Adopt, Don't Shop

Oreo was born in a puppy mill in rural Indiana, a place with cramped cages full of pregnant dogs, newborn puppies, and dirt. As if these horrible conditions were not enough, the dogs were not given any love or comfort. Oreo was taken away from his mother within a week of his birth; he never even got to see what she looked like.  When he was just four weeks old, he was put into a crate filled with other puppies and sent on a sixteen hour long journey from Indiana to New Jersey.

The truck contained a total of six crates, all piled one on top of another. Confused and alone, Oreo could do nothing but pant and bark, desperately wanting more food and more space. After a long journey, he arrived in New Jersey. He was then delivered as an object to be sold in a pet store, where he was placed into a small wooden kennel with thin bedding made of cedar wood.

Oreo’s sister was placed in the same enclosure. Because she was bigger and stronger than him, she received much more attention. Throughout the day, she jumped up and down on her hind legs in an attempt to display her cuteness to each loving family that passed their cage. Within a few days, she was sold to two sisters and renamed Jamie.

Later that same day, a family of four passed the pet store and decided to check out the facility. They had many requirements for their dream dog and, as a result of their misconceptions about shelters, they had decided that a pet store would be the best place to get a dog. As the family walked in, the parents realized that it would be impossible to leave without a dog in their daughter's arms.

Their daughter passed each wooden crib, smiling widely. At last, she saw Oreo. She stopped immediately. He was merely a little ball of fur tucked in a corner of the wooden crate, all alone. To the family, he appeared to be sleeping cutely and thus won their hearts; however, Oreo was shivering, curling his body into a tight ball to conserve as much warmth as possible.

Who wants to spend their life in a cage no bigger than their own body? Who wants to live in an unsanitary hovel without the love of any kind of companion? No person would want to live in these conditions, and no dog should have to either.

We, DGM, are a Girl Scouts Robotics team consisting of six middle schoolers who understand the importance of dogs in our life. We are part of a small group of individuals who truly recognize what goes on in puppy mills across the country.

There are plenty of puppies and dogs living in shelters and waiting to be adopted; we do not need more dogs coming into the world just to be treated badly and have their lives commercialized. You can help save puppies by banning puppy mills across the United States, making adoption from shelters the primary choice.

Most dogs sold in pet stores come from puppy mills. The Humane Society estimates that there are at least 10,000 individual puppy mills in the United States and out of those, less than 3000 are actually regulated by the US Department of Agriculture.

This means that over 7000 puppy mills are unregulated; as a result, animals are mass produced and forced to live in inhumane and unsanitary conditions, receiving little or no medical attention. Many states have recognized this rampant dog abuse and made the wise choice to ban puppy mills altogether.

New Jersey is one of those states and the bill banning puppy mills has been modified a few times to include the online pet market. This new bill would also ban outdoor pet sales such as sales at flea markets; in places like this, the animals being sold often come from suspicious sources. Additionally, the bill will require all pet stores to sell dogs and cats exclusively from shelters and rescue groups.

Puppy mills are bad for dogs everywhere. They are unlicensed mass breeding facilities which work in between laws, finding loopholes in order to continue their business. Their owners only care about increasing their profits, not the well-being of their dogs. On top of that, the female dogs do not get any recovery time between delivering litters, which is necessary for them to stay alive and healthy.

Dogs in puppy mills also receive little to no veterinary care. This leads to medical conditions including severe tooth decay, ear infections, blindness, and far worse. These health problems can also affect the puppies who are sold to other stores at only eight weeks of age.

In addition to these illnesses, puppy mills negatively affect dogs mentally, emotionally, and physically. Dogs begin to go crazy after being locked in a small wire cage for their entire lives. This restriction also causes emotional issues as the dogs begin to feel lonely and left behind. This can cause behavioral issues further down the line which is not good for their puppies. The dogs are not given the opportunity to play or exercise which shortens their lifespans and causes them to stop eating.

In addition to this, many female dogs are brutally slaughtered once they have reached their breeding limit. Nearly three million dogs are killed in puppy mills each year in America! That is way too many. These dogs’ lifespans are dictated by the amount of puppies they are capable of producing.

The harsh reality is that there are many more problems with puppy mills. Although there are laws restricting the actions of puppy mills, the owners find loopholes that allow them to horrifically mistreat the dogs. Puppy mill owners only care about their wealth. While the dogs live in their urine and feces, drink contaminated water, and eat old food covered with bugs, the owners live happily.

By adopting, you would give a home and life to an animal already on this planet, not an animal that was born exclusively to be sold. Additionally, once a dog is adopted, the shelter is able to bring in another homeless or unwanted dog to care for rather than letting them be euthanized. In effect, more and more animals are saved as more and more get adopted. This cycle can only exist if puppy mills are banned.

Now that you know how horrific puppy mills are, do not just sit there. Help us ban puppy mills across the country and spread the word. Use your voice for creatures that do not have the same privileges that you do. Animals should not be born for commercial purposes— animals have lives of their own.

By signing this petition, you are helping us ensure that ALL states introduce and implement bills that ban puppy mills and thus encourage adoption.