Welcome to the Golden Retriever Puppy Mill Rescue site!

Click HERE to order the 2010 Golden Retriever Puppy Mill Rescue Calendar.

WELCOME!

Thank you for visiting the Golden Retriever Puppy Mill Rescue Team website which is devoted to rescuing Goldens from puppy mills and a life of living hell.

The Golden Retriever Puppy Mill Rescue Team (GRPMRT) has grown from a small beginning in 1999 as the idea of one committed Golden rescuer in Oklahoma, to a nationwide effort today involving hundreds of individuals and numerous Golden Retriever Rescues who have saved over 500 Golden Retrievers from puppy mills in the central U.S.

WHAT IS A PUPPY MILL?

Although there are a number of ways to evaluate whether an operation could be classified as a puppy mill, here are some key elements that most would agree describe a mill.

• A relatively large “commercial breeding” facility, usually with dozens or hundreds of dogs, typically of many different breeds.
• The females are bred from their first heat cycle at six months until they are too old to produce healthy puppies, frequently seven to nine years of age.
• Dogs are housed in indoor or outdoor cages or runs for their entire lives with no socialization and minimal interaction with humans.
• The breeder typically sells their puppies to an intermediate “third party” such as a broker or pet store rather than directly to a family.
• When not sold to an intermediary, puppies are offered for sale over the internet and shipped to unsuspecting families.
• The breeder is focused on profit rather than to the betterment of the breed.
• Animals in these commercial facilities are considered as a “cash crop,” no different than cattle, hogs, corn, or wheat.
• Very little attention is paid to the fact that dogs have been bred to be domesticated pet companions with emotional needs beyond the basic survival needs of food, water, and shelter.

PUPPY MILLS & PET STORES

“How much is that doggie in the window,” was the start to a popular song many years ago. Today, almost all puppies and kittens found in chain commercial pet stores come from puppy mills. The commercial breeder’s goal is to get the puppies out of the kennel as quickly as possible (to reduce their costs) so they frequently sell the puppies to a “broker” who then transports the puppies across country and sells them to pet store chains.

One of the ways to help put the millers out of business is to educate people about this connection between puppy mills and pet stores and tell them to never buy a puppy or kitten from such a place. This is not to be confused with the laudable efforts of companies like PetSmart, PETCO, and others who work with local Rescue groups and provide space in their stores so the Rescues can adopt out their many dogs in need of good homes.

AUCTIONS

When millers choose to get out of the commercial breeding business, or to stop breeding a specific breed, they will typically put those dogs up for auction, either as part of a complete kennel closure sale, or will send their close out breeds to an auction house. Until Rescues learned about these auctions, the only attendees were other puppy millers who purchased the dogs and took them back to their own mill, thus continuing a life of breeding and misery for those dogs.

THE PUPPY MILL RESCUE TEAM

The volunteers who started the Golden Retriever Puppy Mill Rescue Team are blessed – or cursed with living near the heart of the Midwest puppy mill country, an area comprised roughly of northeastern Oklahoma, southeastern Kansas, southwestern Missouri, and northwestern Arkansas.

Starting in 1999, the Puppy Mill Rescue Team has sent volunteers to numerous auctions in the Midwest and thanks to the generous donations of so many wonderful people, has been able to purchase hundreds of Goldens out from under the noses of the puppy millers, getting them out of this vicious cycle – forever! There’s one thing we know for certain: the dogs at auctions will all sell and they’ll either go home with another miller/breeder or they’ll go home with Rescue. When they go home with Rescue their lives change dramatically. Medical care, baths, TLC and physical touch – often for the first time, then on to receiving Rescues and into foster homes who have been anxiously waiting for their new arrival.

THE DEBATE

Supporters of paying money to get Goldens out of the mills say the focus should be on the individual lives saved from a horrible existence. Others say we are putting money back in the pockets of those same puppy millers we detest, potentially keeping them in business. Both views are valid, so what to do? Everything!

The Puppy Mill Rescue Team has chosen to attend auctions, bid on, and buy as many Goldens as possible. Because if we don’t go, the selling puppy millers are going to profit from the sale of their Goldens at the auction - to other puppy millers. If we go, the millers profit. If we don’t go, the millers profit. So we’ve chosen to go and change the lives of those individual Goldens that we can rescue.

But our Golden Retriever Rescue community is so great that even those who don’t think it’s a good idea to pay money to the millers are overwhelmingly supportive of caring for and re-homing those puppy mill Goldens. We would never have been able to rescue these hundreds of Goldens without the many GR Rescues who have taken in these Goldens in need. That is Golden Retriever Rescue.

WHAT YOU CAN DO

Help put an end to puppy mills by educating other people about what you have learned about puppy mills and the puppy mill pet store connection. Refer them here to our website as well as to www.nopuppymills.com.

You can make a donation by clicking on the Donate button, or you can mail a check made out to GRPMRT (Golden Retriever Puppy Mill Rescue Team) to: GRPMRT, P.O. Box 57139, Oklahoma City, OK 73157-7139. All donations are tax deductible.

Buy our beautiful Golden Retriever Puppy Mill Rescue calendar featuring pictures of many Goldens who are now living the good life after being rescued from the mills. All profit from the sale of these calendars will be used to get Goldens out of puppy mills.

Encourage your local GR Rescue and it’s families to volunteer to take in Goldens rescued from the mills. It can be a very challenging experience, but it’s extremely rewarding.

If you live in or are willing to travel to the Midwest, you might consider attending auctions with us. We could definitely use your help! Please feel free to contact us at, puppymillrescue@grpmrt.org.

Again, thank you for supporting Golden Retrievers in need!

 

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