My Amish “Puppy Mill” Experience

Written September 2024

For those new to Bailing Out Benji, Hello- My name is Mindi Callison and I am the founder. I have been researching, protesting, and speaking out against the puppy mill industry for the last 13 years of my life after I was sold a puppy mill puppy from a store (with a high interest rate credit card!). Learning everything about this industry and being able to communicate that to potential puppy customers became my mission and Bailing Out Benji quickly became known as a trusted resource across the country for puppy mill issues. Our work has been covered in numerous publications including TV shows, books, a documentary, a podcast, and multiple news articles. Beyond that, our grassroots volunteer program and public service announcements have sparked conversations with millions of people across the country. 

My heart has been broken a thousand times over as I’ve helped rescue dogs from appalling conditions alongside amazing heroes within the rescue industry, while everyone at Bailing Out Benji and all of our supporters are fighting so the dogs left behind will one day get to experience the life they deserved to live all along. The inspection records and photos from licensed facilities we obtain are often the things nightmares are made of and, I won’t lie, I have had many sleepless nights wondering if things would ever change. When you constantly face the worst of the worst every day, your passion never fades but the optimism certainly does. 

This summer, however, I was shocked to experience something entirely different and it rejuvenated my belief that we will see an end to the puppy mill industry sooner rather than later. Please know, the following recap of our visit does not mean that we are asking people to go and buy dogs. We truly do wish everyone would adopt. However, it would have been grossly irresponsible for an organization like ours to turn down the opportunity to see inside of the system that we are working to change. 

Indiana- June 2024

Surprising everyone (especially me!) I was invited to tour licensed kennels in Southern Indiana alongside Alexis Bell, Bailing Out Benji’s Research Analyst. We found ourselves sitting in the back of a van bumping down country roads in Indiana on our way to visit 6 breeding facilities and 1 puppy broker. Among others in attendance, I spent the majority of my day next to an Amish breeder and his wife, two Indiana state inspectors, a program specialist from Purdue University, and two Amish men who run the brokering facility we would later visit.  Side note: Every kennel we visited was a part of the Canine Care Program and was operated by an Amish family.

We didn’t know what to expect on the tour and were given a very bare-bones agenda for the day. 

The evening before the tour was set to begin, we were extended an invitation by David, an Amish breeder, and his family to join them for dinner! Some breeders were nervous that we were in the area, but others wanted to open their doors to show us how they were different! So after our 9-hour drive from Iowa and a not-so-fun hotel mix-up, we hopped into a van full of strangers and began our journey into the unknown. Joe and Nate (our drivers) were kind and explained what to expect over the next day. 

Slowly the van turned into a driveway and we made it to our destination. 

We pulled up and noticed a group of people outside waiting for us. Once we all said our hellos, we walked around their beautiful yard and then sat by the campfire as dinner was being prepared. Once everything was ready, we all went inside to share food and conversation. We passed plates and got to know each other as people, outside of our job titles. With each course of food, the tension lessened and the laughs got a little louder. Finally, it was time to go out and see where the dogs lived. 

Show me the mommy- right? 

And we did see the mommy. We saw all of the mommies, all of the daddies, and all of the babies. I was walking into a USDA licensed, “puppy mill” that didn’t look ANYTHING like the puppy mills that I was used to dealing with. Because, well, it wasn’t a puppy mill. 

Over the next 24 hours, we would be given unfettered access inside the very industry we have been fighting to have an impact on for years and years. A lot of people crave this type of invitation and here we were driving deep into Indiana in a van full of strangers with nothing but curiosity and optimism. We saw the kennels, we saw the paperwork, we saw the play yards and we even saw the inside of the transport vans. More importantly, we talked to the people who ran these breeding facilities. What was more eye-opening than anything else were the conversations that I had. 

When I first started Bailing Out Benji, I released an article that had some flawed statistics about the number of Amish puppy mills in each state. People still reference that and it makes me feel so ashamed. Publishing an article like that was extremely irresponsible and hurtful to stereotype an entire community as cruel and inhumane. Even though that article has been scrubbed from our website, the damage has been done. For those that I have caused harm to, I am truly sorry. When I was visiting Cletus and his Yorkies or Tim and his Pomeranians, never once did I think that these two kind and caring humans would intentionally harm one of their dogs. 

It was at the second facility of the morning where I actually heard firsthand the hurt that harmful stereotypes have caused. 

Marty breeds mastiffs and is a proud member of the Canine Care Certified program. If you know me then you know that big dogs are my heart, so I was particularly interested in seeing this facility. As we drove up, I was truly shocked. It looked like a doggy daycare with dogs running around. Sure, there are still kennel runs and an indoor area for them to be. But these weren’t dogs living in cages barely larger than their bodies. These were gentle giants who were running laps in a safely fenced yard. Immediately, I stray from the conversation and begin playing with the dogs. A two-year-old caught my attention because I have a puppy around that age at home. This big boy was so happy to have me throw the ball for him and he thanked me with piles of slobber on my clothes. Yes, this dog in a USDA-licensed Amish breeding facility knew how to play fetch and was more than happy to show me the ropes. 

While Marty was explaining all of the changes and upgrades he has made at his facility, he began to get more serious with his tone. He hesitated and then said how hard it had been for him to continue to bring in new bloodlines for his dogs. He tried to partner with other breeders in the show world but everyone thought that he would kill their dogs. I could hear the pain in his voice when he said that. People thought he would kill their dogs. Marty went on to say that he knows auctions are bad and it’s hard to import dogs, so he is stuck in this place of wanting to continue to do better while the world punishes him for the community he is a part of. That resonated with me so deeply. 

You might think that someone like me, an anti-puppy mill advocate who was hundreds of miles from home, would have felt unsafe being inside of the very industry I was fighting, but I didn’t. Not for a second. Every single person we met and interacted with was kind, open- and also had a healthy dose of skepticism about us. 

On our tour, I was most closely connected with Devon and his wife Marietta. They were from another part of Indiana but arranged to join us because, like us, they were curious to learn more about ‘the other side’. The two sat near me and Alexis each time we got in the van and we stuck close chatting throughout the weekend. Beyond the kennel tours where Devon pointed out all of the innovative things the breeders who are a part of this program have implemented in order to help with enrichment and health. He was most proud of two things. 1. The magnet doors with remotes for locking that keep the dogs safe at night and out of the kennels while they are being washed. And 2. The heating pad system that many of the breeders have set up to monitor the heating pads for puppies and new moms.

Even though Devon wasn’t from this part of Indiana, he had such an interesting interaction with his puppies at the brokering facility we visited. As we walked through and I was listening to the owners explain how this side of the industry works, I saw Devon pop into one of the puppy rooms. I followed him, as I had been most of the day, and he said “Yep, here they are”. And as he leaned over the partition to see his litter of puppies, they all ran up to the edge and began licking his face. They not only remembered him, but they had great interactions with him and wanted to engage. 

It was the parent dogs that were, of course, the most interesting to us. Those are usually the dogs that we are used to rescuing from horrific conditions. The dogs that need rehabilitation and to learn how to trust humans. But after visiting 7 facilities and probably seeing around 300 dogs, we didn’t leave sad. Not one of those dogs needed to be rescued. In fact, the breeders who are a part of this program have an intentional plan for every animal on their property. Not only are the adult dogs surrendered by age six (or after six litters), but they are treated like dogs. They learn what toys are, what collars and leashes are. They have stairs that they climb on and different types of flooring to walk on. Alexis actually fell in love with one of the mama dogs at Martin’s facility. She had sat down in the grass to play with the puppies and a mini poodle just climbed right up in her lap and asked for attention. Those two sat there for probably twenty minutes, just enjoying each other’s company and staring off into the distance. Alexis still talks about that good girl to this day and would strongly consider adopting her if she were to become available. 

The day after the tour, Alexis and I attended the Canine Welfare Science Forum hosted by Purdue University and Dr. Candace Croney, who started the program. We had attended this twice previously but only through Zoom. Although we knew that we had made a small amount of breeders comfortable with our presence, we didn’t know what the vibes would be like when we were in the room. 

Again, surprise. We felt surprise and relief. 

Word had spread of our visits and people were excited. Many of the breeders who are CC certified came up to us and said some version of “When we heard you were coming we didn’t accept the invitation to allow you on our property. We would like you to come back and see what we are doing too”. Yep. You read that right. The breeders were also so relieved to hear that people like us weren’t demonizing them or their efforts to be better dog breeders and they wanted to open their doors to us. We even received invitations to ride on transports and visit other dog brokers. So many breeders just wanted to shake our hands and thank us for being open to seeing the changes. 

I could go on for pages to share with you the things we felt and the things we saw and maybe I will someday in the future, but right now it felt really important to me and to us at Bailing Out Benji to rewrite the narrative that Amish dog breeders are inherently cruel and evil humans. The hate and vitriol that has been thrown at an entire community of people because some of them do bad things is grossly irresponsible and truly inhumane. 

The conversations that Alexis and I were able to have with leaders in the breeding community have already and will continue to spark change. Much like our “side” of this, if we only listen to ourselves speak, what can we really learn? 

Over those three days, we realized that we have so much more in common than we ever thought possible. We are just a couple of humans who love dogs a lot. We left the weekend with hugs and an open invitation to visit more of the kennels in their community. Several of them have even stayed in touch with me. 

To be clear: 

Am I advocating for puppy mills? Nope. 

Am I advocating that stores should still be able to sell puppy mill puppies and offer predatory financing to customers? Not one bit. 

But I am saying that not everyone who breeds dogs is cruel and inhumane. And some of the Amish communities involved in dog breeding are trying desperately to be the best that they can be to prove that they are better than puppy mills who are harming animals in the name of profit. The innovation and technology they have implemented is truly wild. 

Life is weird, but really- people are weird. We’ve been taught to hate each other and live in this “us vs them” bubble but life isn’t ever that clean-cut. There is no “good vs evil”. We have to stop putting people in boxes to make ourselves feel more comfortable. 

The biggest lesson I learned in June was that the term “animal advocate” isn’t special to just me or people who look like me. There are amazing advocates inside of the dog breeding world who want to see an end to puppy mills as much as I do. 

And goodness is that a relief because we can’t do this alone.