Rant about one of the chain stores nearby: This was maybe 6 months ago now, I was looking around at the local stores for ideas on my community tank I was setting up. Went to one of the big pet stores close to my house and got really frustrated with the staff there. Walked around looking through their tanks and they all were absolutely disgusting. Algae growing out of control. There was at least one dead fish in almost every tank. And there betta display just pissed me off. Close to half the bettas were dead. While I'm just getting more and more upset, every single employee that was working was in the middle of the store, organizing large bins of stuffed toys. So after seeing the bettas, I went to them and said someone needs to go take care of the fish department. All I got was an Ok from one of them and they all turned back to organizing the toys and gossiping. I said "So... you all should go do some real work." and left. Haven't been back to that store since.
On a brighter note though, that pet store opened up a new location sometime last summer about 20min away. Finally checked it out because my wife wanted to see and I'm happy that she forced me there. Manager said hi as soon as I stepped into the fish area (wife went off to look at cat stuff) and we chatted for close to half hour. Tanks there were spotless and fish looked healthy and were very active. Granted, deaths do still happen, but he was on top of it and removed them as soon as one is spotted. The manager at that store actually cares about the fish and takes pride in his work and knows the fish. I stop in every chance I get when I'm out that way.
So yea... there's my rant and kudos.
That's great/horrible news. I wonder if that store is a franchise?
[...] Went to one of the big pet stores close to my house [...] their tanks and they all were absolutely disgusting. Algae growing out of control. There was at least one dead fish in almost every tank. And there betta display just pissed me off.
[...]that pet store opened up a new location sometime last summer about 20min away. [...] Tanks there were spotless and fish looked healthy and were very active.
Wish I had you to stop me from purchasing 2 Crayfish at the local fish store. They were cool and helped clean the bottom but they attacked my bottom dwellers and other fish. I researched but nothing prepared me for those monsters. Needless to say I replaced them with two adorable cories.
0_0 Yikes! We don't actually carry crayfish - but they do "hitch a ride" once in a great while with the shipments of feeder goldfish. We keep one as a pet, and he's very popular. We had another come in about two weeks ago, and adopted him out - I heard my coworker warn them about their feeding habits and the person assured us he would be in a planted tank alone. Wish we could have warned you too
Thats such a good point: with the Big Box stores, you really have to check out each location for yourself and see what's going on; each location has a different "culture" within it.
On our slow days, we do extra cleaning and maintenance tasks on our habitats - our dept. manager is really fantastic about keeping a list of extra duties to do. There's hardly ever a true "slow day" where I would consider stepping out of the dept. ....not that I don't want to help keep the rest of the store clean and organized, but I was hired primarily to protect the health and safety of the animals.
We have customers who drive past other, closer chains (even our sister stores) to come to us.....if that doesn't tell us we're on the right track, I don't know what does!
Lol that customer is still in for a suprise! Crayfish DESTROY plants. That planted tank is about to be a fooating plant exhibit lol
Dagnabbit....really? I hateeeeee retroactively learning things We...keep ours in with live plants? Do we have an oddball?
0_0 Yikes! We don't actually carry crayfish - but they do "hitch a ride" once in a great while with the shipments of feeder goldfish. We keep one as a pet, and he's very popular. We had another come in about two weeks ago, and adopted him out - I heard my coworker warn them about their feeding habits and the person assured us he would be in a planted tank alone. Wish we could have warned you too
So I have read that pet stores/fish stores feed fish at night because transport on full bellies can cause extra stress. No more than two days later I'm at a local big box and an employee is blasting bloodworms into a saltwater tank to catch some fish (pretty white and black stripped ones). My fiancé asks him why he is feeding them, he replies that it is the only way to catch them. The tank did appear to have an awkward hood/entry point and there were a lot of hiding places in the rock in the tank. Still unsure how I feel about the whole situation, idk if he was just not willing to catch them with skill or if the store really just set Him up for failure with a bad setup or false info maybe.....