I don’t know. As far as I know they don’t sell pets so that is a big plus. I buy all my pet supplies from Pet Supplies Plus for that reason. As far as I am concerned pet stores should not sell pets. People should buy their pets from local breeders and not from these animal mills that the big pet stores use. Anyway, I went off on a tangent there but I have not heard about any other complaints about them.
Our local Petsmart sell's several different kinds of pets/animals but all of the cats and dogs are from the local animal rescue
My local Petsmart has pets... but they're from the local humane society and they are adopted. It's actually pretty good because otherwise, you can only adopt a pet the first Saturday of every month because my county has foster homes for pets and no pound. As many pets as possible are housed at the pet stores so they can be adopted out faster.
Meh, personally I don't like PetsSmart. It's kind of like Walmart, for animals, and we know how evil Walmart is.
I think that the adoption service is ok and in fact a good thing. I did not know that they sell other animals as well. In that case, I would say that it needs further investigation. If they sell other pets then they most likely get them from pet mills which is never a good thing. I would not want to support such a business.
Sounds like they are just another Petco. Bird mills are just as bad, if not worse, then puppy and cat mills. Anyway, it is hard to say for sure because we do not have a Pet Smart in my area. I you suggest that you observe the store over a period of time. Do you ever see sick animals. Ask the clerks questions about animals and see how knowledgeable they are. Are they giving out accurate information about the animals care etc..
Never, ever, EVER support the pet trade anywhere in any way. What do you need from PetSmart that you can't get at a grocery store? If you absolutely HAVE to have a snake or lizard or chinchilla or hamster or whatever, get it from a rescue. Same for cats and dogs from the SPCA or local shelter. PetSmart and Petco will eventually stop trading in life if you don't buy it, but they'll still be in business if you buy your pet foods and accessories there. The pet trade is pure EVIL.
I am not so sure that I would go that far. I take issue with the big commercial pet chains because they do not care for their animals properly, get their animals from pet mills, etc. Adopting pets when you can is a good idea. Another option is to get your pets from local breeders, not pet stores. You will get to see how the pets were raised and the conditions they were living in and the people who breed them. You will find that local breeders have a true love for the animals they raise and are not doing it just for money. I purchase my pet supplies from Pet Supplies Plus because they do not sell animals. There are lots of things that you can not get at a grocery store especially if you have exotic animals as part of your family.
hell yeah baby! (i work at a PSP). unfortunately, some pet supplies plus's are selling animals, but we aren't (and won't) because we don't have the space. And also because most of us there won't stand for it, what a hassle it would be. I didn't know it was such a bad thing to sell animals, though, what gives? Oh, and PetSmart usually has much higher prices too, PSP is a good bet usually (our individual store was voted best pet supply store in MI, for prices and service. we rock).
The problem with pet stores selling pets is that they get their pets from pet mills. In these pet mills the breeder animals live in horrific conditions with many abused and deprived of medical care. Once the pets reach the store they are often cared for by people how know nothing about the animals they are selling. Again, they are often denied medical care especially for cheep animals like guinea pig and such. I was in a Petco and saw a couple looking at a guinea pig that was skinny and so sick he could barely stand. When we all brought that to the attention of the workers they took the pet out of the cage. We knew they were just going to throw the animal into a freezer so the other people offered to buy it and the clerk said that they can’t because it is illegal to sell sick animals. In retrospect, I wish that I just purchased the guinea pig (without complaining)and nursed it back to health my self. At least then the poor guy would have had a fighting chance. Another time I went into Petco and none of the rodents had food or water in their cages. I complained and the clerk told me they were just fed and that is why everything was empty. Yea right! Anyway, they put fresh food and water in the cages anyway. You should have seen how fast they all went for the food and water. (Strange behavior for animals that were just fed) I am glad that your store does not sell pets and does not plan to. I know I say this over and over but get your pets from local breeders. Also you can find plenty of great pets from your local animal shelters. A friend of mine got a cat from a local ASPCA that no one would adopt because she was missing an eye. She is the coolest and most affectionate cat I have ever seen. Good luck
I take issue with ALL pet stores that sell animals, whether it be PetsMart or Mom and Pop stores. Their husbandry is mostly crap. Keeping snakes on wood chips (full of mites and other fatal disease carrying parasites) using heat rocks under lizards (ever had to excise and debride a thermal burn from a blue-tongued skink? It ain't pretty) feeding crickets and raw hamburger to iguanas (Green Iguanas are pure herbivores; animal protein destroys their renal system) and improperly housing large boids (the sweetest Goffin Cockatoo I've ever met was eaten by an african rock python that was not securely housed. Along with two chinchillas and a half dozen guinea pigs). Then let's look at employees. "If you keep it in a small cage, it won't get big". Heard that before? That is one regularly told LIE in place of advice. How about I put you in a crib when you were born, never took you out, but I properly fed you, clothed you, changed you, etc. Think you'd stop growing? Guess what? Iguanas, those cute little green lizards, get over 6' long, and can be very vicious if not properly tamed and socialized. Like any other WILD ANIMAL. Oh, and most books you can buy in pet stores are about 15 years out of date, so they cannot be trusted either. OK, that having been said, let's say you have a pet store, you know how to house, feed, environ, etc your pet. Where did it come from? Oh, I see, this sugar glider was raised in a loving home by loving human parents, was birthed by tamed sugar glider parents. How sweet. Prove it. It's a business. Promises mean nothing. Ever been bitten and poisoned with salmonella and e. coli bacteria? Meet Gary, the 12 year old boy whose mother made me take away his Water Monitor. The water monitor he bought with his birthday money and the pet store sold him, no questions asked. The water monitor that was wild caught in Asia and smuggled into the US along with abot 10,000 of it's brothers and sisters. The water monitor that bit ME and put me in the hospital. The water monitor that would have grown large enough to kill and eat little Gary in 5 years. That's what water monitors do. Kill and eat. You can train them that you are not food but they are still large voracious predators. Good luck with that. Would you like to discuss removing spitting cobras from a basement in Washington DC? You wouldn't believe where they came from. Or the 18 foot Boa Constrictor I caught in Falls Church. Nice and fat from feeding on domestic cats. Probably escaped or abandoned. So preach me all the sermons you want, wild animals belong IN THE WILD not in someone's livingroom. You want something pretty and exotic? Fish are nice. Want a kitten or a puppy? Go to the shelter. Leave the rest of the fauna in the flora where it belongs. Idiots who walk around with a 7 foot albino Burmese Python on their shoulders (you know, like the one in the Britney Spears video) should be wearing a t-shirt that reads "I am an attention whore, pay attention to me and my pretty snake because I am sooooo much in love with ME". It's not cool. It's DUMB. So to recap, 25 years of rescue work have taught me the following: Pet stores are crap. Money is more important. Breeders are mostly liars. Money is more important. Animal welfare is not important, money is more important. I know these things because I started in a pet store and moved on from there. My credentials, not bragging: (Name Witheld) Capital Area Coordinator, Mid Atlantic Reptile Rescue, Rehabilitation and Adoption Associate, Mid Atlantic Turtle and Tortoise Society Rescue Worker, MARS Reptile and Amphibian Rescue Member, Maryland Herpetological Society, Natural History Society Oh, and for those of you wondering, yes, I have experience in more than reptiles and amphibs, and yes, I am an angry, bitter person. No really, I'm just passionate, but I get pissed about this stuff because it is 100% PREVENTABLE. You know, preventable, like AIDS. I have had to euthanize more wonderful animals than I can remember because thoughtless pet store owners, workers, pet owners, parents, children, morons, etc sold or bought something they were wholly unprepared to care for, it got sick, they dumped it on me and I had to end it's pain. There is not enough money in the world to nurse some things back to health and I am far from rich. But there sure as hell is enough time and energy left in this old body to continue putting assholes out of business.
I agree with a lot of your post. Pet stores do sell animals to people who have no business owning them. There are also a lot of bad consumers out there that will buy a pet because it looks cute or they think it would be cool to “own one of those” but, they have no clue as to what is involved with caring for many exotic species.
I think our petsmart gets all its pets from shelters and adopts them out. Unfortunately we have a greyhound track here in pensacola but the greyhound rescue folks are at our petsmart quite often doing adoptions, which is great.
Our pet shops take in puppies & kittens from people whos animals have had them and they cant take care for them - my bf got his puppy from a pet shop and theres nothing wrong with the shop or with him. i have given 3 kittens to a pet shop bcause i couldnt give them away to my friends and i couldnt keep them. I think that the pet shops are a good alternative to those people wwho are going to otherwise dump them in a box down an alley or on the side of the road( as i have seen done amny time s and have rescued many times) that being said, i do agree that some people arent totally prepared to take care of the animal they "impulse buy". One of my friends bought a siamese fighting fish, and decided she wanted another and pout them ihn the tank together. Needless to say she only had one sore and sorry fish left. However, the pet shop we got our puppy from was very thorough in explaining the care it needed, the proper food, the way to groom and look after it properly, and when you sign for any animal, you sign a health guarentee, which means u have to take it to the vet regularly, get it chipped, vaccinations etc and if they check up and you havent had it done, they call the rspca to investigate as to why you havent had it done. All in all, most pet shops arent so bad, (well the ones i have been to anyway). But i live in aus, not sure where u guys ar efrom, but the shops sound different tohere. I have found pets paradise to be good as they really do care about the animals. Most of the people i have spoken to who work there are vet nurses or also vlounteer at the animal shelter.
OK, perhaps I was a bit too harsh earlier. So let me clarify if you please. The US, Japan (to include Okinawa), Republic of Korea, Singapore, Republic of the Philipines, and Hong Kong are places I have been and would never purchase an animal there. While I have also visited Australia, New Zealand, the UK, Iceland, Greenland I did not chance to visit pet stores there. The UK, Australia and New Zealand are known for rather strict animal cruelty laws. But the facts remain, get your animals from a shelter. If you buy a purebred dog or cat, you stand a 90% chance that it came from a mill. And leave non-domesticated species in the wild where they belong. Puppies and kittens maybe. Reptiles, rodents, and insects come shoved tightly in cardboard boxes on a truck tuesdays and thursdays. This isn't about splitting hairs and pointing fingers. It's about respecting ALL life. Want to know what a good pet store is? Ask them to let you go in the back and look around. If they say no, don't trust them. If they say yes, check the freezers. If they're full of dead pets, don't trust them.
I don’t think you should buy any pets from a pet store at all. You can usually find a great cat or dog from local rescue groups for free or at a very low cost. If you are looking to make more exotic pets part of your family then look for a local breeder not a pet store. Most local breeders (that I know) treat their pets well. I know I repeat this a lot but I feel it is important. These pet store chains buy their pets from large pet mills where they are housed in horrific conditions, then shipped to the stores. This puts a great deal of stress on the animals and many do not survive the trip.
The pet food they sell is bad, too. It's made of the worst things, like decaying tissue, spinal tissue, brains, and bones. You wouldn't want to eat it. A good brand is pet promise. it has only quality ingredients. if you see anything on the label listed as "meal" or "rendered", it's baaaaaaaaad.
malory also u shoudlnt get any food with "byproducts of ....." on it. Thats also really bad for them. I get totally organic food 4 my puppy from the pet shop, coz its what they fed him there. Its a brand called Innova and he seems to like it. Totally natural too so its a plus. Dalamar, As i said in my last post, the pet shops in aus take animals from people whose animals have had them an they cant keep them. Me, for example. My cat just had kittens, and i have booked them into the local Pets paradise coz i no the animals there are well cared for. The shop assistance are all volunteers at the shelters and one of them in a veterinary nurse. They do care for the animals and Pets Paradise is a franchised business, wouldnt this be classed as "chain"? Everyone ive been in the animals are healthy, well fed and the people do care, so i dont think you should stereo type ALL pet stores, without actually knowing about every one.. But again, as i said, i am in Australia so maybe ours are different to the ones where youre from........ Anyway ciao ash
