How You Know a LFS is Full of Crap

What's really sad is that this is considered an unskilled job so they assign unskilled kids to the task. I go into Petco. today and they have a terrible case of Ich on all their fish and the guy is clueless to it and is selling these fish. It's gotten so bad that the ich has spread all over the bodies of some of the fish. They're dying off and they can't seem to figure out why lol, yet they have all the tools to cure it on-hand in their store lol.

What's even worse is that at these stores the fish-keeper is usually the low man on the totum poll. Yes they put the new kids on fish duty and they have no clue what they're doing. To put these retards in charge of other living creatures should be a crime lol. So so sad...
 
theres only one guy at my local petsmart that knows what hes doing, he actualy dose his job and clean the tank proprly and dispose or cure the sick/dead fishes, and on the days hes not there, theres dead fish here and there and the workers just sit around and chit chat...
 
I bought a golden gourami from my wal-mart(which by the way here only has a 3 day guarantee on their fish!) anyway...at about 21/2" it quit growing...looked into it and turns out it's not the 4 1/2" golden gourami...but instead the spotted gourami which only gets 1 1/2-3 1/2"...haven't bought, nor will I buy fish there ever again.
 
Petco here is the worst. I bought a pair of angel fish from them and they infected my tank with ich. And they barely lived a day, I brought them back and they insisted that it was my tank that killed them. The tank in the store that had the angels was empty. all the angels had died. but they still insisted it was my tank that was bad. i spoke to the manager and got my money back.
Everytime I go there there's dead fish rotting in the tanks and their tanks are very small, barely 10 gals. they cram lots of fish into these tanks. and they only sell common plecos, i asked them if they would ever carry any other plecos and the clerk said "no, common plecos are great, they dont get very big and are great algae cleaners". i told him that common plecos can get to be over a foot long. and the clerk just shrugged his shoulders and said "that isnt that big". so i said "if this fish gets too big can i bring it back?" and the clerk said "no way, you're kidding right?" :rolleyes:
 
We have a store chain here called Pet Supplies Plus. In the one I visited it had a self service fish bar. The fish were in little quart size compartments and you were supposed to scoop them out yourself. There were no descriptions of the fish anywhere and the employees didn't go near the section. Not that I can blame them, there were dead fish in the compartments, on the counter and on the floor. The fish weren't even all feeders- I saw cories there and tetras.
 
I found and chose my LFS. The girl who was in the fish department normally worked in the puppy section (something else I don't approve of, that's what breeders are for), but went and got Chelsea the Fish Lady for us, who gave correct information, was polite and informative, everything. All the tanks were clean, they had two six-inch bichirs, a big emperor plecostomus, and they had ordered the blind tetras against the wish of their manager, because they liked them. It's the best LFS in the Charlotte area, I swear.
 
I chose my trusted LFS due to a couple of reasons.
When starting out i did a load of research on thiss site, via books and on planetcatfish.com (i have an unhealthy fasination with L No plecs!). I then asked questions i remebered the answer too.

One LFS told me that my rio 125 (approx 30g) would be good for any of their stock and in particular the leopoldi ray they had going for £600 (i wear expensive looking suits most of the time!! ha ha). Well they also had silver arowanas and oscars that they told me would be fine in there! As yet that Leopoldi is still there.

I have also been told that I can fit up to 9 Black ghost knife fish in my tank (by another LFS). Where the heck do these people get their info - even using 1" per gallon rule (which i know is a pretty lax rule at that) you get a stocking limit of 5 Black gohsts and I wouldn't even attempt that! :mad2:

The guys i trust have a min quarantine time of 4 weeks for any new FW livestock. I bought my plec fomr them and they told me his eating habbits, tank requirements, did a water test for me and gave me 5g of RO water and a new piece of driftwood (nice piece worth about £10) for him to munch on completely free.

My angels were form the same place - anyone in the south UK i can recommend highly any store in the "Maidenhead Aquatics" chain - and just in case they are reading this - thank you Wimborne bracnh you are all legends in your own right! :clap: :clap: :clap:

ONe thing i have found out incredibly quickly in this hobby is rely on info from this forum and other trusted sources. There seem to me to be a lot of LFS people out there who are more interested in looking at the fish in their stores like stock in a warehouse.

If I see one more RTC in a 30g tank looking well pi**ed off i think i'll have to scream!

Rant over sorry for the length of the post!
 
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greendeltatke: You should have scooped all the dead fish from the "fish bar" and took those to the register/manager, and made a point...well if you have a lot a free time I suppose;)

What surprises me is not that stores stock inappropriate fish for the average 10-20g keeper, nor that they don't get experienced help, but that people actually believe the 16y/o kid telling them "<insert outrageous information>." You have to know that when you go to chain store, especially one that sells everything from fish to guns to diapers, and a young, disinterested kid comes over to help you, that they probably aren't the most reliable source of info.

I don't understand why people don't research things more often. I know I have done things on impulse, without reasearch, but it seems there are a heck of a lot of people who have no clue, and worse, don't strive to get one.

fianlly My LFS (non-chain...i expect these guys to keep their animals a little better) gripe: Bettas in a tank with goldfish, someone is suffering here. If you can't realize that these 2 fish need different habitats and you own the store...c'mon!?!?!?!
 
greendeltatke said:
We have a store chain here called Pet Supplies Plus. In the one I visited it had a self service fish bar. The fish were in little quart size compartments and you were supposed to scoop them out yourself. There were no descriptions of the fish anywhere and the employees didn't go near the section. Not that I can blame them, there were dead fish in the compartments, on the counter and on the floor. The fish weren't even all feeders- I saw cories there and tetras.
Click to expand...
i was just about to mention them.

now, i live in northern lower, MI. we dont have them there, but im in grand blanc, MI on vacation right now and they have a pet supplies plus here and i was curious. i went in and saw the same thing and i was kinda confused when they told me to get the fish myself and pointed to some plastic cups and a net. haha. i was pretty disgusted because the fish were packed into a 20gallon tank with nothing but a filter. there was some black skirt tetras, blind tetras, tinfoil barbs, a cory cat of some sort, a few sun cats, a tiger khuli loach, some danios and some asian striped catfish... all were about 1-3". most were in really good shape, but i was just really unhappy with the setup. more than likely they had just got them in. there was no label on the tank, or ven a price... so i asked the woman at the counter and she said all fish were $1.49... so i got all 4 of the asian cats and the tiny little khuli (wich they didnt see in the cup, so i was charged for 4 fish). anyways, i really felt like i was guilty of something for purchasing fish from this little crappy tank and encouraging them to carry them, but 4 catfish for $6 was too good for me to pass up being that they were in excelent shape. i wanted to see how knowledgable the employee was, so i asked what the cats were and she replied with "I think theyre pleco's and they shouldnt get much bigger than that". *cough* yeah.... alright.

on the other end of things, i was exploring the surrounding towns for fish shops and found one called "All Wet Pets Inc." in Flushing, MI. there were several kids working there, but the one i spoke to was actually very knowledgable and answered most of my questions the same way i would have. he warned me about the size a RTC can reach, warned me that gulper cats would infact eventually eat my cave tetras, etc. he was friendly and knowlageable, i liked that store alot. everything was housed properly and very clean. the only thing he said that i was unsure of was that my 130 gallon tank would be suitable for a silver arrowana.

in conclusion:
Pet Supplies Plus in Grand Blanc, MI (Thumbs Down)
All Wet Pets Inc. in Flushing, MI (Thumbs Up)

i'm going to check out one more tonight called Dave's Tropical Fish in Toledo, OH before i go home tomorrow morning.
 
Oh I have to agree wholeheartedly with everyone. I have read more in the number of weeks prior to even getting a tank then I read in high school. This is solely due to the reason that with any common sense you come to the realization that it's next to impossible to trust anyone in any store.

Chain stores here in Spokane, WA. Forget it! Wal-Mart, Petco and Petsmart are horrible. The staff know nothing at all. There is a minimum of 6 dead fish EVERY time I have ever been in there.

There are 2 Northwest Seed and Pets here in Spokane. The smaller location is horrible. But the larger location seems to have knowledgable staff who at least specialize in the "section" they work in. I talked to an older gentleman at that larger location the other day and he seemed very knowledgable. He cared about the fish's well-being and didn't seem like he was trying to "sell" me anything. He actually admitted he didn't know a lot about the snails they carried and told me he would need to do some research to give me any difinitive information. All in all he was the first person I've met so far that I've trusted the information I was getting.

I have to STRONGLY recommend research ahead of time as well. Ask them some questions you know the answers to and take it from there. It's the ONLY way you can be sure.
 
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