by Rory Kress
“Ideally, there are a couple of things that should motivate the breeders,” Croney says. “I think you want the pride and the ability to prove that you’re not just doing what you’re required to do, you are going far above and beyond.”
Croney then goes on to explain that the other key component in motivating breeders to submit to the inspectors for the Canine Care Certified program is to elevate the value of the dogs they are selling. “If you are going to get a dog, everybody wants a physically healthy dog. You want a dog that is behaviorally sound, or at least one that you know is set up in life to succeed as opposed to running into issues down the line, right? And while there is no way to guarantee a perfectly and behaviorally healthy dog that doesn’t have any problems, if you’re a consumer, you probably want to pick the dog that comes with something that lets you know they were well taken care of [and] their parents were well taken care of, so that the risk of running into these problems is lower than the dog that doesn’t come with this type of certification process behind it.”
Personally, I agree with Croney. I believe that if someone is going to purchase a dog instead of adopt, he should be willing to pay a premium to ensure that dog was humanely bred. Like a fair-trade sticker on a bag of coffee or a “pasture-raised” label on a carton of eggs, so too could the exemplary dog breeders out there demonstrate that they are worthy of an extra investment—particularly on an animal that the average American spends more than $1,500 to care for annually.9
Croney believes that there is a desire among commercial breeders who run responsible operations to differentiate themselves from those who oversee facilities that could easily be labeled as puppy mills. Same goes for retailers who wish to show consumers that their dogs, while they may be for sale and are not rescues, truly do not come from puppy mills. Then, with the Canine Care Certified mark of distinction, these breeders can command a higher price for their dogs as they come with a stronger value proposition.
“Doing all this extra stuff [to become Canine Care Certified] actually costs money. And frankly, their dogs are worth more because they’ve had more work and more effort put into raising them to a much higher standard of care that can actually be documented,” Croney says.
This is a point that particularly interests Petland’s Winslow. Even as pet stores are closing or ending their puppy sales operations around the country, Petland persists. I asked Winslow how many dogs the company sells each year, and he replied that the company does not disclose the numbers of puppies they sell because “animal rights advocates will take any number and twist it to their advantage. Animal rights advocates think that no animals should be sold, and broadcasting numbers gives them ammunition.”10
As for those animal rights advocates, the Humane Society estimates that Petland sells tens of thousands of puppies every year across the United States. And just as Winslow mentioned, the chain has been a frequent target of scrutiny and even outrage from animal advocacy groups. Notably, in 2008, the Humane Society published the results of an investigation into Petland that labeled the store “the nation’s largest retail supporter of puppy mills.”11 While these animal welfare advocates may fight any sales of puppies by Petland or any retailer, it’s obvious that the chain holds immense influence over the industry where there remains a demand for pet store puppies. To have Petland’s support for reform at a national level and the company’s commitment to only purchase from breeders who obtain the imprimatur of the Canine Care Certified program could be a game changer.
“Our goal is, at some point in time, that every puppy that goes through a Petland store comes from a breeder that is Canine Care Certified,” Winslow says. “Based on a lot of variables outside of our control, we can’t mandate the speed [at] which the [Canine Care Certified] program expands, meaning that we’re not third-party inspectors. We’re not in charge of the marketing of the program. But what we can control is our influence on breeders for one, to join, and two, to compensate them on doing a job that would be recognized by a third-party auditor.”
While Winslow stopped short of telling me that Petland would commit to only purchasing from these certified breeders, he said it is the company’s “desire” to do so someday. Winslow says that Petland is working consistently to improve and has increased its efforts to personally visit and evaluate as many of the breeders in its supply chain as possible. Having a third party that can be trusted with performing these evaluations would save the company time and money while also helping to restore public trust—all around, it would be good business.
So far, similar efforts to provide additional certification to the best dog breeders in the business have been attempted at the state level. But with each state conforming to different standards, the national impact has been minimal.
“A couple of states have, within their borders, programs that not only go above the Animal Welfare Act [but also above] their own state regulations,” Winslow acknowledges. “Kansas has this program called KEEP, Missouri has Blue Ribbon, Pennsylvania has [the Kennel Assurance Program] KAP… All of them are voluntary. All of them are things that raise standards…but if you ask the average person who walks down the street or comes in one of our stores… it’s not transparent enough. Because it never makes its way outside of that state’s boundaries. I’m pretty confident because of the legs that the [Purdue] Canine Care Certification program already has, and it’s bolted onto a prominent veterinary school, and doctors of animal welfare are signing their name to it… This program has the ability to go beyond the borders of Indiana. And it will reach a level of transparency that meets demand, and as you create demand, you increase prices.”
But for now, the Canine Care Certified program is rolling out slowly and does not offer the transparency of showing exactly what it requires from breeders. Furthermore, the certification program costs $1,500 a year plus $10 for every dog a facility has over a head count of fifty.12 For the bad actors out there who are only in the business to make money, I’m skeptical that paying these fees will ever seem like a worth investment—especially when it costs so little just to get a USDA license and nothing more. In the meantime, well-meaning consumers are still purchasing dogs that—either intentionally or unintentionally—are falling through the massive gaps in regulation and enforcement.
So what is the best way to care for a dog? The answer is still being decided by the government and by the pet industry—even if the common sense of pet owners would beg to differ. But it’s human nature to be horrified when we catch a glimpse of how the pet dog is treated in a breeding facility. And when a pet owner comes to realize how her dog was treated in its previous, agricultural context, the outrage can be life altering.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
When Big Breeders Have Big Friends
Kristin Akin is the first to admit that she should have known better when she fell head over heels for Lovey.
She and her husband, Justin, had already gone through the process of taking two dogs into their St. Louis home. First, it was a wheaten terrier named Gilligan that they adopted from a breed-specific rescue when they were first married. Kristin filled out a lengthy application and then opened the doors to her home for an inspection from the rescue group. But the rescue almost threw the brakes on Gilligan’s adoption because the Akins did not yet have a fence for their yard. The couple signed a contract promising to erect one within a year. The rescue was satisfied, and Gilligan came home.
One happy dog–lifetime later, Gilligan passed away, and the Akins were ready for another dog. Now parents of a young child, the family returned to the same rescue. But at the time, the rescue could not find them a wheaten that would be good with their son. So Kristin set her sights on a goldendoodle. She found a small, local breeder to work with.
She patiently filled out another lengthy application describing the size of her house and yard, detailing her family’s schedules to demonstrate whether they’d have sufficient time to walk their new pup, how many children they had in the household, whether she had
already engaged a veterinarian for its care, and what her family’s history with dogs had been. The Akinses passed muster, and off they went to personally pick up their next dog, Skipper, from the breeder’s kennels in person.
After living with Skipper for a couple of years, Kristin and her husband started thinking that bringing a second goldendoodle into the family might help with some of his hyperactivity.
“We kept talking over the last two years that we’ve had him that maybe if we get him a friend, he’ll chill out,” Kristin recalls.1
So Kristin and her husband began their search the way most consumers do: online. She found the aptly named NextDayPets.com and began idly searching its roster of available dogs. Sooner than they could have ever planned, Kristin was struck. She found a dog for sale that immediately she knew she had to have.
“Part of what we liked is that the dog was already four months old, so that seemed really appealing. She wasn’t a brand-new puppy… It was kind of a knee-jerk reaction,” Kristin says, trying—but failing, as most people do—to explain why she was so intensely certain this was the exact dog for her family.
This type of impulse purchase is common, even among well-intentioned buyers like Kristin. In fact, people who have gone through reputable breeders or shelters in the past can be particularly vulnerable to the lure of a click-to-buy puppy—after all, they know just how time-consuming the process of doing it right can be. To them, an easy purchase can seem like a harmless shortcut. However, as Kristin would go on to discover, these easily purchased dogs more often than not go on to be anything but easy in the long run.
For Kristin, that click-to-buy dog would turn out to be Lovey. And from the very beginning, Lovey was different from the dogs Kristin had in the past.
BUYING LOVEY
On June 3, 2016, Kristin sent an inquiry to purchase Lovey—then named online as Kylee—from the breeder. She texted the breeder’s phone number posted on NextDayPets and got a quick response the very same day telling her that the dog was still available and ready to go home right away. To secure the dog, she was told to pay a $300 deposit and fill out the application.
“I take full ownership in that I was not thinking through it all after the previous things that I had to go through to get the other two dogs,” Kristin says. “It wasn’t until I was filling out the application that I did kinda make a mental note, like, this isn’t really an application. It’s just name, address, city, state.”
With the deposit paid, Kristin looked up the breeder online: Debra Ritter of Cornerstone Farms in Curryville, Missouri. Kristin found her website. The page is typical of many other breeders I’ve encountered: frilly web graphics that might have seemed high-tech over a decade ago, stock images of fluffy puppies, and lengthy references to the Bible and the God-driven mission of their work with animals. Their landing page features the following welcome message:
We are Cornerstone Farms, home of the Ritter Family! We’ve been showing, training, and breeding for over 30 yrs. We offer references and a lifetime of puppy support. We are State, AKC, USDA, and Vet inspected yearly… As a Missouri State licensed breeder we are held to the highest standard of care for our companions. We very firmly advocate against such places where animals are kept in unsanitary, often unsafe conditions and used only as tools for profit… We love our dogs and they are our pets, every one of them!
We love Jesus too!!!2
On another part of the site, explaining the process of how they will fly or ship a dog anywhere in the country for a fee, the Ritters again emphasize their faith and their dedication:
Purchasing a companion from anyplace around the world can be fun and exciting! We do our best to make the whole thing a lot of fun for the kids, peaceful and trouble-free for Dad and Mom. All of the Ritters love Jesus, so if you do as well then faith helps the whole process be stress free!
When reading through the website, Kristin noted all these religious references and also saw the breeder’s list of accreditations running down the left side of the screen, including their pronouncement that they are “proud to be members” of the Missouri Department of Agriculture and the USDA. Neither the Missouri Department of Agriculture nor the USDA have members—only licensees.
“I noticed the accreditations, and they seemed legit to me. I did not dig any further or do any [additional] googling,” Kristin says regretfully.
She began emailing back and forth with Ritter. Kristin asked why Lovey was a bit older than the majority of the dogs posted online for sale—most of the other listed puppies average between eight and twelve weeks.
“[Ritter] said, ‘Oh, we keep all our puppies… If they don’t all get a home right away, then we keep them until they get placed,” Kristin recalls.
Next, Kristin asked how big the dog was. Ritter responded that the puppy was twenty pounds. This answer was acceptable for Kristin who did the rough math that a dog weighing twenty pounds at four months should mature to be around twice that size once fully grown. She also took heart to hear from Ritter that the dog was already socialized and had been living with her family in her home as a pet. The wheels were now in motion; Kristin was instructed to pay $1,250 for the dog via PayPal. She immediately ponied it up.
Ritter then mentioned that she would be driving into Kristin’s part of town the next day to deliver puppies to a few other families in the St. Louis area.
“I was expecting that I would drive to Curryville [Missouri]—wherever the hell that was—and that was fine,” Kristin says, expecting that she would repeat her experience of purchasing her dog Skipper from a breeder, when she had traveled to the kennel where he was born to pick him up in person. But the convenience seemed harmless at the time. Why not just pick up her new dog the next day in the parking lot of a local shopping center and spare herself the one-hundred-mile drive from St. Louis to rural Curryville?
“I’m embarrassed because now I’ve read all this stuff on puppy mills,” Kristin concedes, referring to the fact that groups like the Humane Society and the ASPCA often list it as a red flag when a breeder offers to meet a buyer in a neutral location as opposed to letting her view the property where they breed and raise dogs for herself.
As it turns out, NextDayPets.com lived up to its name and brand promise. Sure as Kristin had found her dog on the site on June 3, she was sitting in a shopping center parking lot near her home, waiting to pick up the pup on June 4. A dusty brown conversion van pulled up, and one of Ritter’s daughters emerged with Lovey. Debra Ritter herself had stayed behind in Curryville and was not present for the handoff.
Ritter’s daughter put a leash around the dog’s neck. Kristin says the dog seemed to be on tranquilizers: barely moving and zoned out. Believing that this dog had been kept as the Ritter family pet, Kristin assumed it was just scared to be somewhere unfamiliar and so far from home.
“I crept over, and I’m like Hiiii! in my sweet, baby voice. I put my hand out, and she’s just totally withdrawn from me and from everybody. It wasn’t like when you take your dog to the groomer and they don’t want to leave you and they’re like clawing on you and trying to hold on and stay in your arms. It wasn’t like she was connected to them and not wanting to leave them. She just stood there like she was a zombie…she wasn’t cowering. Her head was down. She just was standing there like ‘I got nothing.’ You know what I mean? Like, ‘I’m a beat-down person who just doesn’t have anything to give you. I mean, I’m not sad to leave these people, but I’m definitely not glad to see you, because all the people I’ve seen are shitheads.’ Excuse my French.”
But Lovey’s demeanor wasn’t the only remarkable thing about her at that first meeting in the parking lot: the goldendoodle that had been promised to be twenty pounds just the day before was clearly more than twice that weight.
“I said to [the Ritters’ daughter], ‘Wow, she’s a lot bigger than we were expecting.’ She was like, ‘Yeah, we weighed her today. She’s actually like forty-five [pounds].’”
But the money was already paid,
and the deal was already done. Kristin signed the dog’s USDA disposition forms and managed to scoop the suspiciously large puppy into her car and take her home. As she drove, she couldn’t help panicking that this four-month-old puppy already tipping the scales at forty-five pounds would potentially double in size when it reached adulthood, an eventuality she and her husband had simply not envisioned or mentally prepared for. But all the same, Lovey was her dog now, and that was that.
But with Lovey came more problems and more questions.
Immediately, Kristin discovered that Lovey had constant diarrhea. When she wasn’t evacuating her bowels, she was compulsively scratching herself with maniacal vigor. Seeking a remedy, Kristin tried to bathe her, expecting to find bugs or fleas on her body. Instead, she found scabs all over her skin, concentrated around Lovey’s joints. In the tub, she pulled back Lovey’s ears in horror.
“I lift up the flap, you know, and it’s dirty, dirty, dirty, stinky, stinky, stinky, oily, greasy, filled with dirt, horrible. I used a half a bag of cotton balls and hydrogen peroxide trying to clean them out the best I could. They were just filthy,” she says, the self-described clean freak still cringing at the memory.
Meanwhile, Lovey’s demeanor remained troubling. Kristin lives in a two-story home with stairs. But for Lovey, these stairs were a physical impossibility and an unfamiliar mental puzzle. She simply could not climb them, not even the single step required to enter the main floor. Kristin and her husband reasoned that this dog had never seen a stair before in her life.
“She’d probably never been inside a house,” Kristin recalls, once again uncertain how this dog could have possibly been raised as a pet in the warm and loving home environment that Ritter had described to her. “For probably the first week to ten days, to go upstairs to bed at night, we would just carry her. Carry her up and down.”