Oprah Reveals What You Need To Know Before Buying a Puppy

Oprah Winfrey is going to reveal her true love on The Oprah Winfrey Show (DIS) today, and surprise (!), it’s not her partner of 21 years Stedman Graham or her best friend of more than 30 years, Gayle King. “Sophie gave me 13 years of unconditional love,” Winfrey says on the show, according to a transcript. “She was the true love of my life.” 

Yes, that’s right. Oprah’s gone to the dogs. (Sophie died recently of kidney failure at 13, which for a cocker spaniel falls right in the middle of their life expectancy of 11 to 15 years. ) That is why today's episode is dedicated to Sophie, Winfrey’s beloved pooch, and will explore the harsh and abusive realities of puppy mills. Winfrey says the episode is “for anybody anywhere who loves a dog, has ever loved a dog, or just cares about their basic right to humane treatment.” So next time your heart melts while checking out a puppy at your local pet store, remember that beyond the plexiglass and $1,000 price tag is probably a history of abuse and mistreatment.

“I’d say that pretty much every pet store selling puppies is buying them from puppy mills,” says Daphna Nachminovitch, vice president of cruelty investigations at PETA. Puppy mills are crude outdoor breeding farms, mass producing designer puppies to supply pet stores and animal brokers. The animals are treated like stock, jammed into wire cages and are highly susceptible to illness and infection. “We’ve found the ones who say they buy from private breeders, but that’s not the case. If you stay long enough, you’ll see the trucks full of puppies coming in from Missouri, Kansas, Pennsylvania and Ohio.” PETA isn’t the only animal lover to take a stand against pet stores. “We tell people to never buy a puppy from a pet store,” says Nadia Zonis, New York editor of Urban Hound, a guide for city dog owners.