demonized pet stores

all across the Internet it is said DO NOT BUY FROM A PET STORE.
I use to be on that band wagon so much so I use to have a yellow
page ad stating I will help you find a good quality pup. I would
try to redirect the buyer to what I considered a reputable
breeder. I did this for years I actually got more calls off that
ad then on my pet grooming ad. The business I was actually
doing.

When I showed conformation my first breed was the loveable
bloodhound. I loved this breed very much. I was in a Local mall
and saw a big chain pet store. They had a bloodhound pup that
made me want to cry. It was under sized, thin,green phlegm was
oozing from his eyes and nose. He was the wrong color a color
produced by breeding the wrong two dogs together. His price tag
was double of what I paid for my show dog.

I was floored and from this one experience decided all pet
stores were bad. I even made a comment to the gentlemen working
at the store he could only boost the dogs good qualities which I
could not agree with. The poor pup was so sweet though and I
felt he was not long for this world.

I became so snobby that any dog bred not to show conformation
was garbage. As time went on all my show dogs died early ages.
the bloodhound ended up with a very horrid skin allergy, he also
was sterol, so I had to stop showing him. My boxer died of
cancer, another bloodhound at age 6 months old had to be put to
sleep for major genetic defects that effected the entire litter.
My show boxer bred to the second dog in the nation had 1 sub-
standard pup showable but not champion quality who ended up
having dog aggression issues so bad she was given to a man that
lived on a sail boat. She developed epilepsy and died by 3 years
old.

It was a sad time but my Obedience trained rescue beagle never
had to go to the vet except to be neutered.

Still I was with the rest. unless it was show bred it was
garbage and back yard breeders should be shot, and all pet store
pups come from horrid puppy mills.

I noticed that no matter how much I tried to educate my
customers and the poor souls that answered my adds, that they
would continue to buy from pet stores. I came to the conclusion
the public was just stupid.

Why were they going back over and over to these stores and
buying these sub-standard dogs. Ones that will cost them
thousands in vet bills and early deaths.

Being a pet groomer at the same location you tend to groom many
dogs from puppy hood to old age

as I was watching the so called sub-standard dogs age I noticed
the darn things were like energizer bunnies. I seen two that a
judge would disqualify go to the age of 20. this boggled my
narrow mind.

So I started spying on pet stores. Many reconfirmed my written
in stone ideas. One of them kind of confused me, their dogs were
not show quality but were decent.

When I saw new puppies come in for grooming. I would try to
guesstimate where they were bought. A few I thought were nice
turned out to be bought at the pet store. I thought maybe my
trained eye was going slack.

So I revisited some dog shows. I was not so impressed. many
breeds that in my time were great,seemed to be wilting. I saw a
group of what I thought were vizsla’s. only to walk up on them
to see they were Rhodesian ridge backs. Then I saw the German
Shepard ring icky they were doing wheelie’s, and their skulls
were so skinny.

The fox terriers seemed to have lost their muscle tones too. My
ideas of the perfect dogs did not match many that were in the
rings. most due to the breeds unpopularity and the breeders idea
of perfection, the popular breeds still seemed pretty uniform,
except the German Shepard.

I did have a few clients that did have retired show dogs. every
last one of them either had bad nervous, and aggression
problems, or just started deteriorating very fast.

I still did not get it.

I decided to breed parrots and got into color mutations which
got me pretty deep into genetics.

I am the type of person that if I want to learn something from
someone else I go to the top of the ladder. I do not like
wasting my time at the bottom with all the conflicting
information.

If I disagree with my vet I will call 3 of the top universities
in the country. So when I wanted to learn genetics. I contacted
the top mutation bird breeders in America even e-mailed some
outside of the states. I even joined an e-mail list which
involved the top genetic bird breeders in the world.

When dealing with genetics like fancy colors and such inbreeding
is a must in developing the color. A Color mutation or any
mutation at that arises when a species gene pool gets too small.
Nature tells this species that change must be in order for the
species to survive so mutations are formed. If this mutation is
successful in allowing the species to breed better or find food
easier or camouflage from a predator better it will thrive and
become a new species. If the mutation does not help the species
and the species continues to inbreed it becomes bottle necked
and dies out.

Genetics is a interesting subject and something anyone can
research on the web. The bird breeders seemed more honest then
lets say the dog breeders I was use too. Conditions that formed
from inbreeding were openly discussed. because of all my years
in the canine industry the similarities were way too obvious. So
I started researching breeding practices of dogs more closely.
Come time find out the fancy word Line-breeding is just a nice
way of saying inbreeding.

The epiphany took years to develop. once I processed it all and
even using my own personal experience with show dogs it was quit
obvious that things were not as they seemed.

It was like being in the twilight zone everything you thought
you knew blown to the wind.

Another dirty secret when inbreeding and it is well publicized
is that if you Line-breed you must be willing to cull. So the
public knows Culling means removing from the gene pool. and the
most economic way and sure way no one will see your mistakes is
killing the pup.

It is well written the death and suffering of commercial bred
dogs, Nothing is well written about the hundreds and thousands
of dead puppies it takes to produce a real champion.

I read a web site that was displaying a horridly inbred ( oops
line-bred) dog who won the Crups. it stated that if a breeder
does not line-breed (while showing this dog pedigree. which
pretty much made it its own grandpa.) it stated that if you out
cross then you are a back yard breeder.

novices read this stuff and have these old time people as
mentors. from my point of view the inbreeding is not from the so
called puppy mills its from the show people or hobbyist trying
to copy show people. Ask a breeder do you inbreed they will say
oh no I am against inbreeding, but I line-breed. line-breeding
can consist of half brother half sister, father to daughter and
visa versa, cousins, grandparents to grandchildren and so on. it
is not distant cousins as I was once led to believe maybe at one
time it was but not anymore.

inbreeding makes any animals fertility drop. Too much inbreeding
makes them sterol . The commercial breeders are not into small
litters. I highly doubt and have noticed they really do not
inbreed. very few of them do unless the broker ran across a
struggling hobby breeder you never see inbreeding in pedigrees
of commercial dog breeders. so the myth that pet store dogs are
all inbred is false.

I slowly started referring people to the one store I liked. I
was grooming a lot of dogs from that store and they were growing
up nice.

Then a new store opened in my area. All bells and whistles,
selling dogs for outrageous prices. some as high as $10,000
dollars. Not only that but they were selling sick and under aged
puppies. I never saw such sick puppies coming from a store, and
the teacup priced pups were growing to be even larger then
standard.

One of my long time turned friend customers lost her 2 Maltese
to old age. Lefty and Wiget the sweetest cutest Maltese in the
world. she was very sad so she told me she found the perfect pup
online, she was going to pick it up and wanted me to see it. She
brings in this little guy when she told me she paid 3 thousand
dollars I could not believe it. I asked her is the dog even AKC.
she checked and he was not. Her husband was mad so they went to
take the pup back and somehow got suckered into keeping it and
buying its sister.

a joyful moment turned nightmare. both pups got sick. The little
female was worse and was not expected to live. The little boy
ended up having no teeth meaning he was under-aged.

It took her months of no sleep to save the pups life who to this
day has a heart condition. the little boy needed knee surgery.

She joined a class action against the store which ended up on
NBC special report.

I started watching this store more closely their web site says
all the right things. They call themselves a kennel, It is
written exactly like a reputable place when in fact it is the
worse of the worse.

Because of this I decided I can do better. I decided to become
the thing I fought so many years to end.

my conclusion is demonizing Pet Stores that sell puppies and
kittens or even birds scares away those who would care and run
one properly, which only leaves room for the greedy mean nasty
people that make the industry dirty.

playing the reputable breeder card does not make one reputable.
this seems to be the norm across the net. so many lies who knows
what is reality any more.

When your young you known it all. When you mature your don’t

Author Ginger Pepple owner of Superstar Puppies LLC Davie,
Florida www.superstarpuppies.com