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  #101  
Old 02/19/2006, 02:11 PM
XeniaMania XeniaMania is offline
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I've written to Petco to complain about their conditions. I even bought a fish as a rescue. I think they do it to make ppl like me buy their fish. To top it off, I think one of their girls were trying to sound smart to me by saying she uses a refractometer at home, but she couldn't identify the tang I was looking at.
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  #102  
Old 02/19/2006, 08:20 PM
MAreefer1 MAreefer1 is offline
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lol...I think the staff that I was asking were "trying to act smart too"
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  #103  
Old 02/20/2006, 01:59 PM
minireefer03 minireefer03 is offline
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SAD
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  #104  
Old 02/20/2006, 06:51 PM
Seadogs Seadogs is offline
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Atleast with Petco, you can complain up a chain of command. Not that I think it would do much good, but it may make a difference. On the other hand, there are two LFS's here that specialize in SW. One is beautiful, the other, well let's just say that I'd sooner shop for fish at Petco! I swear, this other store had what looked like a 2' Spotted Wobbegong (I'm new to SW, but it looked just like the picture in my Marine Fishes book!) in a 55 gal that had water so green you could only see the fish when it was pressed against the glass! And that's just the first tank! This store is just a LFS, so who do you complain to when the owner's the one running the store?
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  #105  
Old 02/21/2006, 08:56 AM
MAreefer1 MAreefer1 is offline
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Petco's issue with Petco is Corporate, and they have many other products in there store, and many stores...thats why they havnt been taken down by a few angry hobbiests...on the other hand, a LFS might suffer if the surrounding hobbiests did not visit.
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  #106  
Old 03/18/2006, 06:03 PM
MAreefer1 MAreefer1 is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by acroporid23
death to petco LOL
agreed
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  #107  
Old 03/18/2006, 09:41 PM
::PixelFish:: ::PixelFish:: is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by MAreefer1
agreed
If you agree with this then why did you go to Petco to buy salt?

It's just puzzling how people get all upset about how Petco treats their animals but because their caring for animal welfare stops at their wallets, they keep on shopping there because Petco is cheap.

Petco is the same as a puppy/kitten mill. Working there and shopping there is supporting animal cruelty.
  #108  
Old 03/19/2006, 03:56 PM
wfrost wfrost is offline
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I use to be on the hate Pet-Co team, but ive seen some LFS that make Pet-Co look like saints. yes I know that most of their employees dont have a clue, thats retail visit a Wallmart, a Lowes, Home Depot etc.. and find a different story. Also remember when you complain about a bunch of tangs in a 20 gal tank or corral unser 20 watts of light that if it stays there more than a week its a slow sales week. My .02 cents worth its not a perfect world.
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  #109  
Old 03/26/2006, 09:54 PM
EricBrian EricBrian is offline
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I went to Petco today to buy a back up heater. While there I looked at the tanks. There was one small tank with 2 eels in it and one plastic thingie which they could not use for cover.

It was soooo sad.
  #110  
Old 04/21/2006, 04:18 PM
shrug1013 shrug1013 is offline
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so true!!
  #111  
Old 04/21/2006, 09:47 PM
Lord Voldemort Lord Voldemort is offline
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I would like to add my opinion. First of all most of the fish are there TEMPORARY. Second, it's all about where you go. I bought my fish from there once and guess what? They asked me like the excact opposite of the first post on this thread. They asked how big the tank was, is it SW, and tankmates. A little weird.
  #112  
Old 04/22/2006, 04:50 PM
GTI2.0t GTI2.0t is offline
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I am the aquatics manager at the Petco 2 miles from my home. Hearing some of your stories saddens me. It appears that a few bad apples can ruin the whole tree. I don't seem to have any of the problems mentioned here at my store. Yes occasionally we have sick fish, and yes occasionally fish do die. If you have ever kept fish as a hobbyist I am sure that has also happened to you.
If this does occur, say one damsel comes in with ich, I will put up a sign on the entire system that houses that fish(our systems consist of 12 about 15 gallon tanks and 2 about 30 gallon tanks, about 240 gallons total with a 20 gallon sump) and I will begin treatment and not sell a single fish from that system until everything looks better. I am not allowed to use any medications(which is fine with me). The way that coorporate would like us to deal with ich is 50 percent water changes daily until signs of ich are gone. This might help some but does little to help the fish that have it. Don't tell anybody but I do hypo. I just do it I don't need to contact some bigwig and ask him how he wants me to deal with a problem. I am the one there, these fish are in my care, I hold myself responsible for their well being and I will utilize the most effective means to do this.
Part of the problem lies in the fact that there is usually only one aquatic specialist in an average store. What happens when I am not there? Sometimes, employees give bad advice, or sell a fish to someone who had no business buying that fish. This has stopped happening since I have implemented a few policies(my own,not coorperate). I have posted compatibility charts for salt and freshwater fish, I make a list weekly of uncommon fish we don't normally receive and I list their needs and care requirements. I make sure all fish are properlly labeled and I do have a cellphone that I encourage anyone to call if they have questions when I am not there.
I also have been to some Petcos that looked pretty bad. I don't purchase items there and I will do my best to make something up to get some of there fish transferred to my store. The last thing I want is to allow them to sell sick fish or even support them by purchasing dry goods.
I have found that the key to success at my store is simple. Only order species I know I can properly house and care for. I could care less if customers come in and say " Comeon when are you gonna get something cool in". I simply say there are plenty of tank raised clowns, dottybacks,cardinals and the like to choose from and those are all very cool fish. The most expensive and exotic fish I have ordered in a year was a clown trigger. Came in about an inch longer and an inch taller than a pack of marlboros
((sorry its the only thing I had in my pocket at the time to hold up to the glass for reference....cough...cough...cough). After acclimating him(yes I drip my fish although p&p does not include that) I was happy to see that he was looking very healthy. I was a little nervous at first cause clown triggers have always been my fav agressive salt fish and I didn't want someone to sell him on my day off to a jack*** with a 55 gallon tank. But I left a note on the desk about him and hoped for the best. 2 days later he was still there and I was back to work. A customer showed interest in him, I put an under observation sign on his tank, observed and personally fed him for 7 days called him, told him he was eating fine and looked great. He came in that day and bought him. I gained a lifelong customer, and a clown trigger gained a LIFELONG home in a 220 with a dragon moray(thats it).

I suppose by now you can probably notice that I don't really have a point in this post. I am just simply embarassed by some of the stories I have heard and I just want to say that I can assure all of you that the fish at my store, in my fish department, under my care, are doin just fine.
  #113  
Old 04/23/2006, 02:52 PM
hgbarwick hgbarwick is offline
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i live in tampa florida and the PETCO thier is awsome. THier fish and corals are all healthy and thier are no overcrowding. SO mabey not all petcos are bad
  #114  
Old 04/23/2006, 11:40 PM
XtrmCHoPZ XtrmCHoPZ is offline
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I live in CA, and every PETCO I have ever been to is trash. sorry to say it but its true. All the fish ALWAYS have parasites ( ich, oodinium, black ich, you name theyve got it ). The tanks are always overcrowded. Almost every time I go in there I see fish eating eachother. Their corals are garbage and their fish are worse. They should stop selling SW fish ALL TOGETHER!!!!!
  #115  
Old 04/24/2006, 10:49 AM
Fishfirst Fishfirst is offline
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I have to agree... I've been to all but two or three petcos in WI and I haven't found one I'd ever buy livestock from. Hole in the head and ich seems to be the biggest problem in every store I've been to.
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  #116  
Old 04/26/2006, 05:32 PM
JotaDe JotaDe is offline
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I have been to several good PetCos here in the bay area and have met many very knowledgeable employees who could put most LFS employees to shame.
Conditions of the tanks are varied, in the same store I've seen good looking tanks and poor. I have no idea what it depends on.
To say the "company" blows as opposed to an individual or individual store is wrong though IMO.
  #117  
Old 04/26/2006, 05:35 PM
EricBrian EricBrian is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by JotaDe
To say the "company" blows as opposed to an individual or individual store is wrong though IMO.
So when the company says that the employees can not treat sick fish, that is ok?
  #118  
Old 04/26/2006, 06:57 PM
JotaDe JotaDe is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by EricBrian
So when the company says that the employees can not treat sick fish, that is ok?
Since I've had relatively good expieriences at PetCo I "have" to say the company "blows" because of someone elses experience?
  #119  
Old 04/27/2006, 03:16 PM
GTI2.0t GTI2.0t is offline
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In no way does Petco say we can't treat the sick fish, they just have ways they want it done. The main reason for that is that a store that has an untrained staff(aquatics managers fault)would misuse medications. They would just go ahead and start dumping stuff in and hoped the fish got better. As we all know improperly medicating the fish is probablly worse than not medicating at all. There policies for treating disease are: for ich in freshwater, it is a salt treatment that will eliminate all signs of ich in 4 or 5 days(it works if done correctly), and for ich in saltwater they want you to do daily 50% water changes(time consuming, not feasable in a high volume store when you have two, 247 gallon salt systems and one 30 gallon barrel for mixing salt water) I have personally used hypo on one system a few months ago when a copperband butterfly came in with ich, and my fault I didn't notice until the next day. It worked.
In my opinion it depends on the aquatics manager. If this person stays on top of water quality then treatment procedures would be immaterial as you would have no disease in the first place. And don't order delicate species unless you are confident you can care for them. Just cause its on the list, has a cool sounding name that you can't pronounce,and you have never seen one before, doesn't mean you should order it. Every once in a while a fish appears on the availability list that I am not familiar with(mostly freshwater) all I do is write the name down, look it up in a book at the store, if it is not in any of them I will research online when I get home. If it is something I feel confident ordering, and it is still available next week I will order a few. If it was only on the list that one week and I missed out cause I was researching it, oh well.

Last edited by billsreef; 04/27/2006 at 10:34 PM.
  #120  
Old 05/02/2006, 01:27 AM
Poorcollegereef Poorcollegereef is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by MAreefer1
But the cruelty torwards the animals is horrible, and they are not healthy at all, do you see that at your LFS????????

I dont think so, there always well kept up, I have never bought from Petco and never will.
Well, we dont have a petco around where I live, but my LFS is worse than any Petco horror story. The cram Ritteri, BTA, LTA Condys and other anemones into the same tanks. Im talking about 10-15 in a 20 gal tank, with alot of other creatures and two RO florescent lamps. Even their mangroves dont last very long. Even then the have RTN coral labled as "rescue corals". Quite frankly, if you dont get to the LFS before they introduce the item into their tanks, you will have a longer recoup time, if they survive at all. Its amazing to see Rock Anemones (Aiptias... sorry cant spell that one) covering their LPS and SPS specimins. I dont know, I think a Petco might be better so atleast my LFS cleans up it's act.

Heck, a bad LFS almost want me to start a LFS with better ethics
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  #121  
Old 05/02/2006, 08:25 AM
yeame yeame is offline
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LOL this is a joke I have gotten alot of things at alot of pet stores and petco isnt that bad compared to alot of lfs and now every one needs to go to petco and save a fish give me a break it happened to me got my sohal tang out of a 15g tank on sale for 35.00 lets see a lfs do that not that I like petco but most of the lfs up in maine suck
  #122  
Old 05/02/2006, 02:43 PM
RichConley RichConley is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by MAreefer1
lol...I think the staff that I was asking were "trying to act smart too"
Honestly, I live in MA, and I've had higher success rates with fish from PetCo (almost always the brighton store) than any other shop around.

As far as fish goes, I'm about 6/6 on fish bought from petco still being alive, whereas I'm 0/3 from Skiptons, 1/4 from Tropic Isle, 1/2 from Aquarium Gallery.

The fish at the LFSes look healthier, but maybe thats the problem. Maybe I give them more of the benefit of the doubt. Sometimes I think the only difference is that the LFS are savvy enough to pull out the dead fish.

Do you really think care matters that much when most of the fish are being sold in a day or two?


(Just for reference to the above statement:
Petco:
2xOccellaris Clowns(alive)
1 Bangai Cardinal (alive)
1 Coral Beauty (alive)
1 Cirrhilabrus Cyanopleura (alive)
1 Cirrhilabrus Solorensis (alive)
Skiptons
2x YWG (both dead, wasted away.. cyanide caught?)
1x Cirrilabrus Cyanopleura (wasted away...same?)
TI
1xYWG(dissapeared overnight)
1xCirrhilabrus Exquisitus (alive)
1xCirrhilabrus Rubrimarginatus(Never ate)
1xFlasher wrasse (wasted away)
AG
1x Halicoeres Iridis (alive)
1x Flame Angel (never ate))
  #123  
Old 05/13/2006, 05:48 AM
mjdlonghorn mjdlonghorn is offline
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Petco doesnt care about the quality of their livestock. The only reason why they stock live saltwater fish is to get people interested in the hobby. When people see the pretty lionfish they have in stock they decide by buy the hardware. That is where petco makes money selling the actual aquariums and filters etc. I dont think petco is any worse than some LFS. I saw one LFS in town that had a 4" flagfin angel in a tank about 8" x 8."

Although, I should say that I have bought some very nice damsels and arrow crabs at petco.
  #124  
Old 05/13/2006, 06:45 AM
darkwaterdevil darkwaterdevil is offline
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all of there saltwater tanks are run to a central sump same with fresh and its all waterchanged there same with one of my lfs. i dont think there great at all there stupid but the fish quality isnt bad because of them go in there every day and i bet you that the fish will sell fast all of the fish come in like that from the distributor. im not defending them. i work for a lfs so there the competition
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  #125  
Old 05/14/2006, 05:26 PM
Ursus Ursus is offline
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The fact of the matter is, Petco is not a specialty shop, so the employees and conditions aren't going to be perfect. Some will be better than others. The Petco closest to my house has knowledgeable staff and the fish look decent. However, the one on the other side of town is not as good. The only positive is they move the fish to customers pretty fast. Of course, then it's up to the un-educated first time owner.
 

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