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The Effects of Inbreeding
Meet Puff and Little Bit....

Puff  was born with only half of his back leg. His foot is missing so he walks on his “knee”.  Whenwe first got him, he had an open wound at the end of his leg because there is no cushion between the skin, the bone and the floor. But you can't tell a cat not to use his leg ....well, you can... but he won't listen. He is so full of kitten charm and curiosity that he has no idea there is anything wrong with him. He charges around the office with his catnip mouse, tossing it up into the air and catching it, racing to and fro (the mouse is very fast... but Puff is faster).  He is quite a little rascal.

Little Bit was born with her left front leg missing. She has about one inch of leg below her shoulder. She hasn't quite figured out that all four legs don't touch the floor. When she walks, she steps down on the missing leg and her chest almost touches the floor before she realizes that the leg isn't there. When she uses the kitty box she rests her chest on the side of it to keep herself from falling over. (She is very resourceful.) She is the tiniest of kittens...barely anything to her, she only weighs two pounds.   
These kittens are a product of inbreeding.  Life outside would not be easy for them. I am not so sure Little Bit would have made it. This is one of the reasons it is so important to spay and neuter.
Nature goes to great lengths to discourage inbreeding. Related animals rarely mate, which prevents genes for diseases and defects from coming together with any great frequency. Sometimes circumstances give animals no choice but to mate with relatives. If those conditions persist for any length of time they create a "genetic bottleneck." Inbreeding reduces fertility, vigour, overall health and mental stability. Inbred animals are more prone to sickness and disease as it always affects the immune system. A feral colony or barn cats that are isolated from other cats, by geography  or other factors, can become very inbred especially if a dominant male mates with his sisters, then with his daughters and grand-daughters. When he is deposed it will most likely be by his own son or grandson which
therefore continues the inbreeding. The effect of any deleterious genes becomes noticeable in later generations as the majority of the offspring inherit these genes. Within such colonies there may be a higher than average occurrence of certain traits. Some are not serious, such as a predominance of calico pattern cats  and polydactyly (multiple toes on each foot).  Dwarfism, miscarriages and physical defects on the other hand are serious, and will begin to show after about three generations. 

A cat left to make it's own way in the world needs all the help it can get. A strong immune system and all four legs are essential for survival. These precious little kittens will not have to worry about the perils of living outdoors anymore because they are in the safe and loving arms of AniMeals.

Dogs hold a special place in our hearts. Domesticated thousands of years ago, they were chosen to be our protectors, companions, and best friends. And although we have betrayed our responsibility towards them in many ways, none is so distressing or disturbing as the puppy mill. The word "mill" refers to an operation that churns out dogs in mass, using female dogs as nothing more than breeding machines, valued not for their companionship or loyalty, but for the cold hard cash they bring. These dogs spend their whole lives crowded in wire cages, living in their own wastes, shivering from the cold, or baking in the heat.  Most people are shocked when confronted with the bleak images of dogs housed and bred in puppy mills.
Many people possess an image of puppies at a family farm, lovingly raised and cared for. Others may not even think about where a pet store puppy comes from. Drawn to a pet store window by a bin of wriggling puppies, the furthest thing from a customer's mind is the origin of these cute bundles of fur. But by buying a puppy, the consumer is unknowingly supporting a cycle of abuse that begins at the puppy mill.

What the consumer can't see is the puppy's mother, imprisoned miles away, pregnant again, her body being used to produce more money-making puppies. Starting at six months, she is bred every heat cycle. She is often weak, malnourished, and dehydrated. Rarely, if ever, is she provided with veterinary care. She knows no human kindness, she is sick, filthy, her coat is matted with urine and feces, and her toenails are grown completely around piercing her little feet. She cannot maintain her productivity past her fourth or fifth year. After that, she is nothing more than a drain on the mill's operation and must be disposed of. More often than not, she will be shot or bludgeoned to death. Discarded, her wasted body will lie forgotten in a local landfill or garbage dump.

There are 5,000 puppy mills across the country that produce well over 500,000 puppies a year. They insist that it doesn't make good business sense to sell sick puppies or house breeding females in less than humane conditions. But evidence gained after years of documentation and investigation directly conflicts with these
assertions. Only half of the dogs bred at puppy mills make it to the pet store; the other half die from the mill’s squalid conditions, hypothermia, starvation, or other horrors of transport.

It is virtually impossible to breed in a humane fashion and make money at the same time. In order to make a profit and cover costs, corners must be cut, and puppies must be churned out at a furious rate. The cut corners are the animals themselves: their housing, their health, their cleanliness. Until the demand for mass-produced pet store puppies decreases, there will always be a buck to be made in the production of dogs.

But there is light at the end of the tunnel. Puppy mills and the pet store industry have begun to feel the scrutiny. No one has more power to fight puppy mills than the consumer. In each individual's hands is the ability to stop the cycle of abuse that ends with the purchase of a puppy mill puppy at a pet store. Collectively, we can fight an industry that views dogs as mere profit machines. Dogs, our best friends and companions, deserve our best effort. After all the licks, wags, and love they have given us, we owe them this fight.

Don't Buy A Dog From A Pet Store.
It's that simple. Most puppies sold in pet stores come from puppy mills. After years of artfully dodging the question of how AKC papers could be registered to dogs and puppies found in the worst of puppy mills, the AKC itself is admitting the misconceptions that are connected with purebred papers. When you're ready to bring a dog into your life, visit your local animal shelter. Millions of homeless dogs are waiting at animal shelters for life-long, responsible homes. You won't be supporting the puppy mill industry, and at the same time, you'll be fighting the tragic pet overpopulation problem. If you are interested in a particular breed, your animal shelter can help you locate a breed specific adoption group that will match you with the type of dog you want.

In today's world, feral cats exist because of irresponsible pet ownership. They are the offspring of abandoned pets, unaltered strays that previously lived in human homes, but now are forced to live on the street.  They are born outdoors and usually hidden by their mothers; they have had little or no human contact in the formative months. Not socialized to humans, they view people as a danger.  Raised without human contact, they quickly revert to a wild state and form colonies wherever food and shelter are available. As they are often nocturnal, you may not be aware of their presence or total colony size. Neither pets nor fully wildlife, feral cats live somewhere in the grey zone.  

Some feline experts now estimate 70 million feral cats live in the United States, the consequence of people assuming their cats will survive on their own when they move away. They live on the streets, in parks, in parking lots, and in the shadows of human civilization. 
The number concerns wildlife and ornithology organizations that believe these stealthy predators decimate bird populations and threaten public health. Predation is the most controversial issue surrounding feral cats.  Certainly cats do kill birds, but no one has a clear handle on the exact numbers. Most of us love birds as much as we love cats. So we are not trying to choose one species over another, we are trying to come up with a solution that benefits everybody involved. The goal is to reduce the feral cat population. 
Eradication is the traditional method for feral cat control, although several studies show that eradication programs do not work. Cats are removed, but the food source - rodents, dumpsters, etc. - remains. Thus, the surviving cats have less competition for food. They will breed several times a year, quickly recolonizing. A study by Karl Zaunbrecher, DVM, published in The Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, also showed that removal creates a vacuum, which can be followed by an influx of an equal number of new
cats. In little time, you are back to square one. Killing is not the answer.

Julie Levy is a veterinarian and professor at the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine in Gainesville. She says the answer to permanently reducing wild cat populations is through the Trap-Neuter-Return (TNR) method, in which entire colonies of cats are trapped, vaccinated, and sterilized by a veterinarian. Homes are found for young kittens, which can be tamed. Healthy adults that are too wild to be adopted are returned to their familiar habitat outdoors, where volunteer caregivers feed and look after them for the remainder of their lives.
An established colony will defend its territory to protect the food source, limiting the addition of new cats to the group; for this reason, leaving spayed and neutered cats in a colony is the best deterrent to population growth. The TNR approach stabilizes the colonies and eliminates many of the problems people find annoying about feral cats. Spraying and urine odor abates; mating yowls are eliminated; and fighting is reduced.

Feral cats exist due to people's failure to make a lifetime commitment to cats in their care and their reluctance to spay/neuter.  Killing the victims of such negligence should not be a consideration. For decades, the public has been apathetic regarding the plight of these homeless animals. It is time for us to take responsibility for the tragedy we have created.

A sugar substitute found in a variety of sugar-free and dietetic cookies, mints and chewing gum is proving highly toxic, even fatal, to snack-snatching dogs. Xylitol can be "very, very serious" to dogs when ingested, says the Animal Poison Control Center of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

"It doesn't take a whole lot (of xylitol), and the effects are so rapid that the window of opportunity to treat the dog is extremely small.” Within 30 minutes of consuming a small amount of a xylitol-sweetened product, dogs can experience a dramatic drop in blood sugar, and they usually begin vomiting, become lethargic and can have difficulty standing or walking. Some have seizures, develop internal hemorrhaging and lesions and suffer liver failure. As few as two or three sticks of xylitol gum could be toxic to a 20-pound dog.

Immediate and aggressive veterinary treatment, which includes glucose drips and IV fluids, has proved effective in many cases. The ASPCA's poison control unit has received scores of reports of dogs becoming gravely ill.

It's not always entirely clear what has caused the problem when a dog arrives at a veterinarian's office with seizures or liver failure. It is suspected that there are more cases than those reported because they come in with liver failure, and the owner is not aware of what has been ingested.

Right now, xylitol is used mostly in cookies, candies, cupcakes and other sweets developed for people who have diabetes. It's also sold in bags of crystals for baking. Because of its bacteria-killing properties, it is put into some oral care products, including Tom's All Natural and Biotene toothpastes. It also is beginning to be used in a broad assortment of products including: Jello, sugar-free puddings, and a wide variety of sugar-free gums, including Trident, Orbit, Stride, Icebreakers and Altoids.

Makers of products with xylitol say their products were never recommended for dogs and were neverintended to be ingested by dogs. “Owners should be careful because some dogs get into just about everything and eat everything they find.”

There is no indication that any of the other sweeteners on the market adversely affect dogs. And there is no evidence so far that xylitol is toxic to pets other than dogs. But cats, for example, don't scavenge for sweets as dogs do, so it's possible there are risks that have not yet been discovered. For now, veterinarians advise pet owners to keep
xylitol away from all animals.

...AND MORE TOXIC FOODS TO BE AWARE OF....

GRAPES AND RAISINS
These fruits can cause acute kidney failure mainly in dogs, depending on their sensitivity. Just a handful can be disastrous. In fact, just five or six grapes can kill a 20-pound dog. So little is known about their toxic potential that experts, including those at the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, say don't give these to your dog or cat in any amount. In fact, don't even let your kids give the dog a bite of a cookie with raisins.
Symptoms: Vomiting, loss of appetite, diarrhea, abdominal pain and lethargy.

ONIONS AND GARLIC
Humans sure like them, but they contain a substance that zaps red blood cells in dogs and cats, causing a form of anemia, according to the Website wisegeek.com. Onions are worse for your pet than garlic, and raw ones are more toxic than cooked. They seem to be worse for cats than dogs.
Symptoms: Labored breathing, vomiting, diarrhea and discolored urine.
CHOCOLATE AND COCOA

These contain two toxins for pets - caffeine and a substance called the obromine. Unsweetened baking chocolate, semi-sweet and dark chocolate are more toxic than milk chocolate. Be vigilant during the holidays. Dogs get into Easter baskets all the time. And we see problems at Christmas and Halloween.
Symptoms often don't surface for several hours, falsely causing some pet owners to believe nothing is wrong. Toxicity depends on the size of your pet and the amount and type of chocolate consumed. Symptoms include vomiting, diarrhea, increased heart rate and panting, muscle tremors, seizures, coma or death.
MACADAMIA NUTS
This is another new one. It isn't clear what toxin exists in macadamia nuts - an ingredient in some cookie recipes but dogs can become very ill. Up to nine or 10 are poisonous for a 20-pound dog.
Symptoms: Weakness, depression, vomiting, unsteadiness or drunk acting, muscle pain, joint pain and swelling. 

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