Why you too, should 'Adopt, don't shop'.

Stray dogs can give you the same amount of love as the poodle you see in pet shops. There are many speculations that strays are more aggressive and more prone to disease, which is highly untrue.

According to Dr Patty Khuly VMD, a Miami based veterinarian said that mutts are most likely to win the battle against purebreds for their sheer hardiness, thriftiness and longevity. The reason is because they are less likely to receive a high dose of specific purebred genetic material which may lead to inherited disease, which in this case can be deemed to be healthier than purebreds (KhulyVMD, 2017).

Some purebred dogs that are bought from pet shops may have health complications due to poor and unsanitary conditions of puppy mills.

Now, puppy mills in my opinion are one of the main reasons why one should not shop but to adopt. Do you know how sickening is the living conditions of a puppy mill?

If you don't know what a puppy mill is, it is a large-scale commercial dog breeding operation where the dogs are treated as products, not living beings. Dogs here are bred for quantity, not quality. These dogs can be seen living in overcrowded small wire-floored cages with no shed, unsanitary conditions with no proper veterinary care or even food and water.

The poor enforcement of law allows pet shops to continue selling sick animals that are bred in dirty living conditions that attract bugs and rodents and breed infectious diseases. According to statistics, there are an estimated 10,000 puppy mills in the United States and over 2 million puppies are bred in these mills every year. An estimated number of 1.2 million dogs are euthanized in shelters each year.

The amount of dogs in animal shelters that are euthanized are increasing every year due to overcrowding. In 2008, it is estimated that 3.7 million animals are euthanized in the nation's shelters in America (Americanhumane.org, 2017). The decreasing number of animals being adopted means that there are no free space for new animals to enter the shelter.

Therefore animal activist groups always urge the public to 'Adopt, don't shop'. This movement has spread to many parts of the world with one goal in mind which is to encourage people to adopt animals from shelters and never buy them.

If you have plans to adopt from an animal shelter, please consider senior dogs/cats because they are the first ones on the list to be euthanized due to old age. Senior dogs may not be with you for a long period but by adopting a senior dog, you are giving them a chance to spend their last years/months in a home living comfortably, knowing he was loved and also saving it from being put down.

If you are interested to adopt and give stray animals a loving home, please contact your nearest SPCA or local animal shelters.

#strays #opinion #puppymills