‘Puppy mill’ accuser calls for stricter provincial rules

“I’m glad it did,” he said via telephone on Monday evening. “Because, I mean, the more people that can be educated on this, the better.”

The Debden breeder is the subject of an ongoing investigation by the Saskatchewan SPCA. The Doggie Days Kennel at Horses Deluxe had been the subject of numerous other online complaints prior to Baert’s visit and subsequent Facebook post.

He’s now looking to the provincial government to change the laws that apply to breeders. On Monday, after contacting the Saskatchewan SPCA, he realized the organization is restricted to the confines of the law.

“As long as they have adequate food, water and shelter, then everything is fine,” he said. “There’s nothing listed about the space that they should have, the cleanliness of the facility.”

He’s hoping the public too will lobby the provincial government and to make it easier for the SPCA to deal with complaints similar to his.

“Because to me anyone that walks into that place and says it’s acceptable, I would really not like to see what their definition of what … not acceptable is.”

For the dogs living at Horses Deluxe, he would like to see them taken away and given to rescues or the SPCA.

The Saskatchewan SPCA could remove the animals during the course of the investigation if the animals are in distress and if the owners haven’t relieved that distress, said the manager of animal protection services, Kaley Pugh.

The province doesn’t have a specific piece of legislation that governs dog and cat breeders, but the Animal Protection Act would apply to those operations. Pugh said the act applies to any animal in the province.

The act requires animals to have adequate food, water, shelter and care. Pugh said when it comes to large dog breeding facilities, there are certain parts of the act that aren’t really specific where those operations are concerned.

The SPCA, she said, has to assess whether the animals are in distress. This includes ensuring the dogs are being fed food appropriate to their life stage and that they have clean water.

“So, conditions like air quality, or the size of a pen or something like that are sort of grey areas, and what we do is we rely on a veterinarian’s opinion as to whether or not the conditions are adequate or not,” Pugh said. There is a national code of practice for kennel operations, she added.

“But even that, it has space requirements, but they’re very, very basic requirements and are the absolute bare minimums. It doesn’t have anything about acceptable levels of ammonia in the facility, for example. So, even those rules are very basic.”

Pugh said the legislation in place is reasonable, but a code of practice similar to one in place for livestock would help. She suggested the creation of a code of practice applying to dogs where adequate care and shelter are defined specifically.

“The legislation is adequate in that regard. It just needs a second document to refer to, to define things like space and air quality and that sort of thing for dogs.”

There are provisions in the legislation allowing the Saskatchewan SPCA to conduct routine inspections on facilities breeding animals for sale, Pugh said. However, the problem is the SPCA doesn’t have the resources to do that. For the entire province, there are only five animal protection officer positions.

“So, we’re extremely busy and have a hard time keeping up with the complaints, let alone trying to do routine inspections of dog or cat breeders or anything like that,” Pugh said.

The Saskatchewan SPCA investigates about 700 complaints a year, and several of those are about dog breeders. It doesn’t track the complaints separately as dog breeder complaints.

The complaint against the Debden dog breeder

The owner of three dogs heard complaints about conditions at the dog breeder’s property and decided to investigate for himself.

Baert called the co-owner of Horses Deluxe, Betty Rath, and told her he was interested in buying a dog.

On Saturday morning, when he did drive out to visit the site, he saw what he described as a dead dog near the business. Its body was decomposing by the side of the road.

Rath asserted on Monday the corpse is that of a goat, and not a dog. But Baert disputed her claim, saying he had seen decomposing goats and coyotes when he’s spent time at farms. He said he also saw footprints made by dogs in the snow surrounding the remains.

“And, you know what, it wasn’t a goat, but even if it was, why would you leave that there?” he asked.

He got to the business and met with Rath, and they went out to where the dogs are housed. He described it as the size of a large ice fishing shack. He estimated there were more than 30 dogs living in the “shack.” Baert, a journeyman plumber, said the smell inside of the building made him gag.

Inside, he said there were dog cages on the floor and on shelves, “wall-to-wall.”

“With the exception of one dog, there was one dog that was caged by himself, and I asked her about that and she had told me that that dog in particular had killed two of her previous, like two of the dogs she had had. So, that’s why he was caged by himself.”

The dogs, he said, did have what the law required, adequate water, food and heat.

Rath soon asked him to leave – he said he thinks he was taking a few too many pictures. After leaving, he said he drove about five kilometres down the road, got out of his truck and vomited. Baert then drove into Prince Albert and then to the SPCA to report what he saw.

He said it was important for him to share his experience with the public because dogs are important to him.

“They’re unconditionally loving and I wanted to go out and see firsthand what people talk about when they say ‘puppy mills.’ So, it was very important for me to see that for myself so that I was aware of what a puppy mill was.”

And now, for Baert, this is not the end.

“I will be doing everything in my power… I will be starting petitions, I will be signing petitions already in place. I will be lobbying the government to get these laws changed.”

For more about what Betty Rath had to say about the allegations, click here.

tjames@panow.com

On Twitter: @thiajames

by Thia James

‘Puppy mill’ accuser calls for stricter provincial rules

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