What Do You Wish Pet Stores Knew?

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Blackenedsabbath

Hatchling Member
Hello everyone!

As some of you already know, one of my jobs is in a pet store. However, I only work two days a week here and I'm the only employee with a reptile which my manager said makes things difficult when customers have questions (usually they're about beardies). So, she's asked for me to make a "mini booklet" that herself and my coworkers can reference when someone has questions or concerns about their beardie.

She wants it to cover essentially everything from set up to health issues. That seems like it'd turn into an encyclopedia quickly, so I thought it'd make sense to turn to the community that taught me everything I know :D

What do you guys wish pet stores knew/what information did you wish pet stores told new reptile owners? Relating to anything about beardies or any other reptiles at all.

P.S. I'll make sure to aggressively underline "Do not use sand as a substrate"
 

KarrieRee

BD.org Sicko
Beardie name(s)
Hiccup he is 6 and Blaze is 4
The lighting is the most crucial - basking and UVB --- they need to know the correct UVB - no coils- I would print up a sheet of Info for all New Buyers and hand it out to people who are buying --- everything you have learned from husbandry to health issues and give them this website for a resource
Karrie
 

HippieLizards

Gray-bearded Member
Beardie name(s)
Daisy, Loki, Rocket, Phoenix, Mulder & Scully. Non beardie pets: Stan (Leo) Cayde (Hognose) Tillery (cat)
Definitely Proper lighting info, also Zero red bulbs or nighttime lamps. And definitely tell them Zero particle substrates (like none whatsoever).

I'd also say tell them to NEVER house beardies together, that is an incredibly dangerous and stupid thing to do. I sadly see way too many people do that at pet stores.
they Buy one then the clerk tells them that the dragon would be happier with a friend (it won't), and they eventually start fighting over everything stressing each other out, until one of them gets injured or dies.

Feeding, Feeding is extremely important and I also see way too many pet stores with beardies that are severely malnourished and sick due to a improper unhealthy and Just downright bad diet. So definitely Get a full thing on how to properly feed them and what to avoid.

Also Tank size, It's very common for people to buy wayyy too small tanks for their adorable new little Beardie, unknowing that it will soon grow into a 15-20" Dragon that needs a 4x2x2 to live in.

It also would be smart to have a couple printed copies of the beardeddragon.org Care sheet to hand out to new Beardie owners perhaps? Just a thought, a Beardie rescuer friend of mine gives anyone who purchased a Beardie from her a bearded dragon.org Care sheet, and some other excellent articles.

That's all that I can think of at the top of my head. But good luck on your job! :)
 

kingofnobbys

BD.org Sicko
Petshops should be banned from selling live reptiles PERIOD , only specialist Herp Shops should be permitted to sell live reptiles and the management and staff MUST all be experienced reptile keepers with years of experience in reptile husbandry and be tightly regulated by the government ( National Parks would be my choice of departments running licencing ).
 

Blackenedsabbath

Hatchling Member
Original Poster
KarrieRee":107z6bxh said:
The lighting is the most crucial - basking and UVB --- they need to know the correct UVB - no coils- I would print up a sheet of Info for all New Buyers and hand it out to people who are buying --- everything you have learned from husbandry to health issues and give them this website for a resource
Karrie

Our store has info booklets but the information in them is way off. I'll see if I can send in the information to head office and get them to change it. If not, printing off information sheets is a good idea. I will definitely put this website on the papers. :)

HippieLizards":107z6bxh said:
Definitely Proper lighting info, also Zero red bulbs or nighttime lamps. And definitely tell them Zero particle substrates (like none whatsoever).

I'd also say tell them to NEVER house beardies together, that is an incredibly dangerous and stupid thing to do. I sadly see way too many people do that at pet stores.
they Buy one then the clerk tells them that the dragon would be happier with a friend (it won't), and they eventually start fighting over everything stressing each other out, until one of them gets injured or dies.

Feeding, Feeding is extremely important and I also see way too many pet stores with beardies that are severely malnourished and sick due to a improper unhealthy and Just downright bad diet. So definitely Get a full thing on how to properly feed them and what to avoid.

Also Tank size, It's very common for people to buy wayyy too small tanks for their adorable new little Beardie, unknowing that it will soon grow into a 15-20" Dragon that needs a 4x2x2 to live in.

It also would be smart to have a couple printed copies of the beardeddragon.org Care sheet to hand out to new Beardie owners perhaps? Just a thought, a Beardie rescuer friend of mine gives anyone who purchased a Beardie from her a bearded dragon.org Care sheet, and some other excellent articles.

That's all that I can think of at the top of my head. But good luck on your job! :)

A lot of people come into the store and buying the infrared bulbs because they can't get the heat up in their terrarium :/ It's way too common and a lot of them are beardie owners so I've started asking what kind of reptile they have. I'll definitely make it clear that they shouldn't have them in the booklet, and I'll see if I can make up a sign to put by our light bulbs stating that.

I'll print off the nutrition chart from beautiful dragons, that should be the easiest way for people to see what is best for them to be eating. Using the care sheet from this website is a good idea! Thanks for that :D
Thank you, hopefully my coworkers will actually use it >_>

kingofnobbys":107z6bxh said:
Petshops should be banned from selling live reptiles PERIOD , only specialist Herp Shops should be permitted to sell live reptiles and the management and staff MUST all be experienced reptile keepers with years of experience in reptile husbandry and be tightly regulated by the government ( National Parks would be my choice of departments running licencing ).
'

I agree, thankfully the store I work at doesn't sell any live animals apart from fish. People just come here to buy supplies or ask questions about reptiles as it's the only pet store within a very large rural area, and most don't want to drive the distance to see a vet or to the proper reptile store (yet they drive a longer distance to PetSmart to get the reptile). Sadly, Canada's animal protection laws and SPCA aren't that great so I don't think government regulation or a ban on selling live animals would happen here.
 

HippieLizards

Gray-bearded Member
Beardie name(s)
Daisy, Loki, Rocket, Phoenix, Mulder & Scully. Non beardie pets: Stan (Leo) Cayde (Hognose) Tillery (cat)
Blackenedsabbath":373l9307 said:
HippieLizards":373l9307 said:
Definitely Proper lighting info, also Zero red bulbs or nighttime lamps. And definitely tell them Zero particle substrates (like none whatsoever).

I'd also say tell them to NEVER house beardies together, that is an incredibly dangerous and stupid thing to do. I sadly see way too many people do that at pet stores.
they Buy one then the clerk tells them that the dragon would be happier with a friend (it won't), and they eventually start fighting over everything stressing each other out, until one of them gets injured or dies.

Feeding, Feeding is extremely important and I also see way too many pet stores with beardies that are severely malnourished and sick due to a improper unhealthy and Just downright bad diet. So definitely Get a full thing on how to properly feed them and what to avoid.

Also Tank size, It's very common for people to buy wayyy too small tanks for their adorable new little Beardie, unknowing that it will soon grow into a 15-20" Dragon that needs a 4x2x2 to live in.

It also would be smart to have a couple printed copies of the beardeddragon.org Care sheet to hand out to new Beardie owners perhaps? Just a thought, a Beardie rescuer friend of mine gives anyone who purchased a Beardie from her a bearded dragon.org Care sheet, and some other excellent articles.

That's all that I can think of at the top of my head. But good luck on your job! :)

A lot of people come into the store and buying the infrared bulbs because they can't get the heat up in their terrarium :/ It's way too common and a lot of them are beardie owners so I've started asking what kind of reptile they have. I'll definitely make it clear that they shouldn't have them in the booklet, and I'll see if I can make up a sign to put by our light bulbs stating that.

I'll print off the nutrition chart from beautiful dragons, that should be the easiest way for people to see what is best for them to be eating. Using the care sheet from this website is a good idea! Thanks for that :D
Thank you, hopefully my coworkers will actually use it >_>
I See, Well in the booklet you could say Don't use COLORED bulbs at all or nighttime bulbs that emit any form of light.
IF they need to up their terrairium more than you should suggest that they get a CHE(Ceramic Heat Emitter) bulb to heat it up a bit bit more, they don't emit light and most likely won't hurt their eyes or disrupt their sleep patterns.

Oh yes! The nutrition chart from Beautiful dragons would be perfect! and You're welcome, I Would definitely have copies of those articles And maybe some other BD.org articles to give to them, and definitely do have some sort of reference thing telling them to go to BD.org. :)
 
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