Has anyone seen the Gumtree (to name only one) site lately? Puppies are made to look cuter and cuter with enlarged photos etc. In tough economic times, obviously anyone is going to take to selling puppies if you can get anything up to R1000 for an unregistered “pedigreed” puppy. There is a horrific number of puppies for sale, underage, with no laws to protect the adult dogs from turning into money making machines by being indiscriminately and continuously bred as an income generating option.

And of course, this means that even more pups end up in pet shops, indiscriminate and uninformed breeding creates pups with personality problems, which in turn leads to more neglect, abandonment etc. Somehow this cycle needs to be stopped!
Pet babies are NOT a source of income. This mind set has to change. And the only way I can see is exactly what Marion suggested…..laws. With the proper authority to back them up!

Boy, oh boy, do I agree with your point.

I think to resolve this problem we should propose the following:
1. The SPCA by law becomes the official police with regards to all animals, domestic, wild or farm animals – but they have no or minimal shelters for emergencies only. This will give them the right to prosecute offenders.
2. The animal shelters that currently operate as NGOs become official animal shelters, therefore you can only BUY (yes you must buy the pet) from them. The price will be the same country wide and will cover all their costs.
3. Breeders must be registered with not only their Breeding Association but with the SPCA as well and will work on a quota system (just like the fishing industry). And this goes for all breeders, obviously farmers have a different quota to domestic pets. They should only be allowed to have a litter every two years and no more than 3 or 4 litters in the bitch’s lifetime. After that the bitch is sterilized, the same applies for a male animal.
4. If you buy an animal from a shelter or breeder your details are entered into a central data bank (like our car lisence) and the shelter or SPCA will ensure that the pet is sterilized at 6 months, if you don’t comply you are then fined and blacklisted.
5. Breeders should pay 10% of their selling price over to the SPCA who hands this money out to the shelters on a regular basis.
6. Pet shops are only allowed to sell pet products but no live animals what so ever.
7. All animals bought through either a breeder or shelter must have their first innoculations and deworming at least. Obviously a home inspection will also be done, before a pet is released. And the animal gets a chip.

regards
Marion