Barking Up the Right Tree
Ten Tips for Finding a Responsible Dog Breeder and Avoiding a Puppy Mill Purchase
Is your heart set on a purebred or designer hybrid puppy? If so, here are some tips to help you find an ethical, responsible breeder and avoid getting sucked into a puppy mill purchase (see last week’s blog post).
First, I have a few questions for you.
Have you researched the size, temperament, and original purpose of the breed(s) you’re interested in? For example, be prepared for a border collie to watch your every move and herd most anything that moves, from livestock, to chickens, to small children. Siberian huskies are bred to pull and run, then pull and run some more. Can you say, mush? If you tend to spend a lot of time reading on your couch, get a dog that loves being a couch potato. If you run ten miles a day, find a canine companion with tons of energy to burn.
Have you considered adopting an adult dog instead of a puppy? There are plenty of mature purebreds in shelters and rescue organizations. Yes, I agree, puppies are insanely adorable. But if you’ve never raised one, or you have puppy amnesia, let me remind you — they are a sh*t ton of work. Always!
Now, onto finding a responsible dog breeder. Here’s how you’ll recognize her. (For the sake of my writing sanity and your reading sanity, I will refer to breeders with the feminine pronoun.)
The responsible breeder is passionate about the breed she fancies. Not only does she know the breed’s history, she’s a walking encyclopedia about their inherited health issues (every breed has them), temperament, and special needs. The reading material on her nightstand probably includes at least one breed-related magazine.
The responsible breeder takes pride in what she does and will want you to visit her facility and meet her dogs. Contrast this with puppy millers who don’t allow visitors — they have way too much to hide. The responsible breeder has an ulterior motive for insisting you visit. She wants to see how you interact with her dogs. She won’t sell her puppies to just anyone. By all means, visit! It is imperative to meet the mama of the litter and see how and where the dogs live. If the breeder says no to this, turn and walk away. Make that run away!
The responsible breeder likely has more questions for you than you have for her! She may ask you to describe your immediate family, other pets, prior dog experience, house and yard situation, amount of time spent at home, how much you’re willing to spend on veterinary care, and what activities you hope to share with your dog. If you feel like you’re being interrogated, that’s because you are!
The responsible breeder wants to show you all the paperwork pertaining to her dogs’ pedigrees and health clearances. She’ll take great pride in this, as it underscores her quest to enhance the breed and produce the very best puppies possible. Consult with the national breed association to learn which medical issues are pertinent. Puppy mills don’t provide documentation of health clearances because they don’t exist.
The responsible breeder insists that you accompany your puppy home. There’s no such thing as sending an eight-week-old puppy solo in the baggage compartment of an airplane. Puppy mill operators tend to have no qualms about this, although many offer a chaperone service for several hundred extra dollars.
The responsible breeder is happy to provide you with references, including people who have purchased her puppies in the past, other breeders, and the veterinarian who cares for her dogs.
The responsible breeder will ask you to sign a contract that details not only what she expects of you, but also what you can expect of her. It will include a health guarantee and spell out your breeder’s ongoing involvement throughout your dog’s lifetime. She will be an enthusiastic source of support and advice for you, and will want to be informed of any significant health issues that arise. No matter the reason or age, if the dog you purchased from her needs to be rehomed, she’ll want to be involved in the process. She doesn’t want any of her dogs to wind up in a shelter or passed from home to home.
The responsible breeder rarely produces more than two or three litters a year. She’s well aware of the amount of work that goes into caring properly for the health and socialization of her puppies. If she doesn’t have a pup that fits your timetable, she’ll gladly refer you to another breeder. Compare this to the average puppy mill website with multiple breeds and dozens of available puppies year round.
The responsible breeder does not typically produce designer hybrids. She’s always looking for ways to enhance the breed she loves. Breeding designer dogs detracts from this goal. The vast majority of intentionally bred mixed-breed dogs come from puppy mills.
The responsible breeder likely holds down a job outside of raising puppies. Veterinary bills for one sick dog can devour profits from an entire litter. Relying on breeding dogs to pay the mortgage and put groceries on the table inevitably leads to cutting corners on their health and well being. Go ahead and ask the breeder if she makes a living from selling puppies. If she laughs out loud, that’s an excellent sign.
How do you find responsible breeders? Ask people you meet at the dog park, on hiking trails, doggie daycare centers, or anywhere else people congregate with their dogs. Do some schmoozing at dog shows and local breed club functions. Pay an online visit to the national breed-specific association, (e.g., the Golden Retriever Club of America) that provides breeder referrals. Regardless of the recommendations you receive, you still need to do your homework to look for the green flags described above and avoid the red ones.
With puppy mills and responsible breeders at opposite ends of the spectrum (kind of like comparing flea poop to butterflies), there are definitely in between dog breeding situations. Stick to the guidance above and you’ll have the very best insurance policy that your new pup will have an excellent temperament and a lifetime of good health.
Have you had experience with a dog breeder? If so, I’d love to hear about it.
I have only met 2 responsible breeders in my lifetime, and I am old as dirt! My first husky came from a puppy mill because I was stupid and clueless. I realized the situation when I started meeting dogs who looked exactly like her, who came from the same greeder.
My second came from a wonderful breeder before I knew about rescues. I found him through an ad in Dog World magazine (clue to my age). He was across the country and we had several expensive long-distance phone calls (another clue!).He asked me loads of questions, as you describe, to make sure I would be a good home for one of his dogs. We had to wait until the pup was old enough to travel. One potential problem was that the contract stated that if the pup developed any genetic problems within a year, I could return him for a full refund. I pointed out that after a year, there would be NO WAY I would let go of him; so the breeder amended the contract to say that if there was a problem, I would keep the pup and get 50% refund...which of course never happened because his parents had been screened for genetic problems. That incredible dog died over a decade ago; his breeder and I still keep in touch. He quit breeding years ago.
Thanks for writing this Nancy!
As a reputable and responsible breeder of purebred dogs I’d like to add some additional information on finding and buying a purebred dog.
Something to be aware of with purebred dogs…
Purebred doesn’t always mean WELLBRED! Just because it ‘has papers’ or ‘is registered’ that doesn’t mean it is wellbred! A wellbred dog is bred to the written standard set by the breed club (the ‘parent club’ is who writes the standard, NOT the AKC or other registry). What does that mean? That means the dogs being bred LOOK like what the standard says they should. In other words, the Labrador Club of the US or ANY Labrador club states that there are THREE colors for Labs…solid black (no ‘charcoal’), solid brown/chocolate (no ‘silver’), and yellow (no ‘champagne’). Breeders who deviate from the written standards are NOT breeding with the intention of IMPROVING the breed! They are breeding just to line their pockets!
A responsible breeder would NEVER cross breed dogs! And let’s start by realizing that crossbred dogs are NOT ‘hybrids!’ A hybrid is a cross between two different species (think horse and donkey = mule). Crossbred dogs are just that, crossbred! So this nonsense of ‘hybrid vigor’ is RIDICULOUS! You can’t take a poorly bred dog of one breed and breed it to another poorly bred dog of another breed and ‘poof!’ the resulting pupppies are ‘well bred!’ That is NOT how ‘hybrid vigor’ works!
Why do I assume that the sire and dam of the crossbred pups are ‘poorly bred’ is because NO RESPONSIBLE BREEDER OF WELL BREED PUREBRED PUPPIES WOULD EVER SELL A PUP TO SOMEONE WHO INTENDS TO USE IT IN A CROSS BREEDING PROGRAM!!! YES! I used caps because people just don’t seem to GET IT!!! The dogs used in crossbreeding programs are poorly bred to start with!!!
And ENOUGH of this ridiculous “Adopt don’t shop!” nonsense!!! Have you walked into a city/county ran animal shelter recently??? HOW MANY WELLBRED PUREBRED DOGS ARE IN IT??? My guess is the vast majority of the dogs in a shelter are crossbred dogs! RESPONSIBLE BREEDERS are NOT the PROBLEM!!! The problem is with people who purposely cross breed dogs to make ‘designer’ dogs and owners who are NOT RESPONSIBLE and don’t desex their pets that are just that, pets!
A RESPONSIBLE breeder ALWAYS microchips their puppies before they leave and puts their name as a contact so that they can get their puppy back in case it does, for some odd reason, land in a shelter. And most purebred dogs have designated RESCUE GROUPS that will work to get their breeds dogs out of the shelter and in a safe foster situation. TO DATE THERE IS NO RESCUE ORGANIZATION FOR ANY OF THE CROSSBRED ‘DOODLE’ TYPE OF DOGS! Meaning, their ‘registry’ cares so little about dogs produced by breeders who ‘register’ pups within their ‘association,’ but think NOTHING of helping these dogs when owners can no longer care for them or want them! Shelters are FULL of pit bull type of pups and dogs and poodle crossed types of dogs and there is NO DESIGNATED ORGANIZATION to HELP or ASSIST in getting them OUT of the shelter and into a proper foster situation. Can that be said for almost ALL purebred dogs? Most purebred dog clubs have a well established rescue set up to prevent their bred from being in shelters.
I could go on and on about how to find a reputable breeder (because as much info is out there on this subject, it seems most people who NEED to know how to find a good breeder simply just don’t utilize the info for one reason or another), but I implore people to STOP BUYING CROSSBRED DOGS!!! I can GUARANTEE you that there IS a PUREBRED that fits all those ‘requirements’ that you are looking for in a dog!