NO Designer Dogs!

Manitoba Voice for Animals http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed-breed_dog

This is an excellent wiki article about mixed breed dogs - there are times when we do deliberate crosses, there are times to keep the bloodlines pure bred but to bring in new genetic material to avoid inbreeding and there are many times where by accident or design a dog is mated for the sole purpose of puppies. These dogs are often labelled "Designer Dogs" when they are anything but!

When you purposefully mix dog breeds you are looking to maximize on the good traits of both parents (often purebred) so that you have a calm demeanor in a working animal (for example). What a responsible person does not do is combine animals who have traits that are not desirable and magnify them - mixing dog breeds who both have genetic tendencies towards breathing problems, for example. Or combining breeds that both have high drive without considering what their purpose, their job is going to be.

Mixing large and small breeds can lead to physical challenges such as a small framed animal with the gains of its larger breed counterpart. This is an animal with health issues from the start.

When petstores and online ads market "Designer Dogs" they are combining a cute mix of names from most often 'guessed' at breeds in the parent dogs. This 'chidoodloor' is a random breeding of two intact animals for the sole purpose of making money. With a high cost to the buyer, to the shelters and vets who end up caring for these animals when their health and temperament deteriorates.

The breeders of 'designer dogs' can be puppy mills and backyard breeders who do not take proper care of the health of the animals, they do not provide proper socialization, remove puppies too early from their dams, they do not give adequate attention to the physical needs of exercise, healthy food and clean water and proper shelter for these animals. They breed indiscriminately, they breed many times and when they no longer can do this they are dumped, killed or left to die.

Stores who can bring in 'designer dogs' are deliberately feeding the market of ignorance and providing the unsuspecting public who has a tendency to trust pet stores with animals that wont' be what they want or pay for.

I have seen ads for 'designer dogs' that go from $900 and down...!

By educating people we can stop this trend. Just because it has a 'designer' name doesn't mean it was a well thought out or good idea. Most often, if you look at the runways of Paris and New York, you see things that are strange, unwearable and quite dangerous. The same holds for so-called 'designer dogs' - they are strange, they are often not able to be a long term, healthy family pet and sometimes their health and temperament can create dangerous situations for the families, the vets and the shelters where they eventually get dumped.

Do your part, next time you hear someone talking about 'designer dogs' educate them, when you see ads for them, report it to the site owner and post educational information. If you know a store which sells these dogs ask them to stop, put them in contact with a reputable rescue to learn where their dogs go and give them an option to actually help dogs instead of adding to the problem.

If you know someone personally who is breeding 'designer dogs' or is a backayard breeder contact us and we'll give you some resources to help educate them. If you know of a puppy mill report it, and if you know where they sell to, share that with us.