How can you find out if a kennel is a puppy mill?

It's hard to say for sure but some things to look for are

* If they charge extra money for 'papers' saying its purebred

* If they routinely advertise their puppies in classified ads or the newspaper

*If they don't allow you to see the facilities

*If they don't allow you to see the pups with the mother ( if you cant see the father that's generally ok, because alot of people will 'rent' a stud dog so he wont be there)

*If they seem evasive about questions

*If the dog is bred under 18 months of age

* If they are calling any type of 'designer dog' purebred ( examples are puggles, labradoodles, shnoodles.. any 'breed' not recognized by the ckc/ akc or other regulatory association for your country

*If there are many many dogs, often of differing breeds

*If the dogs are kept in small runs or cages

*If they are charging hundreds of dollars per pup when it has no registration papers, and they cant provide you with the parent dogs lineage

*The puppies don't come vaccinated and dewormed

*There is a large 'deposite' to hold a puppy, before seeing a contract

*They claim that all of their dogs and pups are champions and show dogs

*They claim that there are no genetic defects in their lines, but don't have the dogs OFA or CERA certified ( OFA is for large breed dogs typically) ( CERA is that their eyes are guarenteed)

*They wont let you go pick up the puppy or they bring the puppys into a separate room from where they are typically kept.