Now, people are always complaining that people use animals, that breeders are awful because they sell animals.  But how is that any different than a shelter?  When people talk about a breeder’s profit, it is (price listed)x(number of animals)=profit.  They don’t take into account the cost of caring for these animals, nor equipment needed, nor anything else.  And yet, should anyone bring up that shelters also ask high prices for their animals, these same people are quick to bring up that the shelters spend their money on the animals.Not one breeder that I know survives solely on the money made breeding animals.  They have jobs, or spouses, the lucky ones have trust funds or huge bank accounts.  Alternate forms of income, to cover the loss that their breeding hobby is no doubt incurring.  They do not rely on public funds, on fundraising or donations – they rely on their own hard work, both in and out of their breeding hobby.  In a good year, a breeder often finds themselves able to use a black pen when it comes to year’s end, but most of the time, a breeder’s ledgers bleed red ink.  Breeding operations are HUGE money pits, and the average public doesn’t realize this.I do understand that shelters and rescues do a lot of good work.  I understand that the majority are out there because they love animals, and want to help them.  I am not in any way trying to vilify them, nor detract from the work that they do.  I just wish that they’d call a spade a spade, and admit to selling or renting animals.

Adoption brings to mind all sorts of feel-goods.  Giving a family to an abused and neglected animal, a second chance at life for that animal, showing it what a family’s love is all about… And I understand that.  But adopting an animal does not make you a better person, it makes you a person who bought a shelter animal.  By adopting an animal, you are not rescuing an animal, you are buying an animal that someone else may or may not have rescued.

That’s something else to touch on.  Where, exactly, do all these animals come from?  I can hear the RARA’s shouts of “evil disgusting breeders like you!!!” already, so no need to comment that.  The way shelters and rescues want you to think, all the animals in their care are neglected, emaciated, abused and on death’s door when they arrive.  They want you to believe that all of their animals were liberated from test labs, factory farms, puppy mills, breeders and hoarders… But they aren’t.  A good portion of animals in shelters are strays or owner surrenders.  The reasons they are surrendered varies from animal to animal, but until they were dropped off, these animals were well cared for, and well loved.  I know, I know, “not loved enough for the owner to keep them!!!”, but let’s not pass judgement.  Knowing nothing about situations, they could be dropped off because the owner died and the family didn’t want the animal, because the owner became ill, or unemployed and could no longer care for the animal, because the owner was in an abusive relationship and couldn’t take the animal with them, because the animal was being tormented by their children, for 100 other innocent or not so innocent reasons.  Regardless of why, these animals are dropped off.  Not all of them are rescued, in fact, the majority aren’t rescued, they are simply provided a place to stay while a suitable home is found.

People are quick to defend the cost of a shelter animal, because the shelters “do all that work for them”, however how many of the owner surrenders are spayed/neutered before they come?  How many are up to date on shots and turned in with their vet records?  I personally don’t know the answer to that question, but it would be interesting to find out.  In any event, not every animal turned in at the shelter requires months of care to rehabilitate it.  Many animals(at least at my local shelter) are transfers from another shelter – and that’s a whole nother kettle of fish we’ll get into another day.  It makes me wonder, then, how much shelters would charge if they were only charging what they’d spent on the animal.

“But herds,” the RARA’s whine, “some animals cost thousands to fix up!  They’re charging a flat adoption fee to try and even out the difference!”

Alright, that’s true…  But don’t those high cost cases usually end up with additional fundraising efforts because of it?  Don’t lie, you’ve seen it on Facebook – “JoJo was abandoned by his owners and then hit by a car!  His pelvis was shattered and he needs a lifesaving operation, and we need to raise $5000 to fund it!!  Please donate, and share, so we can get JoJo the surgery he needs!!!”.  And the rescue isn’t going to shut down donations as soon as they get the money they need for JoJo’s surgery.  They’re going to let all the money keep pouring in.  They might not even admit to getting enough for JoJo’s surgery, making JoJo a poster child for the rescue’s fundraising efforts(another topic that will need to be touched on later).

Let’s examine JoJo’s case a little closer.  JoJo was, indeed, abandoned by his owners – JoJo escaped his yard, and his owners didn’t bother looking for him because JoJo was becoming more work than he was worth.  JoJo gets struck by a car, brought into a rescue, and needs an operation for his pelvis.  The rescue takes photos of poor, mangled JoJo, plasters them all over the internet, and the donations start coming in.  In the end, enough money is made to get JoJo his operation, to pay for JoJo’s meds and food for his recovery, and to cover the vaccinations that JoJo may or may not need(but the rescue does them anyway, because it’s easier than doing a titer.)  Since the rescue JoJo was taken to is all volunteers, there’s no need to pay any employees, so that doesn’t add to JoJo’s debt to the rescue.  He was neutered when he came in, and fairly well trained, so no additional cost for those.  JoJo goes through his recovery, with no complications, and the rescue has actually made more money in donations than it cost to care for JoJo, including vet care, feeding and even cleaning supplies.  So why, if JoJo has no outstanding debt to the rescue, is he still being sold for $400 on their website?

GASP!!!  I used that dirty, naughty, 4 letter word again – Sold.  That’s right, JoJo is being sold by the rescue.  He is not being adopted, nor rehomed, nor placed.  He is being sold.  Or possibly rented, depending on the paperwork that particular rescue is using.

I can hear the cussing now – she did it, she really just said that rescue animals are sold!!  That dirty, good for nothing little so and so!!!

Well, it’s true.  I hate the word adoption.  I really really do.  Those words, to me, are an excuse for RARAs to start patting themselves on the back and start gathering in the feel goods.  If it’s someone particularly irritating, I even have to bite my tongue to keep from correcting them.

You see, when you pay money for something, you are buying it, regardless where it came from.  I’ve even recently been informed that in some places you don’t HAVE to pay money for something for it to be a sale – if you give someone cocaine, you’re selling them drugs, regardless if money changes hands.  It’s the same for animals – you might be giving away your dog, but the final transaction is called a sale.  JoJo is being sold by the rescue.  They need to own that fact and understand that they are sellers of animals.  Maybe those animals were unwanted, or abused or neglected before they got them, but the end result is still a sale.

This is my very firm belief.  A sale is a sale – money changed hands for goods(in this case, JoJo), that makes it a sales transaction, by the very definition of the word.  You can pretty it up, and call it an adoption, but it isn’t, not in the least.  Animals, you see, are possessions, by law, as much as the RARA’s hate to admit it.  That’s why people are charged with theft if they take someone else’s animal, rather than “puppy napping”.  That’s why we own animals, because they are possessions.  That’s why you buy animals.

And then renting.  Have you read some of the “adoption applications” that are out there?  Oh my word, they are a little on the extreme side.  I used to follow the horse world fairly readily(not because I had horses, or even rode horses, but because I love looking at horses, and knew a lot of horse people), and some of those applications for a horse from a rescue?  EXTREME.  You weren’t actually going to own the horse, you see, it says right in your contract that the horse is still owned by GlitterFarts Horse Rescue.  You could have the horse seized at any time if you bred it(only applicable for mares, most rescues would geld before releasing, and rightly so), or if you moved, or if you boarded the horse somewhere, or if you were a day late on vaccinations, or if you didn’t feed it what they required you to feed it, or, or, or… Just like that.  And all the time and money you put into that horse?  Gone.  You see that a lot with other animals – if you don’t want the animal anymore, it HAS to go back to the rescue.  If you move, it HAS to go back to the rescue.  The rescue still, technically, owns the animal because of the paper you signed, you’ve just paid them a non-refundable fee for nothing more than the ability to borrow said animal.

They say they do this in the interest of the animal, but I feel it’s more a case of the rescue not wanting to let go of the leash.  They want to still have some control over that animal, and if you’re not doing things EXACTLY as they want you to?  They take it away.  They have the right because you signed that paper.

“But they’re just PROTECTING that animal,” says the RARA, “they just want what’s best for it!!”

Except some of those contracts are so extreme that you have to have the rescue’s permission to get the animal anything but the standard medical care.  Some of them require that you don’t put the animal down until the rescue has been consulted, or require you to use a specific vet.  I don’t feel that putting restrictions on the owner is in the animal’s best interest.  I don’t think that after 6 months, a year, two years, a person should have to give up their animal because they are moving to a different town, or moving from a house to an apartment, however some of these “adoption agreements” state that that’s how it should be.

Now, I’ve said it a million times if I’ve said it once – I am not against ethical, responsible rescues.  I AM, however, against rescues that require you to sign away your rights as an animal owner to obtain an animal through them.  I thoroughly encourage everyone considering an animal to see what the shelter has available, especially when it comes to cats.  I also thoroughly encourage everyone to read the adoption contract before even going to the shelter, and deciding if that rescue’s terms are terms they can live with.

And I really wish rescues would stop calling their transactions adoptions – call them sales or rentals, because that’s what they actually are.

People are often quick to blame “breeders” …..ALL breeders…not just “some” breeders for the numbers of homeless dogs but maybe we are taking the wrong prospective on the subject.  We seem to be painted this picture by the media that nearly all shelter dogs are products of confiscated dogs in horrid conditions by “breeders” and while this does have some truth to it obviously, it is not the entire picture.  Sadly this has led to a general belief in the public that all breeders are bad….you are automatically a puppymill if you breed.  Your dogs live in cages, are nasty and never given love.  You are guilty until proven innocent.  And I find that the word puppy mill is thrown around too loosely.

 Did you know that 70% of the dogs that fill shelters are MIXED breeds?  What is the percentage of dogs in shelters that came from a pet owner who did not spay their dog and had an accidental litter only to surrender the entire litter?  The same applies for cats!  (I assure you, ALOT more than you realize)  What percentage were rescued from the streets, confiscated from breeders, puppymills and or hoarders?  It is an assumption in the general public that nearly ALL shelter animals stem from breeders but before you decide your opinion or place blame, do you homework and spread your opinion based on facts.

NAIA online:  “New 501(c) charities devoted to rescuing dogs from distant lands are popping up in states across the US. They are not being formed to place only Puerto Rican dogs, but also to save dogs from as far away as Taiwan 6 and other Asian countries. Several shelters and rescue groups in the Northwest knowingly accept dogs from Taiwan, Puerto Rico or Mexico.”

“There is another disturbing pattern developing, a trend toward importing progressively younger dogs. Two years ago when NAIA first began researching the issue, the foreign imports depicted on shelter web sites were of varied ages. Today, most of them are puppies. It is easy to speculate that if no one is capturing and altering the illusive strays that produce these orphans, then enterprising rescuers and shelter directors could help developing countries become breeding grounds for stocking US shelters.”

“Long-term flooding of US cities with foreign dogs has unavoidable implications for pet population dynamics in the US. The practice of importing dogs from developing countries not only prevents us from making further progress against ‘pet overpopulation,’ in time it could also diminish the responsible breeding and placement of well-bred, healthy dogs and cats.Many conscientious dog breeders are so concerned about ‘pet overpopulation’ they have already accepted the idea that a good breeder is one who seldom breeds. The problem with this conclusion is that it does not recognize the basic marketplace reality that demand drives supply. When responsible breeders quit breeding, it means only that in the future someone else will supply the public with the dogs or cats they want. In this specific case, it also means that the public will have fewer reliable sources for healthy, well bred and socialized purebred dogs”

This article is so packed full……here is the link………CONTINUE READING HERE: