Why you should NOT buy your animals at petsmart

[reptarx3]

Hello, I just got a job at petsmart. I of course fell in love with bearded dragons and started doing research on them. I quickly noticed many reasons why they WILL have a short life.. IF they make it out of the pet store at all. First of all, they get fed 4-6 crickets a day. This is written down on a sheet and is enforced by pet care managers. Pet care associates also believe that this is the proper amount that they need to be fed a day. When I brought this to the attention of a manager, she simply said "Well you can only feed them once a day, because you don't want them to get fat." They want to keep them tiny and cute so that they can make a buck off of them. They are also fed lettuce, which is unhealthy for them AND not chopped up so they can swallow it. Last on the list of what they can get fed is mealworms(much larger than the size between their eyes might I add.) As you all probably know those are not healthy for baby beardies. Employees are told to feed them this by CORPORATE. So even head of the company does not know how to care for these animals. They also have water dishes in their tanks. They don't drink from standing water and are not getting bathed, so they are dehydrated. So when you buy them from the store they are dehydrated AND underfed. I also stopped by petco to look at their setups and noticed that they have SAND in the enclosure with their baby beardies. You can tell by looking at them at either store that they are unhealthy. This goes for all of the reptiles at our store though. I'm sure they all need MUCH more food to grow and be healthy. DO NOT purchase your beardie or any other animal from stores like petsmart or petco.. All these stores care about is the money..

Anyone else work there? Or have the same frustrations? /:<

 

[TheWerewolf]

I got my Nimrod from PetSmart and he's doing fine. He's perfectly healthy at 10 or so months old. He hasn't even found a need to go to the vet. So you won't always get a sick dragon when purchasing them from a store. Besides, breeders can sell you sick dragons too, so it's not always pet stores that are evil. Of course, the PetSmart I got Nim at has really good beardie care. The beardies look happy and healthy. And when I brought Nim home he pooped fine, so he obviously wasn't fed mealworms. No, I'm not defending all pet stores, just some. Because there are those good ones. The Petco is a different story though. It has really bad beardie care. They are fed just mealworms and live on sand. So I'm glad I didn't get Nim from there.

Plus, most of the pets I've owned and own are from pet stores. All of them lived and are living long and healthy lives. This includes birds, reptiles and fish, of course. So really, it depends on the place and the store. Not ALL pet stores are evil. You just have to take a good look around. And not ALL breeders are good. Just take a look around and see what's good for you. I found getting Nim from PetSmart and not a breeder gave me the opportunity to see him face to face. He was also on sale, not like I was looking for that.

 

[SkeptiBee]

It's been said a few times but it honestly depends on the store. The beardies at the local PetSmarts near me have always used repticarpet. The only animals that have loose substrate seems to be the iguanas, frogs, Chinese water dragons, and snakes. For some reason, beardies and the geckos always are housed on carpet. The PetCo's near me always have fresh cut veggies too. Not staples that we feed them (not 100%), but they do have a good mix of around four to five different kinds. Nearly every time I go in to see the baby beardies, they are fat, alert, and have no nipped tails or toes. They look very healthy at least visually. There was one that looked like a recent hatchling that looked to be a new resident with a slightly older beardie roughly two inches longer than it. I could easily see it attacking the smaller animal and killing it.

I really am perplexed why they would not want the bearded dragons to look fat. They look healthier that way and I'd be more inclined to buy one. Besides, I think they look cute. Like kittens bloated bellies after they nursed. XD

The one thing I will note is that light temps for basking area always too low, but I'd wager they do it to keep animals from running around and being too hyper. They probably figure if they see reptiles dashing around, customers might be less inclined to buy one. It's disingenuous, and dangerous for the reptile, certainly it doesn't please me any.

 

[wolfysluv]

Definately varies store to store. Ours are treated "okay". Except for meal worms.

Its Petco though that has a well known history of inconsistant standards. Some are a nightmare! Some are outstanding compared to other pet stores.

 

[megaglaze]

I bought Toothless at a petsmart near me and he is 11 months old now and incredibly healthy. Every time I go back their beardies are perky and come right up. they are fed small crickets twice a day and eat untill they are full. So treatment varies depending on location.

 

[randommonks]

I got Darwin from Petsmart 2 years ago and he's doing just fine. I think you need to realize that most animals that go into a pet store come out of it within relatively quickly.

A few things I thought I'd address:

1. Mealworms are not the best feeders for beardies but most dragons will do fine with them. They shouldn't be fed gobs of them but it won't instantly kill them. Darwin got mealworms as treats once a week or so and he always was a regular pooper in his youth.
2. Greens that aren't chopped up into little bits won't hurt a dragon either. The only way I got Darwin to eat veggies regularly in the past was the hold a gigantic piece of turnip greens in front of his face while he took bites out of it. Even if I dropped it onto the viv floor, he would continue to bite at the big pieces.
3. It's up to the individual owner to research care for their animals after purchasing them. Pet stores don't always offer the best advice but at least they guarantee the health of their animal for 2 weeks. In that time, it should be relatively safe to say if you've picked a healthy beardie or not.

 

[jloucks]

I got a little gem at PetCo by my house (Dallas Tx area). Happy health baby lizard with dark grey skin and weird little red dots behind his ears.

I liked the dots, so home he went.

Well, 4 months later after every shed he is getting redder and redder. Quite the exquisite specimen at bargain basement prices.

Oh, sorry, I digressed, the store took wonderful care of their lizards. Couple of purple hair hippie girls working there that, you can tell, love the lizards.

 

[Bunnyward]

We got a small bearded dragon from Petsmart. She died within a month. It was horrible and heartbreaking to watch.

 

[dragontamer13]

The beardies at our petco are in the medium-well care stage. its not like their health is critical but they are on sand...they are actually really active and hyper...anyway ine came from there and the only problems ive though could be wrong was him not eating his veggies...on the first day i had him. he devours his veggies and crickets and loves to be held, besides, if they really took so poor care of them, to get one from there would be a rescue, which is good

 

[OneBigDude]

I bought my beardie, Toothless, at Petsmart a month ago today. When I picked him out, he was the only one left and had apparently been separated when they got him in because the others weren't letting him catch any crickets. He was pretty small, but alert and greeted me at the glass. It felt like it was meant to be so I got him. He was a little over 5 inches last month and he is closing in on 8 inches today. He ate 15 pinhead crickets the day I brought him home. I switched to reptiworms about 3 weeks ago and he's eating about 50-55 small a day. He shed 2 weeks ago and started his 2nd yesterday. I stopped in today and they had 3 baby beardies that all looked pretty healthy.
Some of the pet stores around here don't seem to care about the animals, but some are decent.

 

[ddurph]

We got Perry at Petsmart in September and the person who helped us was great. She has a lot of beardie knowledge and even convinced my son to go home and read about the care and responsibilities before jumping in and buying, which was great. The first trip we walked out with two books on beardies. That night he read all about them while my husband and I looked up on the Internet (found this site). There are a few "clueless" employees who work there, but we always look for Lydia when we go there. Perry is doing great, thanks to this forum. We have friends who have purchased other reptiles from there that also haven't had issues. I imagine, like everything, you will find good ones and bad.