The American Kennel Club is pulling another breed into its roles – the "Coton de Tulear," a dog with the most ridiculous invented history ever. For more on that, read The Coton de Tulear: When AKC's Newest Breed of Toy Dog Hunted Wild Boar in Darkest Africa.
What's the real story here with the AKC?
The same one it always is with the AKC: a desperate move by that organization to stop their economic crash at any cost.
AKC registration numbers have plummeted from over 1.5 million to well under 500,000, and they continue to head south.
In the past I have predicted that the AKC will go out of business by 2025, and their decline is tracking perfectly with that prediction despite adding "new" breeds, like the Coton, every year.
The AKC's business model is heavily dependent on puppy mill dog registrations. AKC board meeting notes reflect this, as does the fact that the AKC created a special computer program and lower-priced registration fees to entice pet shop dog registrations.
The AKC's rather naked hope for the Coton is that it will take off as a new puppy mill breed.
In truth, the Coton is perfect for that -- it's small enough to cram into a crate, and cute enough to sell to young apartment-dwellers displacing maternal instincts. White and fluffy? Perfect! A manufactured history suggesting it is a royal African dog that used to hunt wild board in packs? And there are pirates too? Perfect!
Of course, as with the Border Collie and the Jack Russell Terrier before it, there are those who actually love this breed and have fought like hell to keep the AKC's blood-soaked puppy mill hands off of it.
The American Coton Club and the Coton de Tulear Club of America created a web site and launched a petition to try to keep the Coton OUT of the AKC.
But, of course, that did not work.
The AKC, as before, simply found a small breed club whose members were easily attracted by promises of big dollars and blue ribbons.
Cast a dollar bill down the middle of a trailer park in America and just see who rises to the bait! Just the kind of people who think nothing of breeding puppy mill dogs for the AKC.
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