CHARITY URGES PEOPLE TO BUY MIXED BREED DOGS TO CURB PEDIGREE PUPPY THEFTS

Animal rights group SAFE is appealing to dog lovers to buy mixed breeds from shelters to deter pedigree puppy thefts.

The plea follows an apparent spike in valuable purebred dogs being stolen around the country.

Chief executive officer Debra Ashton said SAFE had seen a rise in the number of stolen pedigree pooches reported on social media.

“It’s cruelty in the highest degree both for the animals and for the families that are having their dogs stolen.

“This is completely unacceptable and the community together needs to fight against it.”

Ashton recommends people go to animal charities which are “screaming out” for good loving homes instead of buying expensive pedigrees from “puppy mills”.

This could help to “nip the theft business in the bud” by reducing demand, she said.

Ashton urged people to be aware of animals being stolen for dog fighting to speak out, and to question new pet owners about where they got their pedigrees.

The price of puppies is believed to be skyrocketing due to more demand after the Covid-19 lockdown.

“I’ve heard figures of around $4000 to $8000 which is phenomenal for purchasing a dog,” Ashton said.

Cavoodle puppies – a hybrid of a cavalier king charles spaniel and a poodle – are selling on Trade Me for $6000, golden retriever puppies for $4000 and Dobermans for $3000 a pup, she said.

Trade Me has seen 28,000 searches for puppies in the last week – a 34 per cent jump on the same time last year.

Ashton said she thought all dogs were beautiful – including pedigrees.

“But my question has always been why would we keep breeding more and more animals when we’ve already got animals who are locked up with charities waiting to go to loving homes?

“It’s just senseless.”

SPCA’s communications and marketing manager, Kim Taylor, said they did not hold data for the number of thefts as when pets were stolen, it became a police matter.

Police said they did not have figures for purebred dog thefts readily available and Stuff could request it under the Official Information Act.

David Lloyd is the general manager of Companion Animals New Zealand, which runs the NZ Companion Animal Register and lostpet.co.nz, where people can list lost and found pets.

Lloyd said while any measurement of stolen animals was reliant on people noting their suspicions in listings, the website had not noticed an increase in pet owners claiming their dog was stolen during the last two years.

However, he advised owners wanting to protect their canines to:

• Have a well-fenced section to limit wandering and opportunistic thieves
• Consider keeping their dog inside when owners are away from home
• Interact with their dog and provide stimulus if the canines stay outside to give less reason for the animal to wander
• Have their dog microchipped (it’s the law) and register with their local council but also on the NZ Companion Animal Register (NZCAR). Animal microchips registered there are searchable by all vet clinics and most rescues in New Zealand, he said.

The NZCAR works with the Scanner Angel network so animals marked as lost on the register will be flagged when they are surveyed with a Scanner Angel scanner, he said.