Stunning puppy mill investigation + elephant concerns on LA and NY Times front pages 9-15-24

The Sunday, September 15th, Los Angeles Times front page lead headline announces a Times investigative report on the illegal flood of puppy mill dogs into California. The New York Times front page includes a headline, pointing to a Metro Section from page story on a troublesome situation with Happy, the elephant at the Bronx Zoo. Sunday’s Boston Globe shares that same New York Times story.

I have posted a photo, on the DawnWatch Facebook page, of the stunning Los Angeles Times front page upper half, . “A Times Investigation” is above a photo of dogs in transport crates, with the headline, “A Puppy Mill Pipeline,” underneath it, and then the subheading, “Unsuspecting dog buyers in California can face heartache and thousands in veterinary costs when their pets, bred in the Midwest, get sick and die.”

Online the headline reads:

” California’s brutal underground market for puppies: Neglected dogs, deceived owners, big profits.”

The report, by Melody Gutierrez and Alene Tchekmedylan, opens with:

“Blaring music drowned out the barking, but there was no masking the neglect inside the sweltering Riverside County garage.

“Jamie Abruzzo, a Missouri middle school teacher who picked up a summer job trucking puppies around the country, was overcome by anger as he took in the filth and feces that surrounded him.

“Outside, the temperature neared triple digits. Inside, where the air conditioner wasn’t working, dozens of puppies and kittens were jammed into small cages and storage bins lined with soiled shredded paper. Water containers nearby were empty.

“Abruzzo cradled his delivery, a 10-week-old Boston terrier that had made its way from an Indiana breeder to a broker, then to a crate inside his transport van. After two days on the road, this was the puppy’s next stop — the detached garage turned holding pen in an Inland Empire suburb.

“The driver knew where this multi-state pipeline was supposed to lead for the animals left unattended that day: loving homes. But what Abruzzo stumbled into was the underbelly of California’s lucrative, unregulated puppy market.

“And it haunted him.

“A Times investigation found that truckloads of doodles, French bulldogs and other expensive dogs from profit-driven mass breeders pour into the state from the Midwest, feeding an underground market where they are resold by people claiming to be small, local home breeders.”

The Los Angeles Times most certainly deserves some thanks for this extraordinary investigation – and some words against puppy purchasing — and takes letters here.

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Announcing what’s inside the paper, the New York Times, Sunday September 15 front page has a headline reading “The Elephant not in the Room,” with the snippet, “Happy the elephant, a star attraction of the Bronx Zoo, hasn’t been seen by visitors since July. Zoo officials say she’s fine. But some animal rights activists say they are worried.” It points to a story on page one of the Metro section, penned by Sarah Maslin Nir and headlined, “For Months, Zoo’s Star Attraction Has Been Out of View.”

It tells us that Happy has not been seen out of her barn, by a member of the public, for two months and “The zoo insists her absence from the exhibit is by choice — Happy doesn’t want to budge from her cozy barn with its food and treats, even as pressure has built from a public eager to see her.”

Oddly:

“The zoo declined a request for a New York Times reporter to observe Happy in her barn or before zoo hours, when she might leave her stable.”

The article includes information on both Happy’s pitiful past and the efforts to free her using the legal system. I can share this gift link from DawnWatch.

I won’t ask you to write, but I will share this plea from the New York Times for more letters from women and will remind you that legislators and other decision makers use the letters pages as barometers of public opinion. I will also recommend checking out the “Comments” section for inspiration.

The New York Times considers itself to be an international paper and publishes a daily international edition so definitely welcomes letters from all over the globe.

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The Boston Globe has that same New York Times article printed on page 19 under the headline, “Activists: Where is Happy the elephant?”

That paper takes letters, which must include the writer’s full name, address and phone number, at

letter@globe.com

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I noted last week that I intended to subscribe to HBO for a month in order to binge watch the series Chimp Crazy on HBO. I did, and it was superb. It was more gripping than most murder mystery dramas. And it was thought provoking. While of course I already knew the horrors of the primate pet trade, it got be thinking even more about our relationships with dogs and cats.

Yours and all animals’,
Karen Dawn of DawnWatch