I will never understand how people can be cruel to animals. This story breaks my heart.

My husband and I currently have a cat at our place who has to be kept in a kennel because his previous owners – they ran a kitty mill; no shit – had kept him in a cage for so long that he can no longer tolerate freedom. We don’t know what else they did because we can’t get close enough to him for an inspection.

He growls and hisses anytime someone so much as looks at him, while curling up in the nearest hiding place and making himself as small as possible. We’ve hear him meow at night sometimes – a ragged, desperate sound – but that’s the only time he ever meows.

He has a genetic defect that caused his legs to grow only a little, so that he has to scoot around on his belly and can’t sit up like other cats. The previous owners were using him as a stud to breed for this genetic dominant because some people find the stubby legs “cute.”

Most reputable cat breeders, however, do not; and some jurisdictions have even outlawed the practice of any breeding scheme designed to perpetuate this anomaly.

On Tuesday, we’re taking him to a unique no-kill shelter in the area where he’ll have the opportunity to enter a sort of kitty rehab program. They’ll also neuter and vaccinate him. We’re paying a steep donation for the privilege, although the administrator of the program says it’s unlikely he’ll ever be adoptable. Instead, he’ll probably live out his life at the cat sanctuary as one of their “mascots” and we’ll continue to make donations for his care as we’re able. 

May the assholes responsible for this, and for those puppy mills, rot in hell along with all the other animal-abusing losers out there.

I can’t read this article, I can’t look at the video if there is any, I just can’t.

If you’re looking to adopt a pet, chances are your local Human Society or SPCA has wonderful animals looking for a loving home. No they won’t be purebred, but then again they won’t have the problems purebreds tend to have. They’ll be beautiful mutts.

Just like your new President

Please remember to make sure that all members of the family aren’t allergic before adopting. If you have children and don’t know if they’re allergic, get them exposed to a friend or neighbour’s pet.

Devil’s Advocate: If you’re talking about stubby legs, your cat could be a munchkin. The thing is, the stubby legs are actually a naturally occuring mutation, so most cat breeder associations don’t actually recognize it as a specific breed, since there’s no standard for how they look like besides the short legs. Munchkins aren’t exactly unhealthy or whatever and their quality of life isn’t necessarily lowered due to the short legs, since they usually can jump and do what other cats do (of course, they just don’t jump as high, but they still do!). They just look really unusual.

That story is horrible. I can’t believe how inbred those dogs got… missing limbs?? WTF?

My husband and I currently have a cat at our place who has to be kept in a kennel because his previous owners – they ran a kitty mill; no shit – had kept him in a cage for so long that he can no longer tolerate freedom. We don’t know what else they did because we can’t get close enough to him for an inspection.

I’ve always heard that it’s very difficult to set up a kitty mill because of the differences in the ways that cats and dogs breed.  You could come up with a puppy mill just out of neglect, but you pretty much have to be actively evil to set up a kitty mill.  But I think you guys have already figured that part out.

Cats go feral pretty easily, and that’s probably what’s happened to your guy.  If they can get him accustomed to other cats, he’ll probably be much happier running wild at a sanctuary.

“I’ve always heard that it’s very difficult to set up a kitty mill because of the differences in the ways that cats and dogs breed.”

The hoarders who wind up with cats spilling out of their chimneys would seem to indicate that this isn’t the case.  Loads of people wind up with extra litters just by being a bit careless about when they get their girl-kittens spayed.

Its poeple like this (and I use the term “people” loosely) that make me want to believe in hell.

Right, but those aren’t purebreeds, and therefore wouldn’t be valuable.

The hoarders who wind up with cats spilling out of their chimneys would seem to indicate that this isn’t the case.  Loads of people wind up with extra litters just by being a bit careless about when they get their girl-kittens spayed.

But that’s not the same as what puppy/kitty mills do when they keep their animals in cages for their entire (short) lives and breed them to their close relatives until they get genetic problems.

An overpopulation of cats is not the same as a kitty mill.  At least hoarders are constantly bringing in new genes for the gene pool.

I don’t get why people keep miserable, mean pets around. They’re dangerous, they’re not happy, and you’re not happy, so why? And if it’s a big dog, it’s even worse.

Inbreeding is just one technique among several used to obtain desirable characteristics in a population.  The Manx genotype gets aborted as homozygous dominant, gives the typical Manx phenotype as a heterozygote, and the homozygous recessives are normal looking cats. Personally, I don’t give a shit what my cat looks like as long as he’s snuggly and healthy. But other people like to breed for appearance, and as long as they treat the animals well I don’t have a problem with it.

Puppy mills aren’t much unlike drug dealers.  A lot of ‘decent’ people buy puppies from the mills, just like a lot of ‘decent’ people buy smack, coke, and God-knows-what-else from drug dealers.  It’s easy to point at the mill operators and call them lowlifes, but they’d be out of business if they had no customers.  Supply-side outrage is understandable, but it might help to consider these numbers: the U.S. spent more for domestic pet care in 2005 than it did for foreign development assistance.  With general moral priorities so inclined, it’s not surprising that many people in the doggie market might not put a lot of moral weight behind their purchasing decisions.

That’s US government foreign development assistance.  Privately, we are actually pretty generous, though we don’t get up to Scandinavian levels.

Separately, that stuff doesn’t work incredibly well.  It’s good for stabilizing currencies and famine aid (which are hugely useful from time to time), but the NGO work is generally much more effective, dollar-for-dollar.  The essential problem is that if a government is so well run that the money donated doesn’t spawn heinous corruption, it is usually perfectly capable of solving problems without direct help from outside.

We had a cat that we suspected had been abused from when she was a kitten. I adopted her the day before she was due to be euthanized. She didn’t like other cats, didn’t like us at first, and had a very sore temper. She couldn’t stand to be touched or picked up. It took years of patience, but she eventually came around to trust us. She grumbled when I picked her up to hold her, but she actually liked it. I named her Mulder, after “The X Files”. Funny thing is that we had another cat named Scully who adored Mulder, and Scully followed Mulder around the house all the time, whether Mulder liked it or not. While Mulder started out as a grumpy and isolated cat, after a few years she calmed down and actually learned to trust us. I know that lots of abused cats don’t come around, but I’m glad she did. I still miss her. She died a few years ago. We gave her a happy life. I would love to know who had hurt her so badly when she was a kitten because I’d throttle those people.

Sheesh. My wife and I had to bail our stupid dog out of the pound this morning after he got picked up last night. Those other poor dogs had been there for 2-3 years and no one wants them. It broke our hearts and we wanted to take every one home with us.

You’re the shit DA for caring for that cat. My hat is off to you. One of mine has nerve damage that makes his left side not work real well and is, thus, the first cat I’ve had in a long time that requires special care. Milo’s slight gimpiness isn’t too hard to care for, but I have quickly regained tons of respect for those who care for animals with serious disabilities.

My latest foundling has the opposite problem from your bud’s agoraphobia; He absolutely goes crazy if he’s confined to anything smaller than a hallway. Probably because he was discovered locked into a freakin’ Weber barbecue grill that had been dumped into a creek bed. No more than 6 weeks old and left to die in a simply abhorrent way. Given it was high summer he couldn’t have been in the thing for too long, but long enough to be so encrusted with creosote that it took four baths to clean him off. Apropos to his origin and coloring - blacker than the blackest black times infinity… even after the baths - Jo went and named him Briquette.

Kudos to the groundskeeper at the golf course I work next to, a ground-zero of pet abandonment, for hearing and rescuing the poor little Briq. He’s a wizened old wind gnarled good ole boy, but he was so angry and saddened by the little guy that he was weeping like a baby. I don’t go to the SPCA for my cats, and I sure as shit don’t go to any breeders. I’ve gotten four cats - one sadly departed - from that golf course now and they’ve been among the best cats I’ve ever had.

Man… some people just fucking suck though. I don’t use words like ‘evil’ and ‘soulless’ so I’m struggling for appropriate adjectives here, but people who run these farms and abuse beings bred to adore us are about as low as you can get. Such a fundamental betrayal of an unquestioning trust is simply vile.

This just reminds me of John Stossel, the utter douche, who did a 20-20 program on puppy mills on the side of the puppy mills!  He accused the ASPCA and Humane Society of being way out of line and running these poor mom-n-pop businesses out of business in order to ‘corner the market’.

Stossel is such a douche.  If anything might be classified as liberal or beneficial to someone not rich and powerful, he’ll attack it.

This is how I have acquired my cats:

Arwen, Arrow, and Malfoy-the-cat:  from friends who had litters.  Arwen and Arrow have passed, but Malfoy is currently asleep on my bed.

Siren:  dumped on my front porch as a kitten, now sleeping peacefully in a laundry basket.

Diamond:  acquired from a shelter.  Currently glaring at me from the top of a dresser.

I have never, ever, ever gotten a kitten from a pet store or a breeder, and I never will.  There are too many good cats who are dumped or end up in shelters - poor little Diamond had been dumped with her kittens, and by the time I showed up the kittens had been adopted and Diamond was starting to go crazy from being in a cage for four months.  The shelter workers almost kissed my feet when I said I wanted to take her because they felt so sorry for her.

Caren Sun -

Anyone who would defend puppy mills should be forced to live like one of the dogs, including the forced breeding.  I cannot believe that even a Grade-A asswipe like Stossel would *defend* them.  Why does he still have a job????

Also, I apparently really like adverbs today.

Andrew, about one quarter of the dogs living in shelters and rescues are purebred/designer dogs.  Turns out a lot of the impulsive dumbasses who drop $800 on “fancy” dogs get bored with their new toys fairly quickly. 
No matter what kind of breed/mix a person’s looking for, they CAN find it at a shelter or breed specific rescue.

Of the four cats we’ve owned:

Boris - from the LA SPCA shelter (died at 14 - fucking poisoned cat food from China)
Natasha - a friend’s cat had kittens (died at 10 - cancer)

Keaton - local cat rescue group (turns 3 soon)
Annie - same local cat rescue group (turns 2 soon)

Keaton has a funny story, at least—apparently a homeless person found him wandering around and kept him in his cart until the cat rescue lady came along on her rounds.  He picked me when I was at Petco one day while the rescue group was packing up—he reached through the grate on his carrier and grabbed me by the arm.

They told us that Annie had spent some time with feral cats but was not feral herself.  She was very wary of us for a long time, but she and Keaton bonded immediately.  As far as he was concerned, he was her mommy and took care of her from day 1.

If there’s one think I hate, it’s puppy mills and back yard breeders. We had a really tragic incident in my neighborhood about 4 years ago that made the national news. My neighbors bought two pit bull pups for breeding purposes - thought they could make a few extra bucks mating them and selling off their puppies. The puppies were the sweetest dogs ever, but completely untrained and unsocialized. They used to tie them up in the basement with a long leash that allowed them them to run as far as the sidewalk. The puppies would jump on any dog or person walking by, looking for affection and attention. Other neighbors said that they often saw the dogs being hit and teased by the family’s children in full view of their parents, who did nothing to stop it.

Long story short, the left the two dogs at home with their 11 year old son. The female had just gone into heat. No one knows what exactly happened, but the theory was that the boy was teasing the female, she attacked him and the male joined in, killing the boy. It was definitely not the dogs’ fault, as far as I’m concerned, and the mauling was not because the dogs were pit bulls, either. The dogs should have been trained and socialized. They should have been neutered if the family were going to keep them as pets. The parents should have made taught their children to treat the dogs with respect. In short, ignorance, neglect and greed lead to the death of a sweet little boy and the euthanization of two really nice dogs. I really think that no one should be able own unneutered dogs without some kind of licence.

A lot of people buy dogs from breeders that they would never think of as “back yard breeders”—but they are.

Reputable breeders are the ones you have to be on a year or more waiting list to get puppies from, because they breed rarely and carefully and produce puppies so healthy and excellent there’s a demand for them.

If you found them in the paper or somewhere else and were able to get a puppy within a year, and/or if they didn’t subject you to close scrutiny before allowing you to adopt a puppy? Guess what, they’re back yard breeders.

If they don’t provide you (without your asking) with papers on the health clearances of the puppy’s parents—hip clearance, eye clearance, these are different from general papers of good health from a vet and very expensive to get—they’re backyard breeders.

If they don’t make you sign papers saying that if you can’t keep the dog it comes back to them, backyard breeders.

I’m still deeply conflicted about even the most “careful” and “responsible” breeding of certain animals for their physical traits when millions of other animals are dying for lack of the resources to care for them. But people who insist on buying from breeders should know that the cachet of saying “I’m a breeder” means nothing, and there’s a huge difference between the methods of people who breed because they love the genetics of a breed and people who breed primarily for profit or narcissism. People who breed for profit are people who breed for profit, period, and they’re scum.

I just received this email from a reader who lives near the puppy mill in question:

I read your column everyday, and how happy I was to see this.  I live in the gated community where the owner of the Puppy Mills lives.

A raid on the run down house where the majority of puppies were found pointed law officers to our little community where the owner lives.  They raided her house, as well as another house that she owns which is adjacent to my property.  What is astounding was that these last two raids were in houses worth around $800K each, and none of us neighbors knew about this – each house sits on 5 acres and is not visible from the neighbors.

We had heard dog barking in the house and talked to our home owners association about it, they questioned the owner who said her elderly mother lived there with her dogs.  We were shocked but not surprised when we awoke to police cars and animal control all over.  It turns out that no one lived in that house and there were a bunch of puppies in cages in the garage.

My regret is that we did not push this farther, trusting that the owner was telling the truth.  We love dogs and have three which are part of our family.

We don’t know what will become of the case, but as they say in South Carolina where I was born—they should put them under the jail house.

Keep up the good work, my dear.

I’m currently between cats, but I got my last one from a shelter. I wanted to rescue a black cat, because they are harder to place and I keep my cats as indoor pets, so there’d be no threat from prejudiced neighbors. I looked at several, but they weren’t warming up to me. I ended up going into the parking lot to cry because I didn’t want to leave without helping an animal, but I wanted one with mutual affection. Then one of the volunteers came up to us and offered to show us another animal. “I saw you were looking at the black kitties, and this one was napping, so you probably didn’t notice her…”
We went into the adoption room with the cat and she walked one circuit around the little room then came over, looked up at me, meowed, and jumped on the chair my DH had vacated. There was no question at that point but that she would be ours. She was probably about 16 when a brain lesion took away her ability to swallow.

Before that, we had Keiko, a lovely Siamese mix who was found by one of Allan’s coworkers. She’d actually seen a man toss a bag out on the highway while moving at full speed. Something bothered her about it and she pulled over to see what was there. 3 kittens. One already dead, one with a head injury (didn’t make it through the night at the vet’s) and the survivor. The veterinarian gave us price breaks on the initial work—she had some parasites to get rid of, and we needed special advice on feeding her because she was too young even for kitten food. She threw up her first couple of meals, and it turns out that when they are really tiny, canned baby food is easiest for them to eat. Her life still ended up being short—FIV-induced lymphoma was cutting off her breathing when she was only a year old—but until that point, she’d lived a happy life.

For me, the satisfaction of giving a needy animal a home is far greater than I could ever have in boasting of a fancy purebred. And as has been said, even purebreds get lost, given up, or otherwise become available for adoption.

You’re the shit DA for caring for that cat.

It’s a genuine pleasure to learn that so many posters here would do the same, or already have. It kind of restores my faith in humanity.

I’m currently between cats, but I got my last one from a shelter. I wanted to rescue a black cat, because they are harder to place and I keep my cats as indoor pets, so there’d be no threat from prejudiced neighbors.

I got my cat, Harriet, from a family that was moving and couldn’t keep her. I also got another cat, Roscoe (who’s no longer with me), at the same time. Harriet’s a tuxedo cat, but Roscoe had a completely black coat. The family had adopted both of them from a shelter.

They were wary at first because it was the week before Halloween, and they didn’t want to give a black cat away so folks could fuck with it.  I was, quite honestly, shocked and saddened. That people would seek out a black cat to harm for Halloween was something that had never occurred to me.  (Once they saw me with the animals, though, they softened.  They called me the next day, rather than waiting—I had Roscoe for 3 years but Harriet has been with me for 8.)

My dad is a veterinarian. My first job in H.S. was working in his clinic.  I’ve always been around companion animals. I’ve seen sooooooo many people that just adore their pets. That folks would do this kind of shit still shocks me. It shouldn’t, but I guess I do that inappropriate generalizing stuff and assume that people love and care for and spoil their critters like I do.

I need to go hug my cat now.

He accused the ASPCA and Humane Society of being way out of line and running these poor mom-n-pop businesses out of business in order to ‘corner the market’.

I don’t buy for a second that you can’t make a good living by following the rules.  Stossel is such a jackass.  And these puppy mill breeders are greedy and LAZY.  It’s one thing not to give a couple hundred dogs proper veterinary care.  It’s another thing entirely not to give them food or water.

It’s a genuine pleasure to learn that so many posters here would do the same, or already have. It kind of restores my faith in humanity.

Yes! If only everybody could have a dangerous, feral animal in their homes. That’s such a good idea.

I’m currently between cats, but I got my last one from a shelter. I wanted to rescue a black cat, because they are harder to place and I keep my cats as indoor pets, so there’d be no threat from prejudiced neighbors. I looked at several, but they weren’t warming up to me. I ended up going into the parking lot to cry because I didn’t want to leave without helping an animal, but I wanted one with mutual affection. Then one of the volunteers came up to us and offered to show us another animal.

I have a cat who doesn’t like me most of the time.  But it kind of amuses me, so I don’t fret much about it.

I’ve never had a cat that was not black.  I’m not sure how this has come to pass, it just seems to be the way things work out.  I love black cats and feel like there’s something wrong with my house if I don’t have two black cats in it.

When my 20 year-old black cat of Siamese and Bast-Only-Knows origin was taken by cancer a couple years ago, I went off to the Humane Society once I couldn’t stand having only one cat anymore, and went looking for the youngest cat in residence.  (I admit, I am selfish.  I want my pets with me as long as I can possibly have them.  It’s too hard on me to lose them after only a year or so.)

There sat a fluffy 8 month-old black female kitty they were calling Tinkerbell, and I asked to visit with her.  She shied away from me, hissing and scratching.  Admittedly, this hurt my feelings and put me off.  I was going to look at another cat, when she launched herself at my teenaged son and began purring like a godsdamned jackhammer.  She was so loud!!  She was ALL OVER the boy, primping and fluffing and purring and chirping and showing him that she was very beautiful and totally meant just for him.  He looked at me and made the strangest face.  “Um…Mom?”

Tinkerbell came home with us, and was promptly rechristened Lulu, after the FFX character.  “She’s smart, she’s beautiful, she’s deadly talented, and if you piss her off, she’ll set your ass on FIRE!”

She has run hot and cold on me in the past two years.  Some days, she’ll sit upon my head and purr while I work or nap.  Others, she’ll hiss and bite and scratch, completely unprovoked.  She has only JUST made a tentative peace with the dog, after beating him up on more than one occasion for the crime of being a dog.  But always, throughout, every day, she has clung to Elder Monster like a burr to a sheep’s ass.  She waits by the door for him to come home from school, and immediately throws herself at him at top speed, demanding snuggles and petting and treats.  And she gets it, immediately.  She has the boy well trained.

I don’t know what she’s going to do when he goes away to culinary school in two years.

MaggieB, my mom had a cat just like that when she was a teenager! She told me that the cat hated just about everyone and was vindictive to boot - a family friend shooed him away too roughly when he was a kitten and the cat would never miss an opportunity to piss in the guy’s shoes if he took them off when over for a visit. But he loved my mom and would either wait in the hallway for her or even sneak outside and come meet her half-way when she was walking back from school.

I really don’t understand why anyone would get a puppy from a store. If you want a purebred dog, fine. But find yourself a reputable breeder. Do the research and wait for a year or however long it takes. Having a pet is no less a commitment than having a child, IMO. The store-bought puppies are impulse buys because they are “cute” and they always end up in a shelter once the inevitable health and behavior problems start. I wonder how much smaller the population of animal shelters would be if the puppy mill operations were shut down once and for all.

SarahMC: I’ll take your word for it. Whenever I’ve adopted a cat (four in my life) I haven’t cared about breed and so just picked one and assumed it was a mutt. Who knows, maybe one of them was some fancy purebred!

a family friend shooed him away too roughly when he was a kitten and the cat would never miss an opportunity to piss in the guy’s shoes if he took them off when over for a visit.

*HOWL*

Sounds like dude wasn’t very well trained by the cats of his acquaintance.  Next time, he’ll learn to grovel properly!

I didn’t have a dog for the longest time after the black Lab I had been given when I was a toddler passed away when I was 11.  Nicky contracted pneumonia, and they couldn’t save the beast.  (He was monstrous huge!)  It hurt so much to lose him - he was just a puppy when my parents brought him home, and spent his days and nights glued to my ass - I couldn’t bear the thought of having my heart broken again like that.

In 2005, I caved in and got the most adorable yellow Lab/Aussie mix from the pound - about 3 years old and clocking in at 85 pounds.  We named him Murphy, fell head over hells for him, and we spoiled him rotten.  He was gentle and sweet and the biggest mooch that ever did mooch.  He developed an aggressive course of primary idiopathic canine epilepsy six months after we brought him home.  His vets fought hard to save him, and lost the fight.  We were completely destroyed.  We were not going to get another dog.  My husband finally understood why I had been “dog resistant” for so long.

It didn’t last long, though.  The Humane Society folks see the big neon green “SUCKER” sign on my forehead, and they position themselves just right with the critters they know are going to weasel in.  So now I have Whiskey Jack, a black Lab/Border Collie/Pit Bull mix who is as cute as a button, and as dumb as a bag of hammers.  He is, at this moment, sprawled across my lap, with my laptop perched upon his back, farting to beat the band and looking at me like butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth.  He was an “owner surrender” - or rather, a “give us the dog or this nice deputy here is going to arrest you for cruelty” surrender - so he’s a great huge bundle of neuroses, but those are slowly slipping away and turning back into a dog.

We’re no fans of pet store puppies either, and actually don’t know of any pet stores in town that sell puppies or kittens - they all partner with the Humane Society or other animal rescue organizations.  Even more abhorrent to me are the backyard breeders, though.  There was one handing out her business card at the mall today, toting a teeny “long haired chihuahua” around and giving her card to anyone who wanted to pet the poor, terrified creature.  My son had to drag me in the opposite direction, as I have a short fuse myself and was ready to give her the what-for.

DA, you are a freaking angel. I’m glad there are people like you in the world.

I don’t get why people keep miserable, mean pets around.

Nice people do it because they believe the pets can be rehabilitated. Backyard breeders do it for profit.

They’re dangerous, they’re not happy, and you’re not happy, so why? And if it’s a big dog, it’s even worse.

In shelters, most dogs with serious psychological problems are put down. But with patience and care, a mildly traumatised dog can be cured. It doesn’t matter what size a dog is - with the right training, any dog can be a good family pet.

Inbreeding is just one technique among several used to obtain desirable characteristics in a population.  The Manx genotype gets aborted as homozygous dominant, gives the typical Manx phenotype as a heterozygote, and the homozygous recessives are normal looking cats. Personally, I don’t give a shit what my cat looks like as long as he’s snuggly and healthy. But other people like to breed for appearance, and as long as they treat the animals well I don’t have a problem with it.

You’ve completely missed the point of the article. Backyard breeders and puppy mills inbreed badly socialised animals for short-term profit. This article isn’t about the origins of purebreeds - it’s about how the demand for cheap purebred pets causes animals to suffer. The alternatives, which many commentators have described, are buying from a registered breeder or a shelter. You seem to be equating boycotting puppy mills with picking ferals off the street.

For the record, Quo Vadis and Soma were both shelter kittens, while Roast Beef was from a litter of strays found in a bin. I donate what I can to the RSPCA, and can’t recommend the RSPCA shelters highly enough. Apart from desexing and vaccinating all animals free of charge, they make you take a test before you’re allowed to buy.

I have acquired all of my animals secondhand from shelters or postings on Craigslist by people about to dump them.  (Well, all of them except my snake.)  I have one lovely cat.  She’s gunmetal grey, but has these odd swirls of dilute calico along her sides and a ringed tail.  I have two dogs: a 2 year old Border Collie/Lab mix and a 5 month old Miniature Dachshund.  I’m 99% sure the Dachshund is full. 

There is a store in the DFW area called Petland, not sure if they’re national.  Anyway, I went there once to get a pinky for my snake and along one whole wall were tiny cages with puppies in them.  The cages were about 2x3, and had a grated bottom.  A lot of the dogs had diarrhea.  They had puppies as large as 10-12 week old German Shepherds in those tiny cages.  I was horrified.  I pretended to be interested in a dog and asked the manager for information on their breeders and she wouldn’t give it to me (red flag right there).  I told her I was appalled and I haven’t been back.  I have heard they charge upwards of $1500 for a puppy and finance them as well.  I have also heard they offer a 48 HOUR HEALTH GUARANTEE when reputable breeders guarantee their puppies free of genetic diseases, defects, and illnesses they were vaccinated against FOR LIFE.

You can rehabilitate ALMOST any animal.  There are few you cannot *tears*, but so be it.  But 90% at least can be.  In my old days of running a county, we replaced bad attitude employees at the animal shelter with ones with compassion.  The change in adoptions and euthanized critters was spectacular.  Being a place we had, by law, to take everything, we had to put some down lest they spread disease to others.  But with working the the rescute people and the Humane Society we accomplished what I consier marvels.  It’s like everything else, “with good will everything is possibole, with bad will, nothing is.”

I *wanted* black cats. My wife’s coworker overheard us talking about getting cats, though, and we wound up with two white farm cats instead. Couldn’t have worked out better. One died a couple of years ago at age 16 and the other is still hanging on.

Yes! If only everybody could have a dangerous, feral animal in their homes. That’s such a good idea.

So long as they know what they’re in for, and have taken the necessary precautions, yes. The people who raised him are dangerous; he’s merely the product of a poor upbringing. The idea that he should continue to suffer, or be euthanized because some people are fucking assholes, is incomprehensible.

/lurker mode off

I actually care for 3 “feral cats” that have become the block mascots. When I first moved here (Oakland… not far from downtown), there was a cat overpopulation problem. I finally got in contact with “Fix Our Ferals”, a charity that provides free neutering/spaying and re-releases the cats back into the neighborhood. That way they hold the territory and stop breeding. Plus they are a lot more mellower…

I originally had 5 cats roaming the territory. One was a male, and even though he got fixed, he had wanderlust. He, after a couple of years, never came back. One female tabby got hit by a car (sob!). We’re down the 3 female tabbies and they are adorable and sweet. They warmed up enough to me to let me pet them… one even lets me pick her up (known her since she was a kitten). They keep the rodent population down, so they are working cats as evidenced by the occasional “tributes” left on my doorstep.

Last year, I had to spend some money for the vet to help one cat who developed an infection. I almost lost her… it’s really hard trapping a streetwise cat! Especially one who’s been trapped before.

My city block pretty much adopted them. At least 2 other people on the block feed and water them, plus the occasional visit from the Fix Our Feral “Cat Lady”. They live pretty good lives for ferals… I wish I didn’t live in a “no pets” apartment.

/lurker mode on

I had to cuddle my cat (adopted at the Humane Society) after reading this thread. D:  Especially Echolalia’s anecdote. (Don’t get me started on “parents” in general who let their kids tease the pets. Then, when Kitty or Rover finally snaps at the little darling, they all of a sudden have a “vicious animal” on their hands…and the poor thing is usually put down.)

I’m really grateful the registration feature was implemented before this post. Otherwise the thread would have been hijacked by Michael McShitstain demanding to know why “you librals care about mere animals but you dont care about unborn babbies.” /spit

Oh, and I’m looking at the comment thread on King5. One of them provides more background on the backyard breeders…

The people who lived in that house in Gold Bar were renters and they are the ones that actually had the 155 mistreated dogs at that location…They own a house in Sultan…It is currently in foreclosure and going up for auction on Feb. 13. Look up the county records. They used to live there and were just starting to raise and sell dogs then the neighbors started calling the police because of the barking and they decided to rent in Gold Bar because it was on 9.5 acres and nobody would complain. I don’t have to tell you what happened next they really “got into the business” well anyways they rented their Sultan house out and the tenants came home one day to a notice of foreclosure on the front door. The irony of the situation is that he got turned into CPS on suspicion of child molestation not for the puppy mill and that is when they discovered the horrific puppy mill situation. Now he and his wife are back at their house in Sultan hiding out from what I understand. It has not gone to auction yet and apparently they have no where else to go. I have friends in this neighborhood and they have called police, news stations, etc. to no avail. So basically this guy is facing child molestation charges as well as animal cruelty yet still able to come and go as he wishes.

Who here is surprised at the child molestation charge? The same types think that both children and animals are mere property, to be done with as the “owners” please.

Animals are property. Just because I treat my cat like he’s my child doesn’t mean I don’t own him.

There’s no good reason ever to get the next family pet from anything other than a reputable animal shelter.

My cat is a vile, misshapen daughter of the dirtiest of alleys—and she is the most lovable animal on earth. My wife and I went to the shelter in the mistaken understanding that we would be selecting a cat. But it was more like she chose us.

What needs fighting is people’s stupid insistence on their predetermined choice of breed and coloration. It should be shown to be a type of discrimination that does tremendous harm. The temperament (I’d dare say the personality) of the animal is what’s really important. As it is with humans.

“Yes! If only everybody could have a dangerous, feral animal in their homes. That’s such a good idea.”

A feral or semi-tame animal is not necessarily a dangerous one.  One of my cats was all but feral—her mom was tame but stray and she was at least four weeks old before she interacted with a human at all—when we got her.  She was terrified of people and spent her first two months with us hiding behind the washer/dryer, being pretty much the polar opposite of a threat.  The investment on my part was time, patience, and being willing to feed and clean up after a cat while not enjoying any of the benefits, not a willingness to risk physical injury from a rampaging cougar writ small.  I’m not saying you never find the two traits in conjunction, but it’s not a foregone conclusion that an animal that needs to be rehabed in order to be a pet is dangerous.

I said “mere property,” Entomologista. Yes, you own him; that doesn’t mean you’re legally or morally entitled to mistreat him.

You really don’t seem too bothered by this sort of cruelty. It’s disturbing.

Animals are property. Just because I treat my cat like he’s my child doesn’t mean I don’t own him.

This has been said about wives many times over the eons.  And non-whites.  And the arc of history is slow, but it curves towards justice—and towards the recognition that rights ought to be based in sentience, the capacity to feel, rather than in humanity.  Human-ness, like whiteness or maleness, is too limited a category for what is deserving.

Animals are property. Just because I treat my cat like he’s my child doesn’t mean I don’t own him.

It also doesn’t mean that you can treat your pet any way you please.  There are these little things called “laws” that prevent you from, say, throwing your cat out the window or not taking your dog to the vet when he gets an infection.