Eddie
Hi, I wanted to share my story about our puppy who we believe came from a puppy farm. We saw an advert in June 2018 on Pets4Homes from 'breeders' advertising cocker spaniel puppies in South Wales.
We rang and chatted to the woman and she seemed lovely, answered all our questions etc. There was no pictures of the parents on the advert so she sent me a picture of an adult cocker spaniel. She assured me we could see mum with her puppies when we arrived. We drove down to Lampeter, South Wales to a remote farmhouse. Two puppies were left and it was only when I asked to see the mother, that they brought the adult dog in. She did not take any notice of the puppies at all and the puppies didn't go anywhere near her. The 'breeders' took the mother back out after a couple of minutes. That was the first time I was suspicious, but I didn't want to leave the puppies then and if I could have afforded it I would have taken both. We chose a puppy and we set off on the 5 hour journey back to Manchester. He was sick several times on the journey but thought this was purely down to the journey. He also had diarrhoea in the evening. I also noticed he had several fleas.
I took him straight to the vets the following morning. The vet didn't waste any time and treated him for parvo straight away just incase, worming medication and flea stuff. This meant he couldn't have any vaccinations for 2 more weeks due to the medication. He had had his first injection in a local vets in South Wales.
I started to do some research on the 'breeders' trying to find out more about them. At the time, her Instagram page was public and I was able to find out her children's names (they were grown adults). Then looking t other puppies for sale on Pets4Homes I discovered that they were advertising puppies on their own profiles. I played very friendly with the 'breeder' and kept in contact with her via email pretending I was so grateful to have found such a beautiful puppy from such a lovely home etc etc. I said I was so sad that I didn't have any pictures of the mum and so she sent me some pictures to my phone. I started to recognise her descriptions when looking at puppies for sale in and around Lampeter, and even though they were advertised by her children, I knew she had written the adverts and was likely the seller.
A couple of weeks later her daughter advertised some cocker spaniel puppies and so I pretended to be called Brenda and texted her pretending to be interested. She sent me some pictures and I asked for a picture of the mother. Surprise surprise, she sent me exactly the same picture of the 'mother' dog that had been sent to me two weeks earlier. I knew at that moment that my pup was being sold from traders as part of a puppy farm operation. I contacted the Kennel Club (I had foolishly believed that being a KC puppy somehow ensure his quality) and shared my suspicions. I asked them what evidence they have from 'breeders' that the puppies are actually born to KC registered parents and they said none.
I was horrified by this. I contacted Camarthenshire Council and they weren't interested one little bit. I had to keep chasing and chasing them and their only excuse for not looking into it was that they were busy with other cases. I rang the vets who had apparently given our puppy his first vaccination and they wouldn't discuss anything with me and the RSPCA weren't interested either. The only think I could think of at this point was to contact HMRC to raise a concern about people avoiding paying tax on income.
We were lucky in that I think because our vet didn't wait around and treated him straight away, that he was one of the lucky ones. And I'm so sorry that Reggie wasn't. Well done you for doing something so worthwhile in his memory. I loathe these filthy puppy farmers/traders and I am horrified how lax the law is. I just thought I would share my story. My Eddie is now nearly 3 and is a healthy much loved dog, but it could have been so different.