A6 (with Ann): Tragedy in Pet Shops (Final Version)

When we pass by pet shops, our eyes fall on adorable dogs in the cages, but we would never truly know where these puppies come from. They are not natively born to be purebred, attractive and get beautiful fur. A particular male dog and a particular female dog are arranged and forced to pair in breeding farms. Breeding farms are not as comfortable as pet shops. We are supposed to know the tragedy behind the stores.

Ann:

I’m going to uncover the pitiable truth about dog breeding. The merchandisers know that people would buy dogs with beautiful fur colors or pure breeds. Therefore, they would intentionally match the dogs of good breeds, and the puppies would be more gratifying. The cages those dogs stay in would be decided by different breeds in order to be easily recognized by people. They would inject the drug, the aphrodisiac, into the bodies of the female dogs to attract male dogs. The duration that a mature female dog is pregnant and finally gives birth to puppies is about sixty to sixty-five days. That’s about two months. After a month of break, the merchandisers would have the female dogs injected and impregnated again. As a result, we could easily figure out that the female dogs will gradually get tired. Once the female dogs couldn’t give birth to any puppies, the merchandisers would put them in the cages without any food and water, just leaving them dead there, or if the merchandisers happen to leave for another place tomorrow, they will take those female dogs, put them into a big black bag and throw them away.

The puppies will be classified and checked whether they are healthy or not, and those sick puppies will be abandoned. The probability of abnormal puppies are high since the breeds of mating dogs are close. Hence, the merchandisers want to sell those healthy puppies as fast as they can because they’re not sure whether those puppies would have undiscovered disease and would survive or not. If the puppies aren’t sold out, the good ones would be kept to be the mating dogs. The others would be thrown away.

Their “homes”, the cages, are dirty and small. The space of the cage is only enough to let the dogs stand or lie prone, and the cage is easily getting hotter or colder when the weather changes. The merchandisers don’t take care of those dogs when their nails grow long, so their nails are easily stuck in the cage. When they stand in the cage, the long nails would prick in their soles. It would cause their feet to bleed.

The food is basically rotted rice bran with chicken feed. Also, the merchandisers wouldn’t clean the dogs’ excrement, so the environment is dirty and easily attracts many bugs and mosquitos to bite them. Even, when they feel bored or painful, they couldn’t bark because the merchandisers have already used a steel tube to pierce into their throats and make them hoarse.

Eileen:

My family keeps two dogs. One was a stray dog. She appeared in my elementary school when I was in my third grade. My school called 119 to take her away. I saw fire fighters put her in a big gunny, she struggling with unwillingness as well as tension. I was so young that I didn’t consider how they treated her was a blameful deed. I didn’t take pity on her. Now, I feel shame on myself badly. Later, I saw her show up again in my community. I guessed those fire fighters just released her somewhere not close to my school, but she came back as you can tell. Then, I called her and let her come to my house. I simply thought she was special and extremely cute so I wanted to keep her. When I recall the decision to let her be my family, I think without no doubt, I was right. Another dog in my house was brought back home by my older sister. He was not bought from a pet shop but adopted from an organization. My sister told me that there are many dogs that need a house to live and someone to love them.

        Those puppies in pet shops are naïve and showing shining eyes but their parents are suffering great pain in other places we don’t know. If we want to stop what we see in breeding farms, please don’t get moved easily by pretty puppies in the stores. Furthermore, if we are eager to raise dogs, think about those stray dogs and please give them a sweet home.