Cooper P.

Topic: Puppy mills and pet stores

“Why won’t my dog fetch? Maybe he’s lonely.” I went up to my dog and started petting him. “I’m sorry, boy. Do you want another dog to play with?” Maybe I should buy a new puppy. I thought about the idea of getting a new puppy for the whole day, but I could not decide, so I just went to sleep and thought about it more the next day.

I woke up and I went outside to walk my dog. Whenever I wake up, my routine is to walk my dog out on the sidewalk because there are dirt and plants right next to it. Sometimes I run into other dogs, but my dog is calm about seeing other dogs. If it is a dog that doesn't like my dog, my dog does not like the other dog. That dog usually barks viciously at my dog, and I just simply keep walking.

I got home and asked my wife if it was a good idea to get a new puppy, and I gave her the reason that our dog seems to be getting lonely. She said it was a good idea. “Cooper, you hear that? You’re getting a new friend!” Cooper is going to be happy when he gets his new friend, I thought to myself. It was 12:30, and I had to be at work at 1:15, so I had to leave soon. My work was really close, but I had to prepare.

After I was done with my work, I went over to a pet shop over at the mall to buy a new dog. I was looking at the different dogs that they had, and I picked this small white bichon frise. A question came in my mind before I wanted to ask how much the dog was.

I said, “Where did you get this dog from?”

The clerk said, “This dog was bought from a puppy mill.”

“What is a puppy mill?”

The store clerk looked around for his manager or a fellow employee. Once he realized no one else was there, he said, “I’m not supposed to tell you this, but at a puppy mill, the mother of these dogs is forced to keep on making puppies until the mother hits the point where she cannot make anymore puppies, and then they dispose of the mother.”

I said, “What do you mean by dispose?”

The clerk said, “By dispose I mean kill.”

I thought to myself, That’s really harsh. How could they do such a thing to a poor dog? Then I said, “They don’t do anything else, do they?”

The clerk looked for anyone else and then whispered, “They also treat the dogs really badly, and most of the time the dogs end up having something deformed about them. The owner of this company only buys dogs that have no special conditions so that normal people would buy them.”

I thanked the clerk. I walked out and got into my car, decided not to get a dog there, and drove back home.

Once I arrived home, I told my wife all the details about how the people get the dogs at those pet shops, and I told her that we should not buy a dog from a pet shop.

She asked, “What are we going to do for our dog then?”

I said, “I don’t know. Actually, I’m going to go back and ask him for a better alternative.”

She said, “Are you sure he will actually give you the information you need? I mean, he does work there.”  

I said, “I actually don’t know that, However, worth a shot. It’s not that far away either.”

I drove to the pet shop and asked the clerk if he could suggest to me where to get a dog, and he said, “I already gave you enough information, why should I tell you this now? This is my job, you know.

I said, “My dog Cooper really needs a friend because I think he’s getting lonely.”

The clerk said, “I’m sorry, I know how you feel. I think my dog is feeling the same thing. One suggestion for you is to go to the humane society down the road. The humane society accepts dogs no matter what, even if they have been rescued from a bad home or if they were stray before, and they care for them and wait for someone to adopt them.”

I said, “Thanks for the help. I’ll rate this place low on Yelp but I’ll mention that you did a good job.”

The clerk said, “Have a nice day.”

I then drove to the humane society.