be no pets in the future. None at all!! Breeding of dogs and cats has been a time-honored pastime for thousands of years. Not to mention, the vast majority of owned pets are already sterilized.
Yet animal extremists have managed to deliver a black eye to those people who love animals and enjoy pet stewardship and breeding. The real problem in our nation that needs to be addressed is not some phony-baloney "overpopulation", but a very real crisis of shelter mismanagement. For some reason, we have people in charge of shelters who relish killing animals rather than having the vision and dedication to save them.
Let's hope people wake up to the animal rights agenda of eliminating animals from our life before the damage is irreparable.
In recognition of the fact that animal rights groups like HSUS and PETA are devoted to limiting pet ownership in our country by any means possible, including subterfuge, lies and animal enterprise terrorism, we the people, the vast nation of animal owners, wish for the truth to be exposed.
Be it known that:
• Animal rights extremists have claimed that "not enough homes" exist for pets. There are 23 million homes for pets opening up each year in the USA, and between 3-4 million animals killed in shelters. We have a failure of shelter leadership and management.
• Shelter killings are only justified in cases of illness, infirmity, severe injury, or owner-requested euthanasia. No adoptable animal need ever be killed.
• Pet lovers across the land are appalled that this killing continues when there is no reason for it.
• The latest national pet owner survey reveals that 78% of all owned dogs and 88% of all owned cats are already spayed or neutered.
• Mandated sterilization results in increases in shelter intakes and deaths everywhere it has been tried.
Shelters and rescues import hundreds of thousands of dogs into the US each year, and many more are smuggled in to meet the current demand for pets.
Be it further resolved:
• ANIMALS, including dogs, cats and other pets are property. The Government should recognize the inherent right to property as specified in the US Constitution.
• The government shall set no limit on our right to own animals excepting local nuisance ordinances.
• No restriction shall be set on the numbers of animals owned or the animal husbandry methods employed by animal owners beyond basic health, sanitation and rabies control.
• No adoptable dogs or cats in animal shelter should be killed. Animal control agencies must fulfill their duties to seek out homes or rescue group placement for all such adoptable animals, and to trap, neuter and release feral, unadoptable cats.
• The reproductive rights for our animals rests with owners and the government shall not interfere with those rights.
Proposal: a federal law prohibiting limitation on ownership of animals as personal property; nor shall any animal ownership regulation be imposed that does not directly affect human health nor violate existing animal welfare laws.
This article is filled with many errors and misperceptions from celebrities who really do not have facts or logic on their side. Let's correct some of these urban legends right here and now.
SPAY-NEUTER AND SHELTER INTAKES
There is an assumption by the article author that mandatory spay and neuter laws work to decrease the number of shelter intakes, and thus reduce killings. In fact, the opposite is true. Every locale that has enacted a mandatory spay and neuter law has seen a RISE in shelter admissions and killings. Fort Worth, Texas repealed their mandatory spay and neuter law as licensing and compliance plummeted, and cases of rabies increased.
Memphis passed a mandatory spay and neuter law last year. Since then, shelter intakes have risen 8% in that city.
Los Angeles is another case in point. After decades of steadily declining shelter numbers, LA reversed the good trend in one fell swoop with enactment of a mandatory spay and neuter law. Intakes and deaths immediately rose by over 30% and continue in an upward spiral. (1)
No mainstream animal welfare organization supports mandatory spay and neuter. The AVMA opposes it. So does the ASPCA, Best Friends Animal Shelter, American Humane Association, Ally Cat Allies and the No Kill Advocacy Center. They know what the Huffington Post should have also discovered, had they done their due diligence - that punitive legislation increases shelter admissions and deaths.
The American College of Theriogenologists is composed of veterinarians who specialize in reproductive medicine. They also have studied the issues and oppose mandatory spay and neuter. The ACT notes:
"....the decision to spay or neuter a pet must be made on a case by case basis, taking into consideration the pet's age, breed, sex, intended use, household environment and temperament. The use of generalized rules concerning gonadectomy (removal of the ovaries or testes) is not in the best interest of the health or well-being of the pets or their owners."
"In fact, in some European Union countries where gonadectomy is illegal unless deemed medically necessary (such as Norway) there are no significant problems with pet overpopulation, indicating that the pet overpopulation problem that exists in the United States is due to cultural differences on the importance of pets, the responsibility of pet owners, and the ability of the government and national agencies to properly educate the public. "
All the experts who have examined the issue (not actors who don't have a clue about the truth) are opposed to mandatory spay and neuter because it increases shelter intakes and death. But, why wouldn't spay and neuter be in the best interest of the health an well-being of the pet, as stated by ACT?
SPAY-NEUTER AND HEALTH
In fact, there are few benefits, and many health risks associated with surgical removal of the sex organs. The American Veterinary Medical Association admits to some seldom-mentioned problems with sterilization in this journal article:
"....potential health problems associated with spaying and neutering have also been identified, including an increased risk of prostatic cancer in males; increased risks of bone cancer and hip dysplasia in large-breed dogs associated with sterilization before maturity; and increased incidences of obesity, diabetes, urinary tract infections, urinary incontinence, and hypothyroidism." (2)
In 2007, in an attempt to verify previous scientific testing regarding negative health effects resulting from spay-neuter, yet another study was done on the effects of neutering on the male urogenital tract. The results were shocking.
Neutered dogs were four times more likely to suffer from malignant bladder cancer than intact dogs. Neutered dogs were eight times more likely to suffer from prostate transitional cell carcinoma than intact dogs. They were twice as likely to suffer from prostate adenocarcinoma, and four times as likely to suffer from prostate carcinoma. On average, castrated dogs are three times more likely than their intact counterparts to develop some type of prostate cancer. (3)
But specific health problems are not the most serious concern when it comes to sterilization surgery. In a recent study reported in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, female Rottweilers spayed after the age of six years old (or never spayed) lived on average 30% longer than spayed dogs. (4)
In a nutshell, you could have many more years with your dog simply by avoiding unnecessary spay surgery. The only medical indications for spay surgery are treatment of pyometra when it occurs, and prevention of breast cancer in breeds that are genetically predisposed. These problems affect a relatively small number of dogs. Bottom line, spaying is a decision best left to the owner after weighing the risks vs benefits of the procedure.
The government has no moral, ethical or medical justification to mandate spay/neuter surgeries. Sterilization can jeopardize good health and can shorten the dog's lifespan. Such nanny laws violate our rights to make our own decisions regarding our animals. Who likes being forced by our lawmakers to spend hundreds of dollars on surgery that is unnecessary, and that can be harmful to our animal's health? No one.
SPAY-NEUTER IS PART OF THE ANIMAL RIGHTS AGENDA OF PET ELIMINATION
And then, we have to deal with the issue of the radical animal rights groups like PETA. Who out there is still foolish enough to listen to PETA? PETA claims to love animals, but their actions betray their hypocrisy. PETA kills animals. They killed over 94% of the animals they took into their Virginia "shelter" in 2010, even while other shelters in the area have excellent save rates. (5)
PETA's employees were convicted of picking up dogs and cats from local veterinarian's offices and shelters, promising to find them homes, but instead killing them in the van within a few minutes, and then dumping the bodies in various regional dumpsters. These poor animals never even made it out of PETA's pickup van alive! (6)
Elimination of pet breeding a stated goal of Animal Rights groups, as per their twelve-step convention platform. This platform was printed in "Animals' Agenda" magazine in November, 1987 in an article entitled "Politics of Animal Liberation" by Kim Bartlett. Item #10 states:
We strongly discourage any further breeding of companion animals, including pedigreed or purebred dogs and cats. Spay and neuter clinics should be subsidized by state and municipal governments. Commerce in domestic and exotic animals for the pet trade should be abolished.
Are things becoming a bit clearer now? The animal rights groups have admitted upfront their agenda to end the pet trade. And the aggressive push for spay/neuter, sales bans and over-regulation of breeding is all part of that agenda to end pet ownership. It's a goal they have been progressing for the past 30 years. And claims of "abuse" and "overpopulation" are tools used to achieve that end.
We need to preserve the gene pools of our breeds of dogs and cats if we expect to have pets in the future. We all want to have pets a few years down the road, don't we?
Well, most of us do, but not PETA and other radical animal rights groups. PETA's Ingrid Newkirk has stated:
"In the end, I think it would be lovely if we stopped this whole notion of pets altogether."
and
"If people want toys, they should buy inanimate objects. If they want companionship, they should seek it with their own kind."
So PETA would be happy if pets went extinct, but I doubt that it would be OK with the 2/3 of the households in the US who enjoy having pets to enrich our lives.
Pet Population Problems are Grossly Exaggerated
The number of animals killed in shelters needs to be viewed in perspective. Let's look at some REAL facts and figures.
According to the 2011-2012 nationwide survey conducted by the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association, there are 165 million owned animals in the US. The numbers killed in shelters, an estimated 3-4 million, is less than 2% of the total number of all owned animals in the US.
And those killed are not all OWNED animals. There is a large population of unowned feral cats in the US. Nationwide, over half the shelter intakes are feral cats and their kittens. These should be trapped, neutered and released, not killed.
Considering that there are probably countless millions of feral cats out there to add to the total numbers of owned dogs and cats in the US, the percentage of those killed in shelters is minuscule. By the way, feral cats are not going to line up to comply with the law and be sterilized. Spay-neuter laws won't affect their numbers one whit.
Next, a goodly percentage of those animals who are killed are aged, ill, injured, aggressive, or brought in for owner-requested euthanasia. Another fun fact: In California in 2010, a full 11% of animals listed as shelter intakes were DOA. Yet these already-dead animals count as shelter intakes.
The APPMA survey further informs us that a full 78% of owned dogs are ALREADY spayed or neutered, and a whopping 88% of all owned cats are also spayed or neutered. So where are all these dogs and cats that need to be forcibly neutered?
They exist solely in the overactive imagination.
ANIMAL ABUSE IN OTHER COUNTRIES - PET IMPORTATION INTO THE USA
David Duchovny is quoted as saying that other countries "control stray dog populations by poisoning, hanging, throat slitting, beating to death, electrocution, and shooting."
What do Mr. Duchovny's statements about the inhumane treatment of dogs in other countries have to do with the conditions of dogs living right here? Absolutely nothing.
Abuse of animals is a separate issue from pet population control issues. Correlating animal abuse with population issues is a common logical fallacy. If there is any relationship, it is one of the US supporting abuse in other countries. US rescue groups import animals from these other, less humane, countries on a regular basis.
Why? Because we have a SHORTAGE of adoptable animals here in the continental US. Check out the websites of such groups as "Compassion Without Borders", "Save a Sato", "Dogs Without Borders", "Animal Rescue Team Taiwan","Pets From Paradise" and many others. By importing from areas with purported abuse, we only perpetuate the cycle of animals raised under poor conditions.
According to the illogic presented in the Huffington Post article, it's not OK to breed our animals here in the US under regulated and humane conditions, but it is fine to import them from other countries, when they are bred under unknown, possibly abusive conditions? There have been so many instances of dogs imported by "rescues" exposing US citizens and animals to rabies and other problems that the USDA is currently writing regulations on the importation of puppies.
All in all, over 300,000 dogs are estimated to be imported each year (7), and even more are smuggled into the country illegally. (8)
Shelters in the New England states have to import dogs because they don't have enough to fill the demand. "North Shore Animal League" has made this into a full-time business. There are tens of thousands of dogs being imported to fill New England shelters that would otherwise be empty. And now, the New England Federation of Humane Societies recently held a conference in Maine. One of the topics for discussion was:
"New England is Running Out of Kittens! Discussion of kitten importation and how we can get ahead of the issue." Facilitated by Bert Troughton, ASPCA (9)
I guess that pretty well blows the assertion out of the water about one cat producing 420,000 kittens. All New England would need would be one lone cat to supply them with all the kittens they would ever need.
THE TRUTH ABOUT PET "OVERPOPULATION"
Why the need to relocate and import dogs and cats? After all we have "overpopulation", right?
WRONG. The facts and figures paint a different picture.
Acording to shelter statistics recently assembled, there are approximately 3 million dogs and cats killed each year. Acording to shelter expert Nathan Winograd:
"How many need to find new homes? If shelters are doing their jobs comprehensively, just over 2 million (3 million on the high end). The remainder should be increased reclaims or in the case of feral cats, TNR'd." (trapped, neutered and released)
Winograd recounts that there are 23 million homes opening up each year for dogs and cats. Four million homes will adopt a shelter pet. Another 17 million have not decided where they will obtain their new pet, and could be influenced to adopt from a shelter.
"So, 17 million people for 2-3 million dogs and cats. Has this happened anywhere? Yes, there are many communities which have hit the 90th percentile in save rates. How long did it take them? They did it virtually overnight when new leadership committed to the No Kill philosophy and passionate about saving lives replaced long standing bureaucrats mired in defeatism and excuse making." (10)
So yes, Ms. Gauld, we CAN adopt our way out of this. We already have. We have a shortage of pets. Maybe someone needs to speak up and say, enough with the sales bans and the spay-neuter rhetoric. It's time to start breeding some nice animals before all we have left is street strays from distant lands where abuse is rampant. Do we really want to support the system of abuse in other countries as detailed by Mr. Duchovny?
The statement that breeding causes shelter animals to be killed is absurd. It makes about as much sense as saying that no one should have a baby as long as there are homeless people on the streets, or kids in orphanages. The logic is the same as that which our mothers used when they implored us to eat our peas, because there are starving children in other countries. Such statements are light on logic and heavy on guilt.
Again, why is anyone listening to the hypocrites over at PETA? Mandatory spay and neuter does not save lives; in fact, such mandates shorten the lives of our animals and cause increases in shelter intakes and deaths. (11) Perhaps a new law requiring celebrities to be muzzled in public would be more beneficial to society.
Our animals pay with their lives for these anti-animal spay-neuter laws.
Response to another article today that quotes inaccurate and misleading information from HSUS on purported pet "overpopulation":
The HSUS is NOT a reliable authority when it comes to pet welfare issues. They have a stated animal rights agenda and are not supportive of animal ownership. HSUS urges shelters to kill animals as soon as any mandatory holding period expires. HSUS lobbied against no-kill legislation in California and Texas. They urged the judge in the Vick case to kill all the dogs, even the puppies! Luckily, the judge did not listen and those dogs have been successfully re-homed. If that wasn’t enough, HSUS embraced Michael Vick; a man who brutally tortured, electrocuted, and drowned numerous dogs, who threw his “pets” into a fighting ring to be torn to bits….the HSUS thinks Vick should be allowed to own a pet, and have partnered up with him and used him in their fundraising efforts. DISGUSTING.
Pet “overpopulation” is a thing of the past. In fact, it was known as long ago as 1990 that the pendulum was swinging the other direction. In 1973, 20% of the pet population was killed in shelters. By 1990, that number had dropped to 4.5%, and as of surveys from 2010 and later, less than 2% of the pet population is killed in shelters. Many of those who are killed are irremediably ill, seriously injured, or brought into the shelter specifically for humane euthanasia. (1)
There are 21 million homes for pets opening up each and every year. These homes could easily absorb the estimated 3-4 million adoptable pets that the shelters instead CHOOSE to kill. Shelter managers need to do a better job of getting the pets to the people who would adopt them. (2)
In fact, many rescues import dogs from other countries, because so many shelters in the US do not have enough adoptable dogs to go around. (3)
And let’s put a stop to the mantra of spay-neuter everything that moves. In most other countries (for example the European nations), spay-neuter is rarely done unless medically necessary, and they don’t have rampant “overpopulation”. Regardless, in the US today, over 78% of all owned dogs and over 88% of all owned cats are already spayed or neutered. (4)
Sterilization has many adverse health effects, including increased risk of many types of cancers. It exponentially increases the risk of osteosarcoma, which is extremely painful and invariably fatal. Sterilization greatly increases the risk of incontinence in females, bladder and prostate cancer in males, hypothyroidism, increased susceptibility to vaccine reactions; it increases noise phobias, fearfulness, and aggression toward humans. (5)
But perhaps the most sobering study from 2011 showed that females who kept their ovaries to the age of six years or later, or those who were never spayed, lived, on average, about 30% longer than those spayed at an earlier age. (6) You could have several more years with your female dog simply by keeping her intact. The one exception to this would be in breeds where there is a genetic predisposition to breast cancer. In those cases, early spay can be helpful to prevent breast cancer.
So let's stop repeating the silly notions that we have an overpopulation of pets and that we need to spay and neuter more. Both these theories have been disproven in numerous recent studies.
Dr. Karen Becker interviews Ted Kerasote regarding his book "Why Dogs Die Young". Some excerpts from the interview...
Ted had seen some data that indicated dogs in Europe tend to live about a year longer than dogs in this country....But European dogs do receive fewer vaccinations. Rabies has been essentially eradicated in Western Europe, so dogs that don't travel aren't required to get rabies vaccines.
Ted goes on to explain that probably the biggest difference between how dogs in Europe are raised versus dogs in the U.S. is, Europe doesn't spay or neuter at nearly the rate we do in North America....sterilization seems to have a significant impact on both the endocrine and immune systems of dogs.
Ted explains that when he talks about the spay/neuter difference in front of groups, he receives a lot of concerned feedback and even angry responses, particularly from folks in the shelter community. People in the shelter community make the point that sterilization is how we control the dog population in North America.
So Ted went on to research the effectiveness of U.S. shelter operations. He wanted to know why we're still euthanizing an estimated two millions dogs each year. What are the key factors?
Ted talked to a lot of people in shelter leadership positions, and it seems the problem is becoming more one of supply and demand rather than that no one wants those two million homeless dogs. It's more a problem these days of connecting people with the dogs they want – getting the right dogs to the right shelters for the people who want to adopt them.
Dr. Becker goes on to comment: I worked at a kill shelter as a younger person, and we firmly believed owners who didn't spay or neuter were simply uneducated. And I could do enough talking as an employee of the shelter to convince people they must spay or neuter. At that point in my life, I believed pet owners couldn't necessarily be trusted to know what to do, and I also believed dogs were healthier if they were spayed or neutered.
These days, I have to re-educate a lot of my clients … after I apologize. I've cried many tears in my exam room as I apologized for creating some endocrine-related disease or other by insisting a pet be spayed or neutered, many of them before puberty.
I just didn't know then what I know now. And it saddens me.
Ted reveals that another cultural dynamic he sees operating here is in regard to breeding dogs.
Ted might tell someone: 'Pukka's got good genes. I spent a lot of time looking for genes like his. He's clear for centronuclear myopathy. He's clear for PRA (a genetic eye disease). He's got good hips and good elbows. It might be nice to pass these genes on.'
The response is almost always 'You want to breed him?' in a tone that says clearly this is not a good thing. There is a small but vocal minority of the dog-owning population in this country that thinks breeding any dog is morally reprehensible.
Ted's response is, 'If you carry that line of thinking to its logical conclusion, there are no more dogs.'
To alter every dog sounds crazy to Ted. It also takes a lot of genetically healthy dogs out of the population.
Ted feels what spay/neuter has done in the shelter population is what narrowing the funnel of purebred dogs to those with exaggerated anatomical features has done in the purebred population.
Both strategies have decreased the genetic diversity of dogs. Choosing only certain popular sires in the purebred world, and spaying or neutering everything that moves in the shelter world, has created fewer and fewer good sets of dog genes out there. At the same time, it has increased the incidence of disease because we are providing ever greater opportunities for recessive genes to meet.
Ted doesn't believe people are thinking through the issue of long-term canine health when they take the approach to 'Spay and neuter everyone.'
The animal rights fanatics have worked long and hard to paint the image of dog breeding as abusive. Meet the next step in that process, brainwashing our children. Coming soon to a school library near you!
The POOR mothers, being forced to breed and raise puppies. We simply MUST rescue them! Those EEVIL breeders discard their older, retired females to go to new homes....how heartless they are! Thank goodness I became a "real dog". "Real dogs" never have puppies, do they? Of course not!
Animal rights kooks have admitted that they would rather see people on welfare instead of breeding dogs. They've made the act of running a small kennel so you can work from home now as morally objectionable as armed robbery or running a meth lab.
And now they have their very own book.
Kids Are Never to Young to Learn Empathy for Animals!
Dear friend,
Happy Tails Books has never before published a children's book because, well, we don't have children! So when Frances Smith, a teacher, came to use with a manuscript and photos for a children's picture book, we jumped at the chance to help her.
How I Became a Real Dog: A Picture Book, is "written" by Phoebe, Frances' adopted puppy mill survivor. The book chronicles the details of Phoebe's life as a mill momma and her subsequent release in words that children can understand, with pictures that are intended to teach children the reality of puppy mills and the proper care of dogs without scaring them.
We highly recommend this book as a gift for any children in your life. It's a positive "gateway" to animal advocacy and empathy for dogs who have suffered because of puppy mills.
