ADOPT OR FOSTER FROM A SHELTER - PLEASE DON'T BUY ANIMALS FROM PET SHOPS!

ALL pet shops that sell dogs acquire their animals from unscrupulous puppy mills. It is easy for a shop to claim, "We got this dog from a reputable breeder". But no responsible/ethical breeder will sell to a pet shop. You have no way to be sure where the animal comes from.

Pet shops place cute puppies behind a window and then encourage customers to hold them. The idea is to get the customer to believe that the "product" being sold is the best in the market. They also rely on people feeling bad about leaving the poor little puppy in a pet shop. If it is too sad to leave a puppy there why give money to continue the sad trade and ensure another puppy and another mother are exploited?

If your puppy ends up with genetic problems down the line, the pet shop will not help you. When after some days your puppy develops a terrible illness, the pet shop will not help you. When you have difficulty with housebreaking, the pet shop will not be there to take your call at 10 at night. When your puppy/dog gets runny eyes or is acting strangely, the pet shop cannot help you or give reliable advice. The pet shop is only concerned about one thing... Your money. After the sale is completed you are on your own.

Pet shops do not care about the puppies nor about the consumer. They only care about profit. Pet shops cannot tell you any personal stories about the parents of your puppy, nor can they tell you about the grandparents. You cannot call pet shops to tell them stories about your puppy like its first experience with training. You cannot bring your puppy to visit its parents nor do pet shops care if you bring a puppy back in for them to see (unless, of course, you're coming back to buy merchandise).

Pet shop owners/employees are all trained in the art of selling and being friendly. It is a cynical exploitation. Certainly some shops have reasonably nice areas for both puppies and customers. Part of the gimmick in selling is to impress the customer. Who wants to buy a puppy covered in filth, much less hold such an animal?

The sad, bad news is in what the customer does not see. EVERY purchase of a pet shop puppy condemns that puppy's mother to a life in hell. No justification can be made by thinking that you might be "saving" a puppy. What actually happens is that you have just purchased a female animal's continued misery. These pet shop dogs are not born in warm homes, they live their entire lives in a cage, sometimes in crowded and cramped conditions. These dogs were not brought into the shop in someone's arms, but in trucks... packed-in, just like old furniture and delivered as merchandise. How horrible for puppies to be taken from their mothers at 6/7 weeks of age, stuffed in a cage with other puppies and shipped off. Then to be kept in solitary confinement. We can imagine the fear these poor babies must live through. The maternal instinct is just as strong in dogs as in people and to have a whole litter prematurely ripped from a mother's side can have devastating and permanent emotional effects on both the mother and puppies. With every pet shop puppy purchase this practice is perpetuated. The breeders do not care about these dogs, they care about money

There is no justification that can be made for buying a puppy through a pet shop. No amount of trying to make it seem like it was the right thing to do can make up for the thousands of dogs that are in cages and the thousands of bitches giving birth to puppies every heat cycle. Nor can it justify the thousands of puppies/bitches that die in birth because they are nothing more than a means to an end.

This is not meant to be a criticism of anyone who has purchased a pet shop dog. Few people realize the extent of horror that their purchase has helped to perpetuate. They have no idea. If ONE person thinks, after reading this, and passes that cute puppy in the window and adopts a dog from a shelter, then this essay will have served its purpose. People must realize that buying a puppy from a pet shop is NOT wonderful or great.

Ask the Lamma Animal Welfare Centre, the HKSPCA, the SAA, or the veterinarians who treat the sick puppies about the condition of the dogs they see coming from impulse buyers and puppy traders.

Perhaps the next time you walk into a pet shop you will see what is behind that puppy face. That puppy face is NOT begging you to take him home, he is begging you to STOP the misery of 1,000's of dogs behind the scenes.