Maisie’s Story and Life Matter

At the weekend I heard a dog had died. I always find this upsetting, irrespective of whether I know the dog or not. When I know the dog, it really hurts. When the dog has survived the breeding industry, it hurts even more. I feel things viscerally when it comes to dogs caught up in the cruelty of commercial dog breeding. It never gets easier when one of them dies.

When Trish told me her dog Maisie had died, I wept. Not being much of a crier, tears flowed freely for Maisie. I know it is because I feel not only the sadness of her death, but the raging injustice of how most of Maisie’s life was spent. And that years on from when I first began writing about the endemic cruelty in the dog breeding industry, it is worse than ever. That nothing has improved despite all the efforts and claims of many, and new laws that have come in. Nothing gets better for breeding dogs. Puppy farming is not over. It is not close to being over. It is thriving and it will continue to thrive because politicians don’t care – they really do not care, if they did they could end it quickly – and the puppy buyers keep buying badly.

“In a second barn, which was much worse than the first, with poor natural light, there were 12 dogs,: four French bulldogs, four Schnauzers and four terriers. The bulldogs were in enclosed pens which had even less natural lighting.

There was a build up of flies due to the amount of faeces in the barn. Only one bowl of water was visible, which was also contaminated by faeces.”

Conditions Maisie was found in when rescued – read more

Maisie was one of several dogs seized by authorities in July 2021 when an illegally operating puppy farm was raided. It was not the first time the Hagloe Farm business had come to the attention of the authorities. In 2014 Margaret Davis lost an appeal to overturn the Council’s refusal to renew the license to breed dogs from the premises. Over 100 protestors attended the hearing, the puppy farm was notorious and well known by many.

Read more on that here.

Now, imagine that this “A close watch will be needed to make sure they can not get back into the puppy farming business again” had actually happened.

So many dogs would not have had the suffering inflicted on them by the Davis breeders for a further seven years.

There was a cage in a back room, which was poorly lit and had poor ventilation. Two Schnauzers were housed inside, each with their litter of puppies. A heat lamp was resting on top of the cage making the metalwork too hot to touch.

One of these puppies, belonging to a Schnauzer, was also lifeless.

Two Scotties and two corgis were kept in metal grilled pens which offered no shelter from heat or rain and lived among a growing pile of faeces.

In the main house there were five dogs, two of which were seized during the first visit. A Corgi was penned in with her litter of eight puppies, one of which was unresponsive and lifeless.

One of the inspectors picked this puppy up and shows it to Margaret Davies, who appeared to be wholly uncaring over its welfare.

The Corgi and her puppies were in front of an Aga in the month of July. It was hot.”

Conditions Maisie was found in – Read more here

I first came to know about Maisie when her rescue (which preferred to stay unnamed so as not to prejudice any legal proceedings) contacted me to help Maisie find a home. In November 2021 she went to live with Trish and Ray and enjoyed 15 months of real life. Although it took Maisie time to learn that life in a home was a good thing, she most certainly did discover it with her family. Their time together was a fraction of Maisie’s life, but if we consider the quality, not quantity of life they shared, it’s infinite. Maisie enjoyed the freedom to be herself, coming to know she had all the choices she needed to make her days happy. She embraced walking and using her senses once she’d conquered her fears of the outside world.

She owned her days because she was profoundly loved for who, not what, she was.

It is with Trish’s permission I am sharing her story here.

The more people who come to know about dogs like Maisie the more, hopefully, will open their eyes to the terrible injustice these poor dogs suffer. Thank you for keeping her memory alive

Trish, Maisie’s adopter