The pet shop terror

I have seen a lot of animal cruelty in my local pet shop. For example 8 russian tortoises with only a 40watt bulb in a small rabbit cage with one iceburg lettuce for food. I saw one desperately trying to eat the core because it was starving. None of the other reptiles have heat bulbs, just reptisun 2.0. They leave crickets in with the reptiles and then they get bit by the crickets. But lately it has hit closer to home. Newts. They keep their newts in 3 gallon tanks with two inches of water and filter that creates a strong current. They also only offer freeze dried tubifex even though they sell frozen bloodworms... Despite all those facts they also house around 5 notos(n.v.v.) and 5 chinese fire belly newts(cynops o.) together. It gets worse, in a 5 gallon tank they have 5-12 paddletails at all times and only offer freeze dried tubifex cubes. I told them paddletails are aggressive. The pet shop lady said, "Ya, we found that out when we fed them...giggle". I was ready to knock her out. I said to house them seperately, you can guess how that went over. Didn't happen. But when I went there yesterday there was a, get this, HEAT LAMP on the 5 gallon paddletail cage! The water was 75-85 degrees. I immediately got the manager out of the back room. I was very enraged by now. I gently told him that there was a heat lamp on the paddletail cage and they like thier temps 60-70, no higher. He pointed to the notos/cfb's and said no its a flourescent bulb. He couldnt even distinguish the species! I said no, "these are paddletails, if you want to display them use a flourescent bulb with little or no UVB." He looked at the situation, and knew I wouldnt leave till he fixed it. I had a lot of things to buy but put all but the essentials back, only getting frozen bloodworms, and a filter cartridge. I will not get anymore than I have to there. They dont deserve a penny. It is hard to see animals in so much pain...and the scary thing is this shop is one of thousands, maybe millions worldwide...and the animals that are here are what didnt die during export...

It's one of the hard things in the world...and there are plenty. This topic has been frequently, repeatedly, and emotionally discussed on the forum. Many of our hearts are burdened by what happens to newts and sals in transit. The best way to fight this, I think, is to get good at captive breeding a species or two, (or more, eventually) and offer them for sale at reasonable prices to the general public. The pet store where I go let me put up a sign w/ picture offering my newts for sale, while I kept them at my house. I offered them a cut of whatever I sold, though they refused. Eventually we could, as captive breeders, offer cheaper and/or better animals than stores. And that's my short version summary of the issue.

Yeah it's absolutely ridiculous. If only i had room and money to keep every animal from every store. They should employ people that know what there doing and actually care about more than just the pay they will receive at the end of the month. It's just distressing from the moment you go in, there's really no point telling them how you feel, they just laugh. Or in some cases make out they know more than you, but cleary they don't.

Lacey said:

Yeah it's absolutely ridiculous. If only i had room and money to keep every animal from every store. They should employ people that know what there doing and actually care about more than just the pay they will receive at the end of the month. It's just distressing from the moment you go in, there's really no point telling them how you feel, they just laugh. Or in some cases make out they know more than you, but cleary they don't.

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Well, I don't think keeping every animal in every pet store will do anything. If that happened there would be a LOT of replacement newts being brought into the country which is the opposite of what we're trying to do.

The main reason most pet store employees don't know a newt from an iguana is because they just work there, and/or have been given bad advice from the owners/wholesalers. I went to a local fish store and offered to treat one of their (clearly) P.chinensis for the sores it had on it's face and the girl at the counter had the nerve to tell me it was a "paddletail newt"! Last time I checked Pachytriton species have smoothe skin, and this one had warts.

Just because most pet stores won't listen to advice from customers doesn't mean we should stop telling them. I find myself directing pet store employees (and often customers) to this site. Even if 9 out of 10 stores won't take your advice, the other one will and baby steps like that eventually make a difference. Though, some pet stores are just plain ignorant, and nothing we do will change their evil ways.

Quiet! Shhhhh!! If PETA and their ilk read this it only helps to build their case against the pet trade. Psst, just between you and me though, I think we all have pet shop horror stories.

Mal

PS Back in the 80's, I was fortunate enough to be able to buy directly from a couple of wholesalers at wholesale prices even though I was a small potatoes hobbyist. You should have seen some of the conditions the herps were kept in at that level. Shudder!

I believe their are still better mom and Pop pet stores out there than bad ones. I happen to have a sales job that puts me in independantly owned pet stores on a daily basis and there are some shops that will blow your mind on how amazing they are and how well kept they are. If however you shop at stores that are full line that focus on dog and Cat you are more prone to see abuse of thier reptiles and amphibians. Just walk into a Petco if you want to see reptile abuse! Independant Pet stores are in a lot of trouble these days with a huge growth in competiton from Wal-mart, Petco and Petsmart and especially the internet wholesalers (DrFosterandSmith, ThatFishPlace, BigAlsonline and Marine Depot). So most fulline pet shops try to branch out to fish and reptile animals because the big guys lack in products for these animal groups. The problem is a Mom and Pop shop that have been dog and cat for so many years now bring in live fish/reptile that they have no expierence with to try and get a niche in the market. Honestly get a part time job at your local pet store a few weekends a month, most shops would love a reptile or amphibian hobbest to work for them and focus on getting the animals in the right set-ups and cared for proerly. I spent most of my junior High, high school and college days working for multiple pet shops and I have to abmit they were the best jobs I ever had! DONT JUDGE ALL PET STORES ON YOUR BAD EXPIERENCE! Also remember almost all hobbiests start from buying at pet stores and what would we do without them?????????

Jake said:

Well, I don't think keeping every animal in every pet store will do anything. If that happened there would be a LOT of replacement newts being brought into the country which is the opposite of what we're trying to do.

The main reason most pet store employees don't know a newt from an iguana is because they just work there, and/or have been given bad advice from the owners/wholesalers. I went to a local fish store and offered to treat one of their (clearly) P.chinensis for the sores it had on it's face and the girl at the counter had the nerve to tell me it was a "paddletail newt"! Last time I checked Pachytriton species have smoothe skin, and this one had warts.

Just because most pet stores won't listen to advice from customers doesn't mean we should stop telling them. I find myself directing pet store employees (and often customers) to this site. Even if 9 out of 10 stores won't take your advice, the other one will and baby steps like that eventually make a difference. Though, some pet stores are just plain ignorant, and nothing we do will change their evil ways.

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I didn't mean it literally, I was just saying i would like to save some. Yeah but they should'nt just work there, it's not right. Imagine if i was to work as a mechanic and did not know a single thing about cars, i would never get away with that. So i don't see why they should so easily. Something seriously needs to be done about it, if you just went to work for the money rather than something you enjoy doing, you would'nt take you'r work home with you and sit and read up on all the different animals the store has.

In my town there are only 2 pet stores.
The first one has been here since the 60's and they take great care of their animals.
The second one is (the dreaded) petsmart, they take no care of their fish. I bought an angelfish and an albino rainbow shark from them, and the lady there put them in the same bag, it killed me to watch her do this, (you all know why this is bad). Before that, I bought a pleco from them and half the pleco's in the 5 gallon tank were dead, it was terrible, in all the tanks there are at least 10 dead fish.

Well I visit my local pet shop almost every week, and I try to keep them up to date on the best way to keep their animals happy and they do a good job at it.

Oh I know what you mean, collin. There is a petsmart that I have been to a couple times; but it is horrible how they treat their iguanas - they have 4 in a 20 gallon aquarium.

My pet store is doing a great job with the housing of their animals, I am thinking of getting a job there to help out.

The pound near me is better at taking care of their animals, than the pet store.

And my favorite pet store shut down, my friends ran it so if there was a problem with the pets (which there never was) i could let them know.

Collin, If the pet store is so bad, why are you doing business with them?

You say every time you visit, there are dead fish in the tank. So why continue to give them your money? You're just perpetuating the cycle. After all, they are, at the root of it, a store. They're selling you a product. They want your money. Unfortunately, their product happens to be live animals. But it's all a matter of supply and demand: once you (collectively) quit giving them money, eventually they'll quit supplying (in this case, dead) animals.

Kaysie said:

If the pet store is so bad, why are you doing business with them?

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Great reply, and I totally agree.

Where I live there are tons of pet stores, but only 1 which I kinda trust. The animals looks healthy and well kept, so it's there where I buy most of my stuff. Sure, I sometimes walk in a different store and see some shocking stuff but the only thing that does for me is deciding not to buy things there.

Buy them all and give them a good home! The pet stores where I lived had to "special order" firebelly newts. When I got them they had to give me about 7 before I got a pair that live because they had some type of infection that was just a white spot in a differant location on the body that eventually ate their flesh away until they died. I was pretty upset to just have to watch them die.

I still remember one pet store in particular that was pretty awful. They sold any animal you could think of, inluding chickens!? Their iguana cage was full of dead iguanas, they had dogs in tiny cages stacked on top of each other, aquariums with slime growing on the sides, some fire bellies with nothing to hide under in a tank with full spectrum light, etc... Luckily, it was closed down recently.
As of good pet stores in miami, there is a great fish farm here where i got my first newts from. I couldn't say that they knew much about some of the herps they sold, but they took exeptionaly good care of there fish. I go there whenever I can, but since its pretty far away, I usually go to a local petsupermarket or petsmart (don't like the way petco treats there birds)