In my local newspaper today I found an article about an 18 year old who wanted to go on some sort of expedition. To raise the money for this they bred their family Labrador :(
I was saddened to read this. The article was almost bragging about selling the 9 pups for £500 each, and basically promoting breeding dogs for money. Well if they made enough money out of it to go on this expedition, it seems they can't be breeding responsibly. They were obviously not intending to better the breed, and are just adding to the huge number of Labradors in this country (lots of them in rescue needing homes). I hope people don't see it and think "What a good idea, we can breed our dog to make money for a holiday!". :(
Anyway, I'm considering writing a letter to the paper in response to this article, sharing my views on the matter. I'm not a breeder and haven't really been into the dog world for long so I might need your help.
Do you think it's a good idea for me to write in? I'm still not 100% sure that I should - I'm a quiet person and I generally don't like to speak out about things.

Oh and I wasn't sure if this post belonged in breeding or general, I'm putting it in general just in case.

I think it's avery good idea to write in. If you let me know where to write to, I'll write in too. It's shameful that they should promote breeding as a money making idea in this way, I'm appalled. :(

Dawn R.

Talk about the Road to Hell being paved with good intentions!   No doubt these poor deluded souls thought that they were doing this in a good cause, but without realising the full implications of their ations :(

If they had 9 puppies, sadly that could mean that there could be around another 25 puppies in Rescue in the next two to three years.  Before I am shot down in flames by the statisticians (amongst whom I do NOT presume myself :) ) - I work this out by the thought process that probably 3 of these puppies will have litters, of around 8-10, and probably 3 males would sire a couple of litters each, again of around 8-10 each.    Half of these could easily be handed in for Rescue/Rehoming :( !

Maybe though we are wrong.   Maybe these people had carefully planned this litter, and both mum and dad were hip and elbow scored, and eye tested, both having good, complementary pedigrees, and maybe all the homes that the puppies are going to have been carefully vetted - and maybe they've just decided out of sheer altruism to donate all the puppy proceeds to the sponsor trip.   Let's hope so.

Margot

Definitely write in! This is absolutely disgusting and irresponsible of the newspaper to print an article like that. It's totally immoral if you ask me. Hey, want some money?  Become a puppy farmer - it's in all the papers so it must be okay.

Regardless of how well bred or otherwise that litter of puppies was, NOBODY with the least bit of compassion and feelings of responsibility towards dogs in general would have bragged about breeding a litter because the kid wanted a holiday in the newspaper. What will the family want next time - a new car, how about a conservatory, kid going to university? How about them donating the price of a puppy to Labrador rescue for the last litter and NOT adding to the problem by not breeding her again!

Thanks everyone :)
I think I will write in. I might find I need a bit of help when I get around to it though.

Hopefully some nearby doggy people will see it and be just as shocked as I am and write in too. Perhaps it'll change some people's minds and prevent these people from doing it again. Dogs aren't money-machines :(

I hope the paper gets an earful about that one, it's bad enough that the family did what they did, but the paper should never have printed it.  I was reading Pick Me Up last week, and I saw a reply to a question ni the psychic section - some woman was wondering why her rabbit was upset.  The psychic reckoned "Gloria" was a male, and that the best solution was to buy him a girl bunny and get ready for all the babies.  I was livid and am writing in about it!

There should be rules about this sort of thing really, but you just know it'd get bogged down in so much red tape. :(

Bekki go ahead!  if they have any problems with what you have to say send them to me! :D ;)...No wait hang on I would run a mile... LOL

Send them this and tell them to turn the volume up :(

Go ahead and write a letter! The more people that do the better. I am very much a letters to the editor type of person myself, I can never stay quiet, anything wrong to do with animals and I send a letter off. :) Sometimes they get published, sometimes not.  I rember once a few years ago one national newspaper listed dog breeds suitable for couch potatoes as all they'd need would be a walk to the pub and back, and they named the cavalier as the best one. That got me going for sure, and they did print my letter complete with photo of my well exercised cavaliers.  Once the local paper wrote about how a family's 6 week old puppy had been stolen -from their garden shed. I wrote in and asked what on earth a 6 week old puppy was doing locked up in a garden shed? That got printed too. Another time a national paper wrote about somebody making a living out of breeding cats. I wrote in and explained how much of a LOSS you make when doing it responsibly, and that was printed. Etc etc. Most of the time newspapers simply don't have a clue so the will just print what they think is a good story, if they then get several complaints about it they may even see it as interesting debate and print the letters -always worth a try.