Rescue Journal

how much is that puppy in the window?

Alison  ·  Mar. 18, 2007

wilbur is one of my most favoritest dogs of all times. he is little, cute, funny looking and he snorts. he has two switches, on and off and both of them at times can be extreme. when he sleeps he is dead to the world but when he plays...omg he is sooooo funny. he is brave as a lion and if any beast even dares to be in the vicinity of his food, he will in an instant be hanging from their necks (including jazz!) but his bite is as dangerous as an old clothespin, it is really just meant for hanging on. and he can be so sweet and gentle with the others, even lola this week has been sharing his bed.

if he was even close to perfect, i could have sold him a hundred times over for hundreds of dollars each time. but he is not. he is a puppy mill/petshop dog and at not even 8 yrs old he is totally wrecked. he is a brittle diabetic, he produces about 3 full gallons of urine a day, and he always produces it on the floor in very large lakes. this one dog alone floods us out every night because his kidneys are shot from his diabetes. his bowels are just rancid from his diabetes too, and the smell that accompanies feces or gas would lay an army of sewer rats low. he is blind now so he doesn't zip like he used to and is cautious as he makes his way around, but he is getting better at moving and he is way faster than honey but not near as quick as jazz.

he gets crystals in his urine and goop in his eyes and he has had pneumonia twice from just drinking water and swallowing the wrong way cuz the pipes in his neck are too short and close together and don't function they way they really should. wilbur is pretty much a disaster. and he has been a long term disaster, each new health issue cropping up after another. i know that if wilbur had never made it to saints his life would have continued to be pretty horrid until someone finally just did him in.

wilbur came here barely 6 yrs ago after getting the boot from several homes. and that boot would have continued to kick him around because people who wanted him initially and then decided they didn't, could always find another idiot who wanted him too and his devastating cycle would have continued. heck, there are still people who innocently call me and think that they want him today. they want him because he is a pug and they want a pug and they have no conception that this pug is alot more than most humans could handle. they think his blindness and diabetes is cute! wilbur is not just a pug, he is a very ill, sightless, walking overflowing septic system who i happen to love deeply.

and he was intentionally bred this way for greed.

someone recently sent me the link for some large scale but now downsizing US breeders who were selling their stock at auction. i carefully read each breeders list...hundreds of this and that and more. i felt like vomitting. thousands of animals up for sale to anyone who wanted to breed. a thousand lifetimes of producing millions of profitable puppies like wilbur to satisfy our human needs.

it boggles me the horrors that man creates for money and to get what we want when we want it. we are truly a sick, selfish species....like wilbur, wilbur himself is not a horror, but his rejected wrecked life from birth to death had the potential to be one huge nightmare. and while he escaped the very worst, the very best is still not all that easy for him either.

puppy millers/puppy breeders/ puppy producers for profit/puppy "want to have one now...ooops now we don't"....,we are a shameful species.

Comments

Marisa

As unpopular as this sentiment is with many animal people, I even believe that "responsible" breeders who care deeply for their animals and find the best homes are contributing to the problem. One more home for a breeder's pups or kittens means one LESS home for a shelter animal. One more forgotten animal forfeited to the sting of the sodium pentobarbital needle.

Melanie

I forgot the all creatures is a big website,to get to the pictures this is the fastest link:

www.all-creatures.org/anex/index.html

Melanie

I have gone to see webites on puppy mills and it makes me so ill. I have also stumbled upon websites on what the meat on our table goes through. It is so unbelievable. I was so sick I cried for two days. I guess I was just ignorant to that fact that what was on my plate was a living,breathing,creature. With feeling and emotions and a personality! I never thought of the pain and suffering, I thought that there was a more human way of putting that meat on the table. Was I ever wrong! From that day on I pledged to be a vegetarian. I have not looked back since. I didn't know where to start. I never even knew anyone who was a vegetarian. Never mind telling my family, there was always meat with every meal. If anyone knows me one thing is for sure, when I put my mind to something I do it. I am proud to say I have been meat free for close to a year. It really forces me to be creative with meals, I have never been a better cook. Well that is what I hear from my husband! Who is a part-time vegetarian. Now he is seeing the benefits of being meat free(most of the time) and he is coming around to being a full time vegetarian. I know we both feel better, not only my body feels better but so is my mind. After all in china dog is considered meat. I would never eat my girl! I would kill anyone that would try, but why is it that we never think twice about eating pigs or cows or sheep, they may be considered pets. If you go to this website you can find out more info. Beware if you watch the video, it is disturbing.

www.goveg.com/factoryFarming.asp

Here is another for you all, even if you only have half a heart the pictures are disgusting!

www.all-creatures.org

If we could all live with knowledge we could all make better choices for ourselves and every living thing, including the eniviroment. Hey if your looking into being a vegetraian, why not google pro-meat, see the argument from both sides!

Heidi

It seems to me that in order to reduce the amount of animals in need of rescue is to 1. decrease the supply and 2. increase the number of homes able/willing to adopt animals.
I believe the spca has and does campaign for altering animals and has probably reduced the numbers that way but is anything being done to decrease the number of breeders and their supply? Do breeders have to be registered/liscenced? Does anyone officialy monitor them to ensure proper care of the animals? I also think there should be a luxury/designer tax payable by the breeders and the buyers.
The second problem is so many places will not accept pets or have strict limitations on animals. I think something needs to be done about this as well.
I would like to work on these issues, does anyone have any suggestions on how to approach/accomplish this? Would anyone like to help?

Deb

Are you sure he's blind, Carol? ;)

Really, there are so many dogs engineered for human pleasure, or greed, or stupidity, Pugs, Bassetts, Danes. Built in genetic problems and life-shortening physical problems, just because "we" can.

It is to weep.