To feel, well, REALLY unhappy at seeing puppy on freecycle...

[Hadeda]

Digest of latest freecycle posts includes a pedigree puppy offered, 12 weeks old with AKC registration. Post says child has allergy which is reason puppy must go.
Which I can sort of understand, but really - freecycle???! Old sofa, used desk, cricket equipment, puppy; it just doesn't sit right. Couldn't she go back to the breeder? Or to the RSPCA or similar who will vet any new home carefully? Weird.

Not in America, no. :) At least not where I live. But a broken leg for a dog in my area would be more to the tune of 250 pounds, not 4000!

My dog has ear infections every so often, as well as the usual rabies injections etc. The most I've ever paid was... about 88 pounds? And that was when he needed X-rays because he'd hurt his paw.

I think it's just done differently here. There are free puppies and kittens, as well as older animals, on freecycle and offered for free in the newspaper every day. Of course, the town I live in is so small that someone would know if you were mistreating your animals or not! :) But I can see if it's not something that's common where you are, it would see shocking. A lot of people I know love dogs but can't afford to pay hundreds and hundreds of dollars for one, but can give a wonderful home to one who's offered for free when it's original owner can't care for it for some reason.

I just looked it up, and according to a CNN article from 2004, 3% of Americans have pet insurance. So it's not really that common here. :)

That really really surprises me, given that Americans don't have an NHS, so have health insurance for themselves.

A broken leg could cost about £250, unless it was a complicated fracture and required a specialist (and I know from visiting lecturers that America does have veterinary specialists!) £88 for a couple of xrays sounds about right, so veterinary treatment there isn't that much cheaper than here, just that you have been lucky so far!

Even without specialists, an ongoing illness (say diabetes, or a skin condition, for example) can really add up. Some people sadly can't run to it. not the dog's fault, but there you go.

How is different from an ad in the newsagent's?

valium- ad in the newsagents just as bad! For all the reasons explained above.

As a breeder, yes, I make puppy buyers sign a contract to say they must return the pup to me if they can no longer keep it at any time in it's life. I simply wouldn't let someone have a puppy from me if they didn't agree to this in principle. I also make sure I maintain a good relationship with them so that they are likely to want to return the puppy to me and I am quite happy to buy the puppy or dog back in order to ensure I do get it back. I have also bought a puppy from one of the top breeders in the breed, who has recently judged at Crufts. I signed a contract to say I must return the puppy to her should I no longer be able to keep it.

People shouldn't be rehoming, selling or trying to find a puppy on freecycle the freeads or most internet sites. For all the reasons Jooly and DBF have mentioned.

Just out of curiosity are people saying that most new dogs owners go through an elaborate interview and selection process. Providing proof of income and letters from their landlord etc?

Only I've never heard of it and I'm pretty certain I could find 50 that just handed over money within 10 minutes walk of here.

Some of the arguments were not unreasonable, but I had to laugh at the idea that being sold on freecycle was damaging to the dog's dignity. I imagine being kept as a slave has that effect too.

Onagar, no that's not what Jooly and I have been saying. We're saying that you'll be rigourously interviewed, expected to sign a contract to return the dog if ever you can't keep him and so on if you go to a reputable, decent breeder and if you really have the dog's welfare and best interests at heart as well as your own.

A good rescue will go further still. Any decent rescue will generally ask you to complete a written questionnaire, then follow up with a phone or email conversation. They'll invite you to meet the dogs - or perhaps a select few suitable dogs, will require to meet ALL the household and any other pets, will then homecheck you, which is where they will want to know if you are allowed to keep dogs in the property. Thereafter you might be okayed to have the dog, you might be asked to sort something out first - increase the height of the fence or wait until the big family dinner party has come and gone and it's quieter in the house - or you might be asked to return to rescue to build up a bond with the dog, perhaps several times, before taking him home.

The dogs in the average rescue are, roughly speaking, made up of the following - a very small percentage of dogs who were adopted from the rescue and have been returned because the owners can't keep them, a large number of dogs which are abandoned/neglected/lost and unclaimed and, increasingly a very large number of dogs who have been purchased without thought, commitment, knowledge, or any promise by the breeders to take the dog back when the owner has kids/changes work hours/moves house/divorces/realises that their baby has grown into a toddler and now "can't cope" with both a dog and a child/realises that they have a working or herding breed which is running rings around them and that they've no idea how to train a dog and can't be arsed to try...

You know I often say that there are a huge number of dogs in rescue who come from family homes, that they're not all strays?

Well, there's your reason.

Just to add, sadly so many people DON'T go to a reputable breeder or rescue. Many don't realise that by buying from Joe up the road who mated his bitch with the dog in the next street just because they look pretty/are both "nice"/the kids wanted pups in the house/to make a few £££s they are buying from a backyard breeder and encouraging a trade which is as much of a problem to people as it is to dogs, emotionally, medically, in terms of safety and financially. It's your council tax money which has to fund unwanted and stray dogs time in the pound and your council taxes which pay for many of those dogs to be killed after 7 days in there too.

Many people also don't know a good breeder from a bad one, don't know that KC reg means fuck all - 90% of puppy farmers pups are KC reg and the majority don't know how to spot one either.

Okay I am probably being a bit thick here but I hear time after time that a cat/dog/rabbit etc etc is being rehomed because a child is allergic to it.

My brother was allergic to cats and we knew instantly if one was in the room as he would start sneezing and his eyes would swell and itch. We never had a pet cat for this reason.

My SIL is allergic to dogs and has always known this from a very small child so her parents never got a dog. Do allergies really come on so unexpectedly and so quickly at the introduction of a pet? Have the DCs never encountered a dog/cat before.

Maybe an introductory weekend would be a good idea to spot this potential problem before the pet is officially acquired, though how that would be accomplished I am not sure..................probably break the kid's heart if they had to wave goodbye to it.

We offer such introductory weekends - trial weekends - to potential rehomers of rescue dogs. We also offer the opportunity for folk to foster, either with a view to owning permanently, or just for a short, agreed period of time.

I can't comment about allergies from the POV if experience of them though there are those on here who have become desensitised to their own pets and those I've met that have been too.

I CAN tell you that whilst it may be true of some families it's also a fucking good excuse for others!

More than once I've been approached to find rescue for a dog because little Johhny is allergic to dogs only to discover that the family are shortly afterwards - or even at the same time - seeking another, equally furry and allergenic dog.

Jooly yes, I have been lucky. :) He is the sweetest dog who ever lived and I would go into debt paying for his treatments if he needed them, of course. I think vet care and the expenses that go along with it vary widely by area, as does anything in the US. The 88 pounds mentioned were for his X-rays, his annual exam, and a couple of injections. (It was close the time for his shots anyway so the vet went ahead and did them then.) And heartworm pills I think...

I think that is part of it; we don't have an NHS and so spend a lot of money getting insurance for ourselves. :)

It's just a different culture wrt to the pet thing I suppose...honestly, no one here bats an eye at a puppy on freecycle. And we're surrounded by farms; there are always litters of kittens and pups "to give away to good home" in the paper.

Now I feel I have to put a pic of my dog on my profile so you can all agree that he is marvelous. :o

Hello - I had a look back over a few weeks and there are a few animals on our freecycle site. Cats, rabbits, birds. It's a London borough, not US. The guidelines don't say you can't offer animals, so I guess the moderators decided it was ok.
But I find it uncomfortable. I think rescue organisations or, if it's a pedigree animal, the breeder would be better options for rehoming than freecycle or other free papers etc.

Here the rescue places charge fairly large fees for their animals, though. They have to keep their organizations running, of course. Whereas Freecycle is, well, free. :)