An HSUS undercover investigation covering every known pet store in New Jersey that sells puppies has revealed that many of these businesses sourced animals from puppy mills with Animal Welfare Act violations. Federal inspectors, in some cases, found bleeding or injured dogs and even dead puppies at the worst of the breeders.
At some of the New Jersey pet stores, investigators found puppies living in dismal, crowded conditions. Other stores failed to disclose any breeder information to potential buyers, in apparent violation of state law.
A puppy in a small, rusty cage at D & G’s Petite Pups in Paterson, New Jersey, looked disheveled and depressed. Photo by The HSUS
Altogether, HSUS investigators visited all 29 pet stores that we could find in New Jersey that sell puppies. Our research staff reviewed documentation concerning the origins of more than 1,400 puppies shipped to the stores from out-of-state breeding operations. What we found was consistent with a string of past investigations that expose the pet store-puppy mill connection:
- Fifty-three puppy mills that have appeared in one or more of The HSUS’s Horrible Hundred reports have sold animals to New Jersey pet stores within the past 20 months. The USDA warned one notorious Iowa breeder that shooting dogs in the head is an unacceptable form of euthanasia (Judy Maassen/ J Maassen Inc.). The agency found seven dead puppies scattered on one Ohio breeder’s property (Andy Yoder/ Yoder Backroad Kennel), while an Iowa kennel had more than 20 dogs in need of veterinary care (Steve Kruse/ Stonehenge Kennel).
- We found conditions at some of the New Jersey stores to be demonstrably inhumane, with puppies confined to small, rusted cages, and starved for human attention. Some of the puppies at NY Puppy Club in Edgewater were in cages so small that they could do little more than turn around. Puppies at a number of stores pawed at their cages, as if desperate to get out. Conditions at Carmona Pet Shop in Union City, Passaic Pets in Passaic, and D & G’s Petite Pups in Paterson were so troubling that our staff reported them to local law enforcement agencies for review.
- Of the 29 stores visited by our investigators, six failed to disclose any breeder information to the potential buyer, in apparent violation of state law. These stores included Carmona Pet Shop in Union City, Oh My Dog in Kearny, Fashionable Pets in Paramus, Passaic Pets in Passaic, and Absolute Fishland and Pets R Us, both in Newark.
- Many pet stores provided incomplete or misleading information to consumers. For example, a salesperson at Wayne Puppies in Wayne told an undercover investigator that all of the puppies in the store were from local breeders, but information posted near the cages clearly showed that some of the puppies had come from a large-scale dog broker in Iowa.
The post Breaking news: HSUS investigation connects New Jersey pet stores to notorious Midwest puppy mills appeared first on A Humane Nation.
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