I dont agree that because the breeder in question has more than one or two breeds they automatically are a puppy farmer or are not giving their dogs the care and socialisation required. If you were to look at my website you will see 3, soon to be 4, breeds listed on there. We dont breed regularly (last year we had one litter and kept a pup to show) and we do health test and show our dogs, but by some peoples definition we would be having uncared for, poorly socialised dogs just by having them listed on the website which, as anyone who has met my doggie family can tell you, is far from the truth I think too much can be read into breeders websites. Like, for example with mine, we have 4 breeds, however, they are split between two different homes and owners (me and my mum) but are owned and shown under a joint kennel name so they are all under the website with our joint kennel name. But, obviously its not really necessary to go into so much detail on a website (i certainly dont want people knowing details of where my individual dogs live from looking on my website!!) so we explain further when people ring up to enquire
And, personally, i do believe that keeping any dog caged 23 hours a day is cruel… If a child were kept in a tiny room for 23 hours a day there would be uproar. But, i do realise this goes on quite often and thats sad. IMO dogs should be part of the family and be raised as companions, or if they are working dogs then i know a lot of people kennel them and i have no problem with that as they will spend most of the day working. But i never will understand why people buy a dog, then confine it to a tiny cell for the rest of its life, that makes me so sad. Between me and my mum we own 14 dogs, none of them are crated for any length of time. So, it is perfectly do able
@Patty:
There is so much talk about irresponsible breeders on this thread with which I totally agree.
I've followed this thread with much interest as obviously we don't have such a major problem here (obviously because we are amuch smaller country). Our main problem with puppy farmers and b.yd breeders are in other much more commercial breeds.
I do disagree about numbers making for irresponsibility although I admit that you can't give all the same attention as you can if you only have one (or two) that's self evident, but you do as much as you possibly can to make their lives happy and complete. It's much harder work though and I empathise with those who do keep numbers responsibly. This is the main reason why I have stopped breeding as at my age I could possibly come to a point where I'm unable to give my Basenjis enough attention.
I must admit that I miss the puppies though and that's why I so love to see all your litter pictures!!
Mind you I know of breeders who would consider themselves very responsible and yet many of their dogs are crated or kennelled 23 hours out of 24!
Unfortunately my two other breeds (labs and pugs) are two of the worst suffering with puppy farmers, it is a real problem for those of us who breed those dogs responsibly and carefully as a lot of times people dont care about whether a breeder has health tested or shown their dogs, they just want a CHEAP puppy. Its such a shame…