It is going to make it possible to eliminate show
breeders of dogs and cats, due to the fact that most of these
breeders can not follow the law to the letter as far as "facility requirements".
Most
breeders breed and raise their show animals in their home. The law requires all surfaces to be sanitizable or disposable (including ceilings which have to be either drop ceilings or sanitizable).
(your couch, carpet, popcorn ceilings, etc are not sanitizable).
The law requires 2 floor drains in facilities and any wood must be painted or sealed on a regular basis or disposed of.
The numbers of those affected that's stated in the 91 page document released can't be more wrong. They state around 350(ish) cat
breeders will be affected, when there are about 350 BENGAL CAT
breeders ALONE who will be affected, not to mention the other breeds.
I breed Bengal cats and although this law doesn't affect me negatively (I'll already have a fully compliant facility that's been planned before I heard about this law), it will affect MANY, MANY
breeders.
They won't be able to comply with the facility requirements as written so they either have to sit back and HOPE that the USDA doesn't regulate to the letter of the law (with facility requirements) or get out of breeding. This is especially bad because we need each other to work on the Bengal breed, lower the COI, and breed healthy stock.
There are already show mouse and rat
breeders culling out their rodents to scale back or just getting out, which is TERRIBLE for the fancy since we rely on each other to get other genes and lines.
When you call the USDA and ask them about licensing for mouse, rat, hamster, gerbil
breeders, they tell you that you don't have to worry about it, they're really only regulating dogs, or, if you're not breeding exotic animals you don't need a license, whereas the letter of the law (if you read that 91 page paper), rats, hamsters, etc are all regulated under the law.
The whole thing is a complete mess.
Also, thanks for the input regarding inspections. I'll pass the word along. Hopefully they all get nice inspectors like that.