[Michael Romanos]

Good heavens. The end of domestic animals and animals use. Help. What crackpot argument for banning docking and cropping of dogs is that?
In NZ, we have had up to 40 million sheep within a human population of less than four million (at the time). These sheep get their tails cut off when they are lambs as part of the farming process. The SPCA (Special Care for the Protection of Animals) and the National Vets Association in New Zealand support a ban on the docking and cropping dogs but only on the grounds that docking and cropping are unnecessary and is a painful action. Both these organisations support the proliferation of domestic animals.

With Pems, docking of their tail may very well be unnecessary. I am very happy with the docking of their tails because it is astethically superior to have a Pem docked than the fairly miserly tail they can have, and it gives a Pem a sense of uniqueness. But there again, given time, I suppose a Pem's tail could be improved through breeding though it would be an upheavel for quite some time to produce Pems with more acceptable tails and not "spoil" other parts of their anatomy.

I don't see any sense in the cropping of dogs ears. I think it is a little ridiculous though hunters would say that a cropped ear present less chance of ear damage to a dog.