Here is my comment to this piece, I am an attorney practicing animal law. I serve as an officer on the board of directors for my local animal shelter that has a government contract to provide animal control services four our community. For purposes of complete disclosure I will tell you I, own, show and occasionally breed pugs. A pug I bred won the breed competition at Westminster in 2012. Last fall I received a call from a fellow who had his purebred dog go missing. He searched his local shelter and put up lost dog signs. A woman called him after seeing one of his signs and told him his dog was brought to a mega shelter a few counties from where this man lived and where she volunteered. The man contacted the shelter’s director who told him the volunteer was mistaken and she didn’t have his dog. In the meantime, the man received telephone calls from witnesses who saw someone pick up his dog and put it into a vehicle. They provided a description of the driver and the car. I suggested the man contact his local sheriff and report the dog stolen and give them the contact information for the witnesses including the shelter volunteer. The sheriff was able to recover this man’s dog from the very shelter director who originally said they didn’t have his dog. She confessed to the sheriff she lied and told him she sent the dog to another rescue organization. This case turned out well because law enforcement took the case seriously and investigated. When desirable pet dogs become scarce but people still want to have a pet, they become more valuable. It is simple economics, the law of supply and demand. If you don’t believe me, just take a look at websites and see what some rescues are getting for puppies, especially purebred or small fuzzy mixed breed ones Many of these rescues have little overhead, they are run by someone out of their home and the dogs are cared for by volunteers who “foster” them. The get donations from the public to cover their vet costs and pet stores donate food and other supplies. While some of them are legitimate and acutally do rescue work, helping uwanted dogs find homes, provide veterinary care for injured or ill animals or help to find lost dogs owners and reunite them, some of the non-profit rescues that form have a board of directors consisting of friends and family and all of them are “employed” by the rescue. Their salaries make sure the non-profit makes no money. They get these animals from various sources, some are legitimate, but the trading and “pull fees” some places charge make the transfers of these dogs look much more like brokering and or purchasing at wholesale. Some get them like the mega shelter I talked about above, by theft. I know of a rescue in that discloses to the public their surrender policy. If you want to surrender your pet to them it has to pass a committee inspection for, health and temperament before they will take it. If it is “adoptable”, they will accept your surrender but if it isn’t, you have to take it somewhere else, like my community animal shelter. (If you want a link to their policy or my screen shot of their page, I will be glad to provide it. Just email me with “retail rescue” in the subject line. skessler2002@yahoo) When only desirable dogs are “saved” is that rescue or retail? It is really difficult to distinguish. The local long existing animal shelters are left with the task of real rescue but have to compete with the public’s donation dollars to do the job. This has to be fixed.
Posted on: Thu, 01 Jan 2015 17:01:57 +0000
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