The Oxford English Dictionary currently has no definition for Puppy Farm.

If you were tasked with coming up with the definition how would you describe a puppy farm ?

Simple competition, no prizes for the best answer :-)

As an example here is the OED's definition of an Amusement Arcade

It is in the OED here however, with a modifier - they've used fish farm as their example

Farm

noun
[with modifier] a place for breeding a particular type of animal or producing a specified crop:
a fish farm

Good find, but in their example the modifier would have to be dog rather than puppy (unless you count a crop of puppies).

Alarm bells ring when I see a breeder has several different breeds and/or puppies always available.

Admin edit follows :

Puppy Farmer

A dog breeder who has several different breeds and/or puppies always available.

A large-scale commercial breeder of dogs.
Anyone whose principal motivation is profit is never going to have the dogs' wellbeing at heart.

Puppy Farmer

A large-scale commercial breeder of dogs.

>Good find, but in their example the modifier would have to be dog rather than puppy (unless you count a crop of puppies).

Well yes - I do think a puppy farmer grows puppies as a cash crop.  Equally I can see no reason why they shouldn't also be described as dog farms

verb   
      [no object] make one's living by growing crops or keeping livestock:
      [with object] breed or grow (a type of livestock or crop) commercially:
ostriches are farmed in South Africa and Australia (as adjective farmed)      farmed salmon

I'd have no problem saying that "dogs are farmed in Wales" or that they produce farmed puppies

Sounds awful doesn't it - as well it might :(

Here's the wiki on Puppy Mill (the North American terminology for Puppy Farm)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puppy_mill

Mass producer of puppies with little or no concern for the dogs' welfare.

The Wikipedia sentence "A puppy mill, sometimes known as a puppy farm,[1] is a commercial dog breeding facility that is operated with an emphasis upon profits above animal welfare and is often in substandard conditions regarding the well-being of dogs in their care. is a good starting point.

I nearly put in my original post. "I don't want to know what the Wikipedia definition is, I can find that for myself" . But I didn't so there is no critism intended to those who have cited Wikipedia.

However I am really interested to know what this community considers the the term "Puppy Farm" to mean.

Mass producer of puppies with little or no concern for the dogs' welfare.

Also produced with only an income in mind.

>>Mass producer of puppies with little or no concern for the dogs' welfare.

Marianne what term would you use to describe a mass producer of puppies who did care for the welfare of the dogs ?
And similarly to Alison in order to be called a puppy farmer do you need to fulfill all 3 of your criteria ?

Thinking about the subject purely logically, not emotionally, a farmer is someone who produces a harvest from living things, whether plants or animals, for a profit. Some farmers are good, some farmers are bad. However most crops (and yes, you talk about a crop of lambs, for instance) aren't destined to be sold to live in a domestic environment, or have the potential to cause harm to the humans or animals therein, which dogs are, so they should be considered a special case and rather different from mushroom farming or arable farming or fish farming or dairy farming. A commercial dog breeder is, by this definition, a puppy farmer.

However animals which are destined to live in a domestic environment should be raised in a domestic environment, from a welfare point of view (less traumatic a transition after sale for sentient creatures) if nothing else. A commercial breeder which does not do this would have be a 'bad' farmer, and the more welfare aspects that are neglected the worse they become.

A business which keeps and rears domestic animals (cats and dogs) as livestock in the same manner as cows pigs and sheep, with the same philosphy (ie when you have livestock, you also have deadstock). :(

> when you have livestock, you also have deadstock

'Deadstock' is actually the term given to farm equipment that has never lived; tractors, rolls of wire netting etc. But I know what you meant.

I've also heard a farmer friend console himself when he lost some lambs with that actual phrase, JG :( should have made it clearer.

Well yes, you accept that there are likely to be losses - from stillbirth, predators, disease or the weather, just as people accept that puppy stillbirths and neonate deaths do sometimes happen even with the best of care. That's facing reality and not evidence of poor husbandry or care. It's a fact of life that there will be death, just as having to sell the extra puppies in your own litter is a horrible but necessary evil.

Puppy Farmer - A dog breeder who has several different breeds and/or puppies always available.

With the addition of - re-home bitches when breeding life over to maximise their breeding stock levels.

>Puppy Farmer - A dog breeder who has several different breeds and/or puppies always available.

Selling puppies through a third party and not directly to the 'end' owner is also an element, but not an essential factor in the definition.

>Thinking about the subject purely logically, not emotionally

Thank you, this thread is not about the morality of puppy farming. I am just seeking to find a definition for the term puppy farm or puppy farmer.

So Jeangenie would it be fair to say your definition is :

Puppy farmer

A commercial dog breeder

I'd say the terms are pretty much synonymous.

There will, of course, be the caring-and-conscientious, taking scrupulous care of the physical and mental welfare of the animals, and the callous-and-compassionless who provide the animals with the bare minimum for survival, and all shades in between. But they're all producing puppies as a business for profit, so it would be hard to separate them by definition.

Selling puppies through a third party and not directly to the 'end' owner is also an element, but not an essential factor in the definition.

Puppy Farmer - or at least one essential factor in the emerging definition

Large (off the) scale commercial breeder who sells puppies through third parties (dealers) and has no further responsibility towards either the puppy or the end owner

I would say a puppy farmer is someone who breeds sells to dealers. Don't health test and miccrochip for tracability. I am not against dog breeders as Long as it's done right. I was talking to my vet last week and asked has the standard in Wales got better. He said yes most definetly. He also said you will get bad breeders but that's everywhere. uk irland Wales. He also said irland is far worse then Wales he worked there last year and said irland is the capital of puppy farming.  

It really is an emotive term and there are those that have been trying to change it to more accurately reflect what a 'puppy farmer' actually is

The KC refers to bred purely for profit, bred too many times, living in unbearable conditions, etc etc and caution about pedigrees

I think it is mostly about the conditions they breed in and the condition of the dogs as well as the numbers bred

I would also add things like the lack of care about health and the testing for health to the list of things

It is too easy to bandy the term around and label someone as a 'puppy farmer' I have heard it used about someone who has bred a couple of litters by some one who has bred far more in several breeds just because they didn't like each other - but then the damage is done

Personally I have always considered a puppy farmer to be someone who makes some kind of living from breeding dogs in whatever conditions they keep them. Someone who breeds with no intention of keeping back one for themselves is doing it for financial gain imho.

There is a phrase I have heard;

"There are those that live to breed and those that breed to live"

So anyone that comes into the second category is a puppy farmer - they are not doing it for the love of dogs and their breed, they are doing it to improve/maintain other aspects of their lives.  That includes Mr & Mrs Smith from number 39 who are having a litter from Fluffy to help fund their Holiday, Christmas, new car etc all the way up to the guy in Wales with 300 dogs in one barn that have never seen grass or the sky.

If you do not intend to leave the breed in a better state than you found it, you are a puppy farmer.

I don't know if I can give a "definition" of puppy farm/mill but I can say what would send massive alarm bells to me as to what one looks like.  Maybe a definition of sorts will come from that once I am finished

1) Rows and rows of wire crates stacked ontop of eachother
2) Unpleasant living conditions to say the least
3) Back to Back to Back breeding of bitches
4) A large number of puppies available
5) Dogs that spend their lives never leaving a crate (or hardly ever)
6) No thought of health of the pups. 
7) Breeds purebred and crossbred
8) This price for papers, this price without
9) A large amount of different breeds available (I say large because to some of the GP they think having and breeding two different breeds is a lot)
10) Little to no care for animal welfare
11) Puppies from pet stores
12) Little to no vetting of prospective buyers - you got the cash, I can sell you a dog.
13) NO health certificates and no references

in our breed where 8-10 litters in the whole uk is the average for the whole year.......then someone who has 2 litters plus in a year!!!

i would say puppy farms  are places where people can make loads of money without any feelings whatso ever about the dogs , puppys or people that buy them and have to pay out for treatment,behaviourists, and the heart break they are causing by breeding animals that are not bodily, mentally and able to produce happy healthy puppys.as far as im concerned puppy farms are Dog Concentration Camps.

sorry if ive offended anyone by my definition