DO NOT BUY PETCO FISH

[HippoTang]

I was at Petco in Scranton, Pa last night. Another horrible sight of fish. Yellow angel almost dead and a big clown sweetlips with the biggest popeye i have ever seen. Yellow tang just breathing fast. It was absolutly sick. And the bad part is that this isnt the worst ive seen it. All their fish get very sick if they are there for a week. They always get in Koran Angels and I always see them sick there. I was there one time when they were putting their fish in and the water was kinda blue, fish were asleep and no color. Guy says they come outta it when they see the light. The water changes back but still it must be poison. What the hell is this? Please people dont buy from Petco. We shouldnt promote this kinda stuff. This is y the prices are going up b/c fish are becoming extinct from dieing like this. Is there anyone i can write to and try to get this chain from stop selling Saltwater fish?

Please respond if u have information or if u have similar experiences with Petco like mine.

Thanks
Mark Phillips

[Vilas]

oo, there's a petco near me where I was told live rock is "too messy and complicated" and I really wanted an UGF. The animals, of course, are lackluster at very best, dead at worst.
Worse yet is the pet club - a chain like warehouse store. Absolutley terrible. They keep buying things like pinnaeus batfish, despite admission by the staff that they can't keep them alive..there are dead fish everywhere, and some of the worst advice I've ever heard circulating there.
Worse yet, I know someone who used to work there - they have a FREEZER full of dead puppies out back.
I won't even buy a dog buiscit from them - why support this cr*p?

I'm in favor of lisencing for selling certain creatures, for sure.

[rickb]

not to defend these guys but often this is the result of local managers. The one here at union square isnt great but its certainly better than petland or what you are describing. If you are genuinely concerned, then send a letter to the head office or the regional manager and let them know what kind of conditions they are being implicated with.

A freezer of DEAD puppies? I find that hard to believe, I 've heard of dogs in bad conditions but they are hardy and not that easy to kill, and if thats really the deal then your friend is a SCUMBAG for not blowing the whistle on them a long time ago, and im my personal view you are not much better. I have a dog so if you are just trying to spread crappy rumors then you are at fault and if you are truly holding information about such conditions then you are at fault again.

Dont just whine... do something

try

http://www.planetfeedback.com

rickb

[Vilas]

Wow, gotta relax there, guy. I'm passing along info that was given to me buy a trusted source. Take it for what you will. He complained several times and quit. The place in question is a major warehouse, they supply other stores with puppies and fish, and get tons of them in. So, it's not inconcievable to me. You really have to see this place - anyone here in Boston probably has.

One can complain, one can call the MSPCA, one can boycott and spread the word to stay away, one can join peta and chain one's self to the door. I've pointed out the dead fish to the managers, who come back with, "oh, that's just how it goes with salt water fish." The whole concept of acceptable losses seems to be at play here, which seems common in stores that deal in bulk. Amazingly sick.

[Clyde]

freezer full of puppies ?

odd - NONE of the petcos around here sell dogs or cats, just fish, turtles, snakes, ferrets I think I saw some once, and some birds. or was that petsmart ?

but I never seen a dog/cat for sale at petco

PetSmart, dogs/cats for adoption.

[Vilas]

Nope, this was the pet club, not petco. I was speaking about the large chains.
I like the way petsmart does it, with the adoption days.

[rickb]

no I wont chill, a freezer full of puppies? Maybe you need to check your self.

For petco complaints

Brian K Devine, CEO
9125 Rehco Road
San Diego, CA 92121

Kim Sherman, Customer Sevice Administrator
9125 Rehco Road
San Diego, CA 92121

Some other letters to the company (many good ones)
http://www.planetfeedback.com/sharedLettersList/0,2941,104432-86-0-0-20-0-fb_date-desc,00.html

For Pet Club (I've never heard of this place)I found this info on the site
The Pet Clubhouse is a Subsidiary of:Tonal Poem's Multimedia Incorporate
608 Schuykill Road Phoenixville, Pa 19460
610 933 9388


I hope your friend gets a life and either stops spreading bad rumors or does something with the info he has.

I see no reason to boycot petco, they do a decent job up here.

rickb

[Vilas]

I officially bow out of this flame war. There's no need for it here.
Good day.

[rockdiver]

Here in Chicago I went to a Petco and the saltwater fish tanks looked like a war zone dead, eyes budgling, ick all over JUST would blow your mind. Talked to the manager and he said they missed cleaning for acouple of days!!! I told him he was full of s**t and it takes WAY more than missing a couple of days of cleaning foe this and than went to the pet rescue which was in the dog/cat section of the store talking to people about adopting anamials and asked them why they were doing business with this company and told them why and showed they the fish and they were speechless!!
Than I called the corp. offices and demanded and got a call from the area manager and she said she would handle it a week later I went there and the saltwater fish section was closed down empty no fish and I heard the manager was fired.
Recived a letter from the area manager thanking me and the pet rescue group of being this to her attition.
SO WE/YOU/US HAVE TO TO SOMETHING AND NOT JUST TALK ABOUT IT, just like politics we do have the power to do things
And petland a hole nother story.
DIVER

[Bubafat]

Saying that ALL petco's are crap is like saying that ALL LFS's are bad, or ALL walmarts are bad, or ALL Mcdonalds are bad. True, they all are corprately owned, but they are all independently ran.

I work there, so I can answer some of these things.

1. Petco DOES NOT SELL DOGS OR CATS, store policy, so you either must have been mistaken about the dogs, or they had them for some reason I don't know. They do freeze all the dead fish, birds, reptiles and small animals to be cremated because F#$%ing Peta thinks it's inhumane to through a dead fish away!

Listen to what rockdiver did, if your petco is that bad, complain! We just got rid of our lead associate in aquatics cause she was a lazy B$%^# who knew nothing about keeping fish! I do my damndest to keep people informed about fish, corals, equipment, etc. If I don't think a fish is healthy, I DON"T SELL IT. I almost got fired once cause I wouldn't sell a fish that was sick to this lady, it was apparent that it had ick, she complained to district manager who was there on inspection, he bagged it out for her, guess what, she came back a week later, all of her fish were dead! Was that petco's fault, she knew that it was sick, I told her, she took the risk (dumb *** hell risk, but up to her) but the fish took the hit.

I have worked at a couple LFS stores. The wholesalers usually unload their crappiest fish on petco. It's cause petco doesn't claim with them, they claim through their corprate office, so we get stuck with crappy, already sick fish. If we just started out with some decent fish, they'd stay healthy. Example...We get captive bred clownfish shipped directly to us, they come in healthy and we have VERY few losses with them. On the other hand, we get crappy fish from Salt Water Headquarters (I think clyde can agree with me that this is a S$#%%y wholesaler) and they come in sick. For the price we sell them compaired to other LFS's in the area, they could easily afford a quarenteen tank, and would have no problem with the fish.

Petco corprate sucks, they don't give us the nessasary equipment to keep/quarenteen saltwater, we have NO CHOICE, we are TOLD that we must overstock these tanks cause tanks full of fish sell better then tanks with fewer fish!

The moral of this story, some suck, some don't, don't discriminate against all of them because of a few bad apples.

Buba

[chipmunk]

I bought two tank raised ocellaris clowns from a Petco in San Francisco about 3 weeks ago, they're doing just fine.

Having worked at 2 LFS before, I usually never buy from chain stores. But these fish were almost half the price of what I saw at a few LFS. Also, I believe they were from the same supplier. The fish actually appeared healthier than the ones I saw at the LFS.

This was the first time I've purchased salt water fish from Petco. What helped me decide was that there was a guy there buying a tang for one of his own tanks. He personally had 5 reef tanks. His business was servicing aquariums. He told me that he shops at all the stores. He spends over $1000 a week on fish and inverts for his customer's tanks. His advice was to observe the animals and choose with care.

Just my $0.02.

[sparkey]

I gotten fish from that exact store before. I have not been there in quite sometime. The last time I was though I noticed a decline in water quality. I will now no longer purchase from here. :mad2:

[Nagel]

Well, I bought 2 False perculas and a royal gramma from the petco in totowa, new jersey. They are in the tank 4 weeks and 2 weeks respectively, and all are VERY healthy. But, I must digress, those are the ONLY fish I would buy from this store. The clowns move fast, they get shipments every tuesday of about 18-24 fish and by sunday theres only 4-5 left. All the other fish usually don't look as healthy as the percs do, and the royal gramma was a find, none of the other 7 LFS's had em, they all had pseudochromis's.

One thing I did note the last time I was there. They had what they called a "fire clown" in the tank with the false perculas. Well, he looked very close to the false percs except his middle bar stopped halfway down his side, kind of like a saddle. Well, he was gettin a beating from the percs (they were taking turns, I swear it!), and I mentioned this to the store associate. He told me he was in there temporarily, they hadda dump him in fast cause the regional manager was coming in, but he said he would move it shortly. 2 days later I went back, and poor thing was in there still, barely alive, fins chopped to bits. If I didnt already have my percs I might have tried to save him the first day, but seeing how they were beating on him, I knew mine would do the same.

Heck, the "smartest" of associates there has a coral beauty in like a 6 gallon eclipse with no live rock or protein skimmer (and he didn't even know what they were).

Sad, eh? Well, I guess its like this... Watch the fish closely, don't buy on impulse, and make sure the fish you choose is healthy. Don't buy fron tanks with dead or dying fish in them. Be smart, some places are nice, some are not, some ain't half bad. Just choose wisely....

[Erin]

I think it's like any other store, you need to evaluate each on its own merits. Some pet chain stores are terribly run, and others have very knowledgable staff (ok, these are few and far between, but they exist!). If you see bad conditions, report it to the manager. Chances are, he or she already knows, but give him/her the benefit of the doubt. If there's no change in a few days, start calling and writing. Boycotting won't work, because there's no way to organize a large enough percentage of their customers. The uninformed will keep coming back to replace what died. The lucky, whose fish miraculously recovered, will think it's not a bad place. The only way to make changes is to let the powers-that-be know. Sic the local humane society on them, and sometimes even Peta will go after them (as annoying as Peta is, they can be a powerful tool to harass a store to stop its evil practices!).

As for the puppy thing, some Petco's do sell puppies. Some states (Ohio, for instance) outlaw the sale of dogs at pet stores because of the puppy farm problem (which breed horribly inbred or sickly puppies that are fragile and can die easily -- I saw a lot of these puppies when I worked at a vet's office).

Just my $.02.

Erin (*_*)