FRENCH bulldog and pug puppies top the list of the most illegally imported breeds according to research by the British Veterinary Association and the Dogs Trust.

Both breeds top the list of breeds vets most commonly suspected of being imported into the UK illegally.

By far the most commonly mentioned breed across the UK was the French bulldog, with more than half (54 per cent) of all vets who had suspected a case of illegal smuggling citing it alongside pugs (24 per cent) and designer crossbreeds (18 per cent) as the three breeds they had most concerns about.

Dachshunds, chihuahuas, shih tzus and poodle crosses were other breeds mentioned by vets.

The statistics mirror findings from Dogs Trust’s latest puppy smuggling investigation, which reported that 63 per cent of puppies intercepted at the British border as part of the Puppy Pilot scheme between December 2015 and July 2018 were French bulldogs, pugs, English bulldogs and dachshunds.

Almost three-quarters (72 per cent) of vets across the UK said their suspicions were raised by the client’s explanation of how or where they got the puppy. Around half (44 per cent) were told the puppy had been brought from abroad, but they found it to be too young to have been imported legally.

In more than a quarter of cases (28 per cent), the puppy’s age did not appear to match the information on the pet passport, while in a similar number of cases the vet found a foreign microchip in a puppy who was too young to have been imported.

Other reasons included poorly completed pet passports, suspicious vaccination records and poor health.

Both charities advise buyers to use the Puppy Contract which can be found at: www.

puppycontract.org.uk .

The Dogs Trust report on puppy smuggling can be accessed at: www.puppysmuggling.org.uk .