Countryboy - I am continuing this, just because I am irritated by your tone. If you hadn't responded back accusing people of slander, I would not have bothered to put this effort in, but I really dislike being told what I can say, or being threatened. Also - based on looking at the posters history, I think you are mistaken about whether she originally asked you for advice. She seems to have only posted twice, in this thread. The other thread you are thinking of is likely another poster. There have been a lot of "I want a puppy posts" lately, so it's an easy mistake to make.
Please, feel free to tell me how I am "slandering". It's not slander to list what is on their website, or visible online. First - slander, is, by definition, spoken. I'm writing, so this would be defamation or libel, if it met the other criteria. Secondly, defamation is not relevant if the statements are true. "In the common-law provinces (all provinces except
Québec), truth is an absolute defence. If the defamatory material can be shown to be substantially true, the defendant will not be held liable, even if the defendant published the material in order to harm the person defamed." (
Defamation in Canada | The Canadian Encyclopedia). We are both in Ontario, speaking about an Ontario breeder on a site hosted in Toronto, so I would assume Ontario common law would apply. Repeating information shown from Cantope's website and own sources, and providing an opinion on their contents, is not, therefore, slander. Calling someone a featherbrain, might count as defamation (if I could prove material harm, which I can't).
A puppy is a huge and important purchase for most people, with a lot of emotional impact. People SHOULD be careful with what puppy they choose, and people WILL judge the quality of the breeder by what is available online. Many people (myself included) prefer that breeding quality poodles is not a commercial pursuit, and will negatively view a breeder that appears to be making their living off of producing puppies. The only way around that sort of judgement is to a) not make a living breeding puppies, b) lie about how many puppies you produce, or c) be okay with people criticizing the volume of puppies produced, so long as the breeder is confident that the puppies are well taken care of. I would personally prefer option A or C.
Based on what you and RKJ have said, they are probably far from the worst breeders this poster could get a puppy from, but they are also not a breeder I would die on a hill defending... They may produce nice, well socialized, confident dogs. I don't know, I haven't met their dogs.
I do know that they wouldn't meet a lot of people's criteria, which often includes a smaller scale breeder and/or proof the breeder "Does something" other than producing puppies with their dogs.
Assuming 40 puppies every 1.5 months, at $2000 a puppy, that would be $640,000 /year gross income just in poodle puppies! What they charge isn't listed, I'm assuming $1500-2500. Obviously, less operation costs like staffing, food, vetrinary costs, etc, but it sure is a lot of money, and worth some scrutiny, and that volume definitely won't pass unquestioned by people who don't believe in for-profit breeding.
Here is the video Cantope posts as the "tour of the nursery".
I see relatively happy, well groomed poodles in small crates, so many of them that they have several crates with two poodles in a single crate. If I were Cantope, and I wanted to allay fears about breeding practices, I would pan their videos of their litters to show the rest of the room, and provide more videos of the socialization they list on their website. Not doing so isn't proof they don't do these things, but it makes it harder to prove they do these things from my living room.
Other criticisms Cantope is likely to recieve:
Do they title all their dogs before breeding? It doesn't look like they title all of them, or even most of them, their "titled dogs" list on their website is from 2015. I checked Cantope on Canuck dogs, and can't find any dogs listed with CKC championships/conformation points from 2019 or 2020. I found some records on UKC for 2019, it looks like one or two of the dogs owned by them was being shown UKC, i didn't see a championship record, but I don't know the UKC site well. They are also listed mostly as being shown in the "non licensed puppy class" whatever that means.
Do they do dog sports with their dogs before breeding? No, not most of them from what I can see. They seem to have done some obedience/rally novice (not titling) with CKC prior to 2015, but I can't find anything more recent than that for a dog owned by Diane Welsh on Canuck dogs.
For my $2000 in poodle money, I got a dog from health tested CKC champion parents, raised with very involved young children and their friends and a baby visiting, raised in the kitchen and sitting on the kids laps in the living room to watch TV, partially potty trained with outdoor access to the yard already knowing "come", already walking on leash nicely, socialized by going to a grooming salon multiple times, school, and hockey games, socialized with other adult dogs of several breeds, with lots of videos showing exactly how the puppies were being raised. I'll put that level of quality against Cantope any day, "nice facilities" and "nice people" or not. Other people might not like my dog's breeder, as she doesn't have cats, doesn't temperament test, and doesn't do performance sports with her dogs. Diffferent people have different criteria, and that's OK.
If someone wishes to buy from Cantope - fine. I would suggest they visit the facilities before they buy the puppy, or put down a deposit - and this goes for any breeder. As I think we all know, you shouldn't take the word of anything on the web, especially a breeder's own site, to be true or accurate without some attempt to verify for yourself the information contained therein.
