Question: Argument with petco worker

Hi. I just had the most unpleasant experience at petco, i almost walked out and told this woman to stick the fish where the sun dont shine.

I went in for a cheap goldfish to cycle my tank with. this is the conversation that followed:
worker: do you care what color?
me: no it doesnt matter
worker: is your tank heated?
me: yeah
worker: these fish should be kept at a temperature of like 60
me: it doesnt matter to me im just using the fish to cycle my tank. thats the only reason my tank is heated.
worker: do you have any other fish?
me: yeah another cheap goldfish. my second one died and the one alone isnt producing enough ammonia to cycle efficiently
worker: how long has the tank been set up
me: like a month
worker: your tank is cycled! no fish can live in a tank that long without the tank automatically cycling itself
me: well no its not. theres never been any signs of nitrites or nitrates and the ammonia hasnt gone above one ppm
worker: yeah you dont need those, theres no ammonia cause the tank is cycled
me: my fish were in hibernation for like two weeks because it was too cold without a heater so they werent even eating, so really its only been 2 weeks. the tank is not cycled
worker: what are you gonna do with the fish when youre done?
me: throw them out?
worker: i dont want you to kill them! you should bring them back
me: petsmart told me i couldnt so i didnt think i could
worker: why dont you just throw some food in the tank instead of using fish?
me: if i throw food in my tank my fish is going to eat it!
worker: yeah!!! and then the tank is gonna make ammonia
me: -confused about the difference- ARE YOU GOING TO SELL ME THIS FISH OR NOT?
worker: yeah i just dont want you to introduce disease into your tank or kill these fish.

mind you these are 29 cent goldfish, and theres like 5 dead ones in the tank because they are overcrowded to death.

could someone explain this conversation to me? am i doing something wrong or does this woman have no clue what shes talking about?

Based on that conversation I wouldn't be selling you a fish either.

If this happened at the store I work at, I wouldn't have sold the fish either. Petco and petsmart refuse to sell live animals when they know they will become feeders/die. They do the same with mice and lizards.

You have the ability to do a fish less cycle that does not harm anything. As for cycling, I have no idea what your parameters have been at, but I would venture to say that after a death and one month, your tank is likely cycled.

The tone of my post kind of got lost in my after-work pregnant brain.
I should have mentioned the death of the fish was because of the temperature change being so drastic and the fish being so small. (tank was in unheated room in ny winter)
And im confused about the cycle being done or not? Is it possible that it is done cycling even though i havent seen any nitrates or nitrites?
i dont want to kill the fish and i wasnt mad about what she was saying, she just had a rude tone but reading it from your eyes, i can see how my confusion can sound like an attitude. (yes the last bit did turn into an attitude)

i accidentally wrote "throw food in the tank instead of using fish" she just said "throw food in the tank" i was thinking she meant getting rid of my one fish and just throwing fish food in it? would that work?

Back in the pleistocene when I first started keeping fish , we all started the cycle with small 'disposable' fish. And in those days we did not have forums and relied on our shopkeeper for advice :what:
It is now considered kinder to cycle without fish (or any other aquatic animal). I have quite a lot of tanks and I have been known to start a tank off by chucking in food while feeding my others. Feeding as if the fish are already there. The effect is broadly similar, the food rots and gives off ammonia. The usual recommendation, though, is to buy ammonia and use regular measured doses and test for ammonia and nitrite, then nitrate as your system develops. There is a full description of fishless cycling somewhere on this site.

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i had no idea cycling with fish was so looked down upon now. years ago i cycled a tank using a couple fish and had great success and i didn't really hear anything about fishless cycling. when i was done i just gave the fish back to the store. i chose this method because you to tend to gravitate towards the things you know but if i cant figure this out soon or if i cycle another tank in the future ill definitely look into fishless cycling.

Best advice, if your going to keep anything aquatic, then its always best to do some research. Most sites these days start off by covering the basics for cycling a tank/aquarium, but as said already, if your tank has been running for a month, then it has probably cycled. And if you have zero nitrates/nitrites then thats a good thing, when a tank starts a cycle normally you will get some sort of reading of amonia, could be high or low, but as the tank cycles, you should lose the amonia or it will drop really low, maybe leaving a slight trace, usually then your nitrates will spike, and then drop, then you will have a nitrite spike, once this drops then your tank has cycled. This cycle can take as little as 3-4 days or upto 2 weeks, all depending on the size of the aquarium and what maintenance occurs during the cycle. I am sure no one on here will be happy to hear of a fish that is used and then thrown away, we love all animals, cheap or expensive. Hope this helps, if not then please feel free to ask.

millerj76 said:

I am sure no one on here will be happy to hear of a fish that is used and then thrown away.

Click to expand...

Two things have struck me while reading through various threads.

1. Fish used for cycling and then taken back to the shop are probably damaged? They are then sold on to unsuspecting buyers as healthy.

2. Some forum members use small inexpensive fish as feeders.

Just observations ('wanderings' if you like)



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The reason i found it so hard to believe my tank was cycled was because it has never had any nitrite spike ammonia spike or nitrate spike. When i told the worker that and she responded by saying "those dont matter" it made me very confused. i have cycled tanks before, done quite a bit of research and those are the three things that i thought were 100% necessary. i believe after thinking about it more and more that the problem is my filter. i have a strong filter set up for my future axolotls and i was thinking maybe it is making the ammonia spike impossible?
i just dont want to get my axolotls and then find out the tank never cycled.

wandering said:

Two things have struck me while reading through various threads.

1. Fish used for cycling and then taken back to the shop are probably damaged? They are then sold on to unsuspecting buyers as healthy.

2. Some forum members use small inexpensive fish as feeders.

Just observations ('wanderings' if you like)



Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2

Click to expand...

This was with regards to the comment that the fish that had been used for cycling the tank would then be thrown away, if it had said that it would then be used as a feeder fish would i have concern? probably not, double standards? possibly. Would rather the fish served a purpose rather than being just thrown away. Have never heard of fish being used for cycling, and then being returned to the shop, i hope that is not a common practice, makes me wonder about a few dodgy fish from past!

naturebabe said:

The reason i found it so hard to believe my tank was cycled was because it has never had any nitrite spike ammonia spike or nitrate spike. When i told the worker that and she responded by saying "those dont matter" it made me very confused. i have cycled tanks before, done quite a bit of research and those are the three things that i thought were 100% necessary. i believe after thinking about it more and more that the problem is my filter. i have a strong filter set up for my future axolotls and i was thinking maybe it is making the ammonia spike impossible?
i just dont want to get my axolotls and then find out the tank never cycled.

Click to expand...

How often did you check your water parameters, as when you first set the tank up you may have had really low levels of each, and with having the little fishies in aswell, your tank and filter may have cycled quickly rather than slowly. Do you have a test kit, if not then i would recommend one, as this can give you accurate readings and also peice of mind. Axolotls in my experience, are quite hardy with water conditions, so as long as you get the temperature and a little aeration right, then you should'nt go too far wrong.

millerj76 said:

if you have zero nitrates/nitrites then thats a good thing, when a tank starts a cycle normally you will get some sort of reading of amonia, could be high or low, but as the tank cycles, you should lose the amonia or it will drop really low, maybe leaving a slight trace, usually then your nitrates will spike, and then drop, then you will have a nitrite spike, once this drops then your tank has cycled. This cycle can take as little as 3-4 days or upto 2 weeks, all depending on the size of the aquarium and what maintenance occurs during the cycle.

Click to expand...

Actually, if you don't see an ammonia spike, nitrite, or nitrate, your tank hasn't cycled. Also, the proper order is ammonia spikes and falls, nitrite spikes and falls, and then nitrate builds up. If your tank were cycled you would be seeing no ammonia and a build up of nitrate (unless you have a ton of plants) . I've never heard of a tank cycling in 3-4 days without adding seeded material or bottled bacteria, the average is about a month. However, cool water tanks take longer usually. I've cycled tanks with fish, axolotls, fish food, dead shrimp, ect. It doesn't matter what source of ammonia you have, as long as you have one. Obviously if you choose to cycle with animals you will have to closely monitor the ammonia/nitrite levels to make sure they stay in check, if they're high, you have to do a water change to bring them back down again. The problem with this is that your constant water changes slow the cycle.

I would advise you to get rid of the fish and cycle with fish food. I do this by putting a few good pinches of fish food in a new nylon and sinking it in the tank with a rock under the filter. Also, I put a heater in the tank and bump the temp up to 75 or 80 to speed up the growth of the bacteria.


As far as your filter slowing your cycle, it isn't. A mechanical filter doesn't remove waste from the water, it just sucks it out of the tank and stores it inside. Therefor, it doesn't affect your ammonia/nitrite/nitrate levels. It's the biological part of your filter that does that (this is where your bacteria grows to process the ammonia/nitrite)

Thank you jess that was very helpful. I will give using food a shot because i am worrying about the water conditions for the fish constantly. i didnt test the water too much when they were in hibernation maybe once a week but in the past couple weeks ive tested every 3-5 days. the ammonia is stuck at 1ppm.

miller- not all pet stores take back fish. when i purchased the first fish from petsmart i asked to return them and she said they wouldnt take them because of potential disease. so i was pretty surprised petco would. but i know local pet shops usually do because they can make double the profit off the one fish.