Pedigree dogs
Grrr... just watched the BBC documentary on them. Nothing there I didn't already know but it did make me a tad angry to see the Kennel Club people being such ridiculous arses. The lowlight was a breeder saying that she found it a pain when vets refused to put down healthy puppies. The healthy puppies in question were pedigree Rhodesian Ridgebacks which didn't have ridges -- in fact, these puppies are healthier than their ridgèd brethren because the ridge is actually a mild form of spina bifida.
Hopefully with the bit of extra publicity raised by the programme will have some effect but I doubt it. I've known pedigree dogs are nothing more than mutants since I worked in vets' surgeries over ten years ago -- one regular customer bred dogs, so I got to see firsthand quite a few problems with one breed in particular -- and it gets raised every year at the time of Crufts but nothing ever seems to happen. It's sickening.
Hopefully with the bit of extra publicity raised by the programme will have some effect but I doubt it. I've known pedigree dogs are nothing more than mutants since I worked in vets' surgeries over ten years ago -- one regular customer bred dogs, so I got to see firsthand quite a few problems with one breed in particular -- and it gets raised every year at the time of Crufts but nothing ever seems to happen. It's sickening.