Puppy Loving

Hayley Pearce has always wanted a dog. And she’s not alone. With over ten million dogs in the UK, one in four of us owns at least one pooch. But during lockdown, the demand for pandemic pups reached staggering new heights, with a 200 per cent increase in people looking to take home a four-legged friend.

To find out why we’re all going canine crazy, Hayley takes a walk into the world of dogs. As she dog-sits her friend’s dog Baxter, she finds out for herself the full-time reality of looking after man’s best friend. She meets a dog trainer who shows her how to keep Baxter under control, visits a dog grooming salon where 'pawdicures' and 'furcials' are on the menu, and sits in on a major operation at an animal hospital, to see at first hand the dangers of buying flat-faced designer dogs. And at a time when dog theft is at an all-time high, she meets welfare campaigners to learn how our demand for dogs is fuelling the cruel puppy farming trade.