Article - Breeding Misery - NY Puppy Mills

Sources in the Finger Lakes Region report that there are about 60 puppy mills in the area, most of them Mennonite, and many of the owners are former Lancaster County residents! (This article is purchase-only; it is not online.) You may cross-post.
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Canandaigua Daily Messenger
Yates County, NY

January 30, 2005
Local News

BREEDING MISERY?
The Humane Society of Yates County aims to rid the area of puppy mills.

By ANNE JOHNSTON / ajohnston@mpnewspapers.com

From the road, it may look like a well-kept farm, pretty and peaceful.

Hidden from view, however, could be a puppy mill - something animal welfare advocates consider nothing short of a torture chamber.

A puppy mill is a commercial breeding facility that mass-produces dogs, solely for profit, in poor conditions. According to the Humane Society of the United States, the dogs in puppy mills are kept in cages too small for them, with poor nutrition and little or no veterinary care. Sometimes, dogs with open wounds are forced to eat, sleep and sit all day in their own excrement. Dogs no longer of use are killed.

The Humane Society of Yates County believes there are between three and five dozen such puppy mills in its county alone.

"That could be thousands of dogs in terrible conditions, " said Lou
DeSantis, a member of People for Animal Rights of Central New York, who has visited local breeders - ostensibly as a buyer - and has taken part in roadside protests in the area.

The Humane Society of Yates County does not endorse the protests, instead choosing other approaches to try to rid the county of the growing problem.

"Our chief goal is to ensure compliance with the law and educate the public, " President Rolf Zerges said.

According to the Humane Society of the United States, many dogs sold in pet stores come from puppy mills.

Officials with the Penn Yan-based organization became concerned about puppy mills several years ago, Zerges said, when they began to receive complaints from people who had purchased animals from local farms only to find they had diseases and other problems.

About two years ago, the society formed a task force to document abuses and increase public awareness. But with an influx of Mennonite farmers from Pennsylvania, some of whom breed dogs, the battle is far from over.

"It's a moving target, " said Zerges, who noted that although puppy mills are not confined to the Mennonite population, there are several Mennonite farmers who have alleged puppy mills.

'It's heartbreaking'

Michele VanCoppenolle, vice president of the Yates humane group, got a
first-hand look at a puppy mill after a neighbor who worked for a pet store visited the puppy mills that supplied the store and found that "the conditions were unbelievably horrible, " she said.

VanCoppenolle accompanied her friend on a visit to one of the farms, in the town of Milo, ostensibly to look at a cow. She said she saw about 60 small-breed dogs were housed in a cold, filthy barn. They stood on wire caked with fecal matter and, since their feet never touched solid ground, their long nails curled around until they began growing into the pads of their feet.

One Scottish terrier, she said, was so desperate for attention that she stepped all over her own puppies, trying to push her nose through a small, jagged hole in her cage and cutting her face.

"That image haunts me, " VanCoppenolle said. "You think, that's their life - day in, day out. It's heartbreaking. "

VanCoppenolle and her friend also saw a pug with an untreated hernia the size of a grapefruit on its abdomen and an eye matted shut by an infection. She inquired about the dog, and whether it needed veterinary care. The farmer "pulled it out by the scruff of the neck, gave it to me and said, 'She's of no use to me,' " VanCoppenolle recalled.

Formal abuse charges were filed through the Yates County Sheriff's Office, and the case file included both photos and reports from a veterinarian. But the case was not pursued by the District Attorney's Office, and the D.A. did not recall it. However, VanCoppenolle later heard the farmer was cited with operating a commercial breeding facility without a license.

The pug, which VanCoppenolle named Grace, made it through a day-long surgery in which she was given only a 30 percent chance of survival. She's blind from the eye infection but "she's a happy girl, " according to VanCoppenolle.

Grace and another pet of VanCoppenolle's, a three-legged dachshund from a Missouri puppy mill, serve as reminders to her about the work to be done.

"They're in a loving home and I think, 'How many years did you languish like that, and how many others are?' " she said.

'Big business'

With tips from the public and calls to breeders who advertise in area
newspapers, the Humane Society of Yates County has tried to figure out just how many puppy mills are in this area.

"We have documented somewhere between 40 and 60, just in Yates County, " Zerges said.

Ed McGuigan, director of the Ontario County Humane Society, said he has had no reports of anything that would classify as a puppy mill.

"I couldn't tell you where any of them are if there are, in fact, any in Ontario County, " he said.

Each alleged puppy mill in Yates County, Zerges said, has anywhere from 20 to 100 dogs. But people should not necessarily expect to hear a lot of noise from such a facility. VanCoppenolle said some puppy mill operators engage in a practice called "debarking " - jamming a steel rod down a dog's throat to sever the vocal cords.

The pug she got from the Milo farm is debarked and sounds like a frog when it tries to bark. "It's a real hoarse, crackly thing, " VanCoppenolle said.

The vet believed the pug's long-standing hernia was caused by so many
pregnancies that her abdominal muscles weakened, causing her internal organs to spill out.

According to Zerges, bitches at puppy mills are bred their first heat and continue every six months until they are no longer of use.

"Their job is to just crank out pure-bred puppies, which are sold to dog brokers and then to pet stores, " he said. "It's big business. "

According to www.prisonersofgreed.org - a Web site set up by a group called the Coalition Against Misery - the puppy industry in one county in Pennsylvania, Lancaster, is valued at $4 million per year. Lancaster has a high population of Mennonites, some of whom have moved to upstate New York for cheaper land prices.

Humane society officials stressed that plenty of conscientious breeders take good care of their animals. Those people, they said, are happy to show prospective buyers the lineage and the conditions in which the dogs are raised. Anyone who doesn't, they contend, has something to hide.

"If they refuse to show you, that's a real red flag, " Zerges said.

"It's like playing Russian roulette, in a way, " Zerges said. "Studies have been done by the Humane Society of the United States that show roughly 48 percent of dogs that come from puppy mills will end up with some kind of genetic problem or disease. "

Public asked to help

Publicized cases of animal abuse tend to provoke community reaction. For example, the case of a cat tortured to death in Penn Yan was followed by a big turnout at a July 8 forum the Yates County Humane Society held.

"The room was full, " Executive Director Don Cass said, adding that there was "no question " the story of the cat played a role.

But the humane society believes the low-profile nature of puppy mills makes them harder to fight. "People aren't aware of puppy mills. They're always hidden from view, " VanCoppenolle said, adding that few people ever see the inside of one.

Another hurdle, she and others said, is that the efforts of those opposing puppy mills are sometimes perceived as anti-Mennonite or against farmers who are simply trying to make a living.

"It's a sensitive thing, " Zerges agreed.

There has been some progress, as far as Zerges and other Yates County animal lovers are concerned. For example, a Penn Yan pet store that was the subject of several complaints and lawsuits, Gizzard's Pets and More, went out of business. Cass believes it was a combination of growing awareness of puppy mills and "people in the community knowing how bad their place was. "

Cass, a former police officer himself, also is hopeful about strengthening relationships with Yates County law enforcement.

The humane society has its own licensed cruelty investigator and is seeking an agreement with the sheriff's office that would have the investigator first check out a case when a complaint is called in.

Sheriff Ron Spike, who has an animal control officer, said he has some
concerns about such a set-up, such as training and certification. But Spike said he believes the two agencies' relationship is a good one, with a "team approach " to cases. The relationship was further strengthened this past summer, the sheriff said, when the humane society agreed to help find homes for some of the 500 to 600 dogs picked up by the animal control officer this
year - dogs that would otherwise be euthanized.

If the humane society and the sheriff's office are not made aware of poor conditions in dog breeding facilities, however, they can't intervene. Neither can other agencies, such as the state Department of Agriculture and Markets, or the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which also regulates breeders.

"We really need the eyes and ears of the community to help us out and let us know where these places are so that we can do something, " VanCoppenolle said. "If people turn away, there's nothing we can do. "

Posted on SHARE Yahoo group Jan. 31, 2005