Blue Rose Cavaliers review: puppy mill, selling a sick dog that died 29

Blue Rose Cavaliers, NE.
I would have to agree with comment above.
I purchased my puppy in November 2020. I knew he had a cough before I picked him up, but was under the understanding that it would be taken care of. He actually coughed when I picked him up at our meeting place and I was told it was from his bath, that he inhaled some water.
A day or so later I got him I texted that Oliver aka Nathan still had his cough. Never got a response.
I have waited until now March 30, 2020 to contact them again. I thought it would be bad luck and being hopeful that he would get better.
They have not responded what so ever. I have spent 4277.52 on veterinary bills, (clinic and hospital).
My Oliver had worms, parasites, giardia, and pneumonia. I also had the bronchoscopy. He has been on many meds and still is. He has improved, but still has that cough. My next step is the U of Mn Veterinary Hospital.
I paid 2400.00 for my male puppy plus medical 4278.00 = 6678.00
Buyer Beware! Make sure you go directly to their facility to pick up your puppy.

Sorry, correction, Purchased November of 2019.

BEWARE:
I have attached a photo of the response letter I received from Blue Rose Cavaliers. My response to the why I didn't contact them sooner. I did with a text that Oliver was still coughing and I never received a response. They had always responded to my texts in the past. This spoke volumes to me. I did have Oliver to the vet within 72 hours and I responded in the text to John Kobel, which he never replied.
John Kobels statement in the letter that Oliver was very healthy before he was delivered is false.
Thinking back on the comments made to me in conversations on the phone from John Kobel: I was told he had a cough and his daughter, I believe (a lady's name) was taking him to the vet. I asked if he had kennel cough/(pneumonia) and was told no. I was unable to pick up Oliver on the following 2 weekends and he told me that was good as I had a young cavalier at home and they would get Oliver's cough healthy. Comment on the cold weather being hard on the puppies. Insistence on meeting elsewhere. Comment when me and my granddaughter picked up Oliver and after Oliver coughed, John said they had bathed him and he inhaled water. He also said to get Oliver in our vehicle out of the cold. I did email all the veterinary invoices (30 in all) to John Kobel. I picked up Oliver on a Saturday and had him to the vet on Monday. My invoices show my commitment to getting Oliver healthy. Hindsight is 20/20. I wanted a puppy very much and looked over many of the alarms that I should have seen. I am so glad I have Oliver and am working to get him healthy. I feel that I am due a refund on Oliver's purchase price and money toward his veterinary bills.
I am very saddened that John Kobel is saying that Oliver was not sick, that he didn't have a cough etc. Very telling.
My next step is the University of Minnesota Veterinary Medical Center.
Kindly,
Debbie

BEWARE Blue Rose Cavalier, John Kobel also ran the following in Texas...[protected] Post
KINGDOM CAVALIERS and RESCUE
Under the Complaints Board: Kingdom Cavaliers and Rescue - Unethical breeder, unprofessional
Please look this up...not good

I wish I would have seen these posts before getting our puppy from them. He had a cough when we picked him up, that was never mentioned to us prior. We brought him to the vet the day after we got him and he had 2 parasites, and a cough that has stumped the 4 vets at our clinic. We have done 2 different antibiotics and it will not go away. I think this is a puppy mill with very bad practices. we would never give our puppy back, but we don't know how long it will take him to get better, if he gets better at all. Blue Rose Cavalier already has 7 new puppies listed since we got ours 2 weeks ago.

I remember having to hand feed Oliver. Try a canned food that is the pieces rather than solid, he seemed to like that. He also liked scrambled eggs. Keep in touch.

I feel exactly the same way. I should have acted earlier. Yes, that is the best place to start. They take care of the licensing for breeders, I believe.

Also - I don't like that this is showing "resolved" when it is obviously an ongoing issue.

Thank you @djhunz and @Hbcb. I too wish you both the best with your puppies. Our puppy was also 9 weeks and we got him on June 9th. I believe he was from the litter after yours, @Hbcb. That would put them at a week apart so they were definitely exposed to the same infections. Yes, it's obviously not resolved. I'm so sorry to everyone.

This is the recent email I got: This is Doug Zarek with Nebraska Dept. of Agriculture, I am the inspector currently assigned to Blue Rose Cavalier’s complaints. I would like to speak with you concerning your complaint. I can be reached at [protected]. I normally work from 0730 to 1600(4;00PM) Monday through Friday. I will be working only on Monday next week but would again like to speak with you at your convenance.

I have recently purchased a puppy from bluerose and she had dry flaky skin when I got her and I thought it was due to a recent bath but have had her now 4 weeks now and it ballooned into a sever itching so bad she is digging out her fur.. we are now on a long experiment for food allegeries but could be inherited problem so says the vet. she also as this cough everyone is talking about. there is no sign of lung or throat fluid but she gurggles and rattles then hacks. it comes and goes. I would appreciate if anyone found out what it was and how the cured it? I am so upset I should have know better as they would not allow us to go pick up puppy at their kennel.,. I am afraid they know the right things to say to make you think they are reputable breeders but they are not. some one needs to check them out...

John Kobel continues to write his lies on Blue Rose Cavalier website about me and others who have had sick puppies or lost their puppy. He even goes as so far as to blame the person for their puppies death.
My puppy had the procedure that he says the puppy died from, twice. What it did was get a culture so the veterinarian at the U of MN could test the culture to see what medication would work on his illness. This saved his life. Yes, there are risks with anesthesia, but that puppy would have died without the procedure.
Because I know the truths about my encounter with John Kobel. He told me my puppy had a cough before I purchased him and now he says the puppy was healthy. I had conversations with him on the phone about it. I also have texts where I responded 2 days after I got my puppy, that he still had his cough and I had brought him to the vet the following Monday, I picked him up on Saturday. I have the vet form that he gave me and the box next to the statement: I hereby certify that I have examined the above ... to be free of symptoms of infectious, ...and or communicable diseases IS NOT CHECKED. It just infuriates me that he uses religion with all of this. The thing is that whomever he believes his maker to be, John will have his day. He will have to answer to his maker. May all who have had such heartache, you are in my thoughts.

I was alerted via email about the most recent post by djhunz and thought I would post an update as well. We are still dealing with our sick puppy who is now 6.5 months old. If you post anything on this thread, the Kobel's will retaliate by posting something about you on their website (of course they spin the information in their favor). They are indeed selling sick dogs and instead of trying to resolve the problem and work WITH buyers, they get defensive and angry. The Nebraska Department of Agriculture is involved along with many veterinarians who are attempting to work together to discover what is causing these puppies to get so sick and unresponsive to medication. Yet, the Kobel's continue to breed and sell sick puppies knowing there is a disease spreading through their lines.

There are two sides to every story. We spoke in depth with the breeder. I want to share some of what we learned.

Every one of these people, who are a tiny percentage of those who have worked with this breeder over 21 years of breeding, had options.

1. They could have had their vet work closely with the breeder’s/NDA’s vet, but they did not.

2. They could have temporarily returned their puppy for the breeder to treat at the breeder’s expense.

3. They could have exchanged their puppy.

These options are contractual. These people chose to ignore the contract they signed, which they had free access to before buying their puppy, yet they decided to thumb their nose at the breeder.

Did anyone bother to check with the Colorado clinic where the breeder got their health certifications in 2020? They could have looked up OFA results on the OFA website, too.

How many breeders warranty parasites and/or kennel cough? Not very many I've seen. It's genetic problems that the breeders are mainly responsible for. With Cavaliers, mild problems are common such as chicken allergies, itchy skin, etc. The entire breed came from cross-breeding only 6 dogs after WWII. The breed has sensitivities. It’s a fact of life. People like these complainers are driving up prices and causing caring breeders to quit. It prevents the Cavaliers, as a breed, from thriving.

Breeders who love their animals get upset when they feel their animals are not being cared for properly. This breeder is no different. This breeder is defensive regarding how their animals are treated. This breeder was angry over the ignorance of these complainers regarding what was necessary to a.) Take proper medical care of their puppy, which the original vet knew how to do, and/or b.) Abide by the contract.

Let me point out that some issues were resolved. Yet, complainers later decided their agreed-on resolution wasn’t good enough and continued their smear campaign, accepting no personal responsibility for their puppy’s health.

Complainers bring up an issue that is over a decade old regarding one little puppy. This issue is resolved. It was found, in court, that the attending vet for the puppy was negligent. Who lets a toy breed puppy starve to death rather than hand-feeding for one week, refusing to give the puppy anything more than subcutaneous saline, then accuses the puppy of having “failure to thrive?” This vet was determined to be at fault by their state’s veterinary board.

How many breeders pay the vet bills of the new owner? Read their contracts. When breeders have zero say-so, they don’t want to be responsible for what other people choose. Would you?

Do you know that moisture on the ground is a highly common place to find giardia? Do you know what rain can do? Parasites do happen!

Do you know how contagious and common kennel cough/bordetella is, especially when the nature of your business involves frequent vet visits and health clinics? Do you know it’s treatable? Do you know how easy it is to get Doxycycline or Amoxicillin?

Also, vets are not in business to be generous. They are in it to make money. I believe human nature dictates desensitization to ethics when it comes to income after a few years of continual temptation. This includes vets, and most other careers as well.

On the topic of income, this breeder is one of us. He’s one of the “little people,” partially because he spends far, far more than a typical breeder on his Cavaliers out of love for his dogs and the breed in general.

What about the vet who cleared these puppies for release? She believed they were healthy. How could the breeders predict how the stress of their first move would affect these young puppies? The puppies were in good shape when the breeders parted with them according to their vet. Yet they're a "puppy mill?"

djhunz didn't have a very good vet initially. She claims to have texted one time, then waited 5 months before saying anything again according to her dates, all the while doing things her own way, racking up vet bills, then expecting the breeder to pay them. She is vicious toward the breeder. Have you ever lost someone's text in a long line of texts?

Gary drove a young puppy in a cage from NE to Georgia. Yes, he stopped for breaks, I’m sure. This long trip was hard on a small, young puppy. Still, he got a 50% refund which he never mentioned. How convenient! How deceptive! He gave the impression that he would be happy with this because, at the time, he was accepting partial personal responsibility, as he should have. Later, he chose to become part of the shark attack. Because of Gary, the breeder stopped allowing their puppies to make long road trips.

DawnM was offered half of all medical bills to be refunded to her. Never mind, the puppy was declared very healthy at the 72-hour checkup which was not mentioned. The breeder told her repeatedly not to have the experimental procedure done on her puppy, which Dawn didn’t mention. (They learned only that the puppy had picked up a virus, which Dawn conveniently neglected to mention. The rest of the complainers’ puppies had kennel cough. What’s wrong with this picture?) The puppy died from anesthesia; a bit of info that was left out of Dawn’s complaint. How many breeders warranty their puppy will survive a new vet's choice of anesthesia administration? Because of Dawn, the breeder made several restrictions on who and how someone could get one of their puppies.

Cavaliers are prone to itchy skin. These people should know it goes with the breed. Buy some Micro Tek shampoo and spray. It works. Besides, what were these people feeding their Cavalier puppies? They were all told what to feed but people have a tendency to opt for what’s cheap. What about chemicals, yards, etc. causing an allergic reaction?

These 7 people turned this page into a chat room. Everyone wants to be a victim, presumably in an attempt to get money, or at least pity. What about the personal responsibilities of these people and their vets' proficiency? I'm certain they did their best, but if they made mistakes it's doubtful they would admit it. What's likely is that there are too many embellishments and partial truths from these complainers.

Did any of these people work with the breeder's vet? We did and everyone was wonderful to us! We just got yet another puppy from them who is completely healthy.

Do you know this breeder is subjected to surprise visits from Dept, of Agriculture? By all means, contact Doug Zarek of the NDA!

Do you know that they do not put their puppies in wire cages so all the waste falls through the wires away from the puppies because they believe the mental and emotional development of the puppies is more important than living on wire in a cage?

Every one of these people signed a contract stating they would abide by the contract. They racked up vet bills and blamed the breeder who sold them a puppy that for all practical purposes was declared healthy by the NDA's assigned vet for their area. This makes them a "puppy mill?" I disagree.

Dawn's comment that this breeder sells "sick pups" and is a "puppy mill" cannot be proven. Actually, it can be proven her puppy was declared healthy by her own vet 72 hours after she picked up the puppy. Furthermore, Doug Zarek of the NDA can verify this breeder is not a puppy mill. This breeder could go after Dawn for slander. He should.

I worked at the vets office and I don’t know how many times we had sick dogs of theirs in our office or how many c sections we had to do or how many puppies we lost :(