Meet Tatty, an ordinary looking Standard Poodle some may say, but, beneath her typical poodle good looks, lurks a sinister secret.
Tatty will be 5 years old in January 2008. She and her litter sister were purchased and used for the purpose of breeding Labradoodles. What’s wrong with that you may ask? Well forget the image you have in your head of cute little doodle pups snuggling up to the mothers, being lovingly raised and cared for by the breeder, for this is a far cry from the conditions Tatty and her pups were forced to endure.
We first learned about Tatty from an advert on a popular internet site. It read something like this:
For Sale
Labradoodle bitch.
Regular 6 monthly seasons.
Good mother, excellent for breeding Labradoodles.
Alarm bells started to ring for a number of caring Labradoodle owners and one called the number listed to find out more information. She was shocked to discover that this poor girl had been bred continually, at every season, since she was no more than a pup herself. Sadly her litter sister had already been sold on for more breeding. It also became apparent that she was in fact a Poodle, not a Doodle as advertised.
So, a dilemma, what should we do? Ignore her plight because she is a Poodle? Bury our heads in the sand and cuddle our own doodles whilst muttering words like, disgusting, inhumane, poor dog etc?
Any caring dog owner could not ignore what was happening to this poor dog so a plan was hatched to visit the breeder, and check out the conditions of both the dog and the environment she was in. The dog was for sale, not for rescue and, as funds are short, the only option was to leave her there and hope if conditions were bad the local authority would intervene.
What we hadn’t planned for was the effect seeing her would have on us. In the garden of an ordinary house, on an ordinary housing estate was a shed and an attached small run containing Tatty, 7 adult doodles of varying colours and in the corner of the shed, her 3 cowering 6 week old pups without so much as a blanket for comfort. The stench of urine was eye wateringly strong.
Tatty was duly brought out for inspection. She immediately jumped up and buried her head in my pocket. She was rather thin, extremely smelly and it was difficult to tell what colour she was as she was so dirty. Talking to her owner revealed nothing but his absolute disregard for animal welfare. The first words from his mouth were ‘breed from her – you’ll make your money back.’ Now this girl had more than paid for herself, at 4 years old she had already produced at least 5, possibly more, litters of pups. You do the maths, her pups were for sale priced in excess of £700, average litter size is usually 7 or more pups. Bred continually, that’s 2 litters per year from approx 9 months of age
There was no way we could leave her there and risk her being sold on to another cash hungry ‘breeder’. Harsh words were exchanged, a price was negotiated, cash exchanged and we’d now become the proud owners of a broken, but lovable, Standard Poodle. Since then Tatty has gone from strength to strength. Many baths later her coat had lost the smell of ammonia and revealed itself to be cream. She has adapted well to her new life and shown herself to be a loving, sweet, bossy, cheeky little madam.
At first she refused to eat from a bowl and would only dine off the floor, she preferred to sleep on a hard surface rather than a soft cushion and her toilet habits left a lot to be desired! With time, patience and lots of love she has learned to behave like a normal dog. She enjoys her walks, has learned about the simple pleasures being a dog brings like toys, rolling in mud, chasing rabbits, paddling in the river etc.
She is a joy to live with and her aim in life seems to be to make up for lost time by doing everything at 100 miles an hour. Her favourite pastime is cat watching – this is the Tatty version of Big Brother it seems.
Sadly dogs are rehomed for a variety of reasons. Some come from loving families whose circumstances change, some have behaviour issues that need correcting and some, like Tatty, are the victims of the Designer Dog tag, used and abused to line the pockets of greedy people and then thrown away when they are no longer ‘fit for purpose’.
The one thing they all have in common is their need to be loved and cherished and given a chance to live the life they deserve.
  
|
