Reptile & Amphibian Forums

im sure that all you serious reptile keepers have experienced this... have you ever gone to a locale ppet shop even a petco and you over here the person in charge of the reptiles giveing bull[bleep] info? i mean just crap youve never even heard of like heres an example, this girl comes into a petshop i normaly goto to get mt feeders and she had metioned that she had just got 3 snakes from a dfriend that had to move away and couldnt keep any pets were he was going. well she had ask what kind of set ups she should have for a rosy boa and 2 dumerals boas well he told here that rosy boas are from central and south america and should have a temp of about 80 with humidity at 80% and then started telling her that rosy boas grow to enormous sizes and picked out everything that would normaly bve used to keep a humid loveing snake as for the dumerals boa he told her that they live in the most southern tip of africa and should be keeped relitivly cool. the girl then said arnt they from like madegascar the employee said no def not who told you that... that info is wrong! when she went to get more stuff for her new pets i then told her that this guy id full of [bleep] and if you follow his dirrections then your snakes are going to die she at first seem to be a little unsure about the correct info i was giveing her then i showed her the correct info in the snake books they had in the store i told her also that google is a very usefull tool. then she told me that she would look on google. then i headed for the employee but before i laid into him i notice at least 2 dozen things wrong with there reptile departmet like they had 2 pac man frogs on moist sand substrate them 2 cali kingsnakes in the same tank, there red eyed leaf frogs were bone dry, and the temp on there red tailed boa was only reading 70 degrees. i then ask the guy/kid(he looked like he was 16) how long had he been working with reptiles and what he had at home he told me he had been working with reptiles for 6 yrs and he told me he had 2 ball pythons, 4 leopardgeckos, and 2 bearded dragons. i then asked him are you serious about the info he just gave that girl he said yea he 100% sure he knows what hes talking about. then he said he was the new maneger of the reptile section i then told him the things wrong he said and the things wrong in his reptile section he told i didnt know what i was talking about then i started showing him thingsin the differant books and told him several differant websites he should visit. he then told me something ive never heared before, he said that those books sre outdated and the internet dosent give you detailed care sheets at that piont i said to myself this kid is just messin with me and hes gonna cut the [bleep] but nope he was dead serious! i told him dude you should at least check out the enternet. then he told me i was a know it all. i dont claim to be a know it all and there are things i dont know but im alway 3 secs from my comp and could finnd out also im always willing to listen to new ideas or care info that sounds laget, but seriously i could not belive what i was hereing, i told him that rosy boas are from the american south west arizona,souther cali, amd baja mexico and should be keped warm and dry plus they only grow to be 3 ft for females, hten i showed him info in one of those barrons books he then looked kind of like he was in shock. i ask him what happen to the other guy was was working reptiles? that guy new what he was talking about. he told me he quit because my info was more acurate then his and gou frustrated and quit i just shock my head and pay fior my stuff and got out of there. its crazy to see [bleep] like that happen

Yes, it's all too typical!,......that kid should have stayed working at McDonald's where he would (hopefully) be a little less dangerous!, at least to animals!LOL......customers on the other hand,.....might be a different story!

~Doug

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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

People working in reputable and knowledgeable stores hate this too. Though we do get a good deal of customers from the crap they get at other stores.

Problem for the stores is trying to legislate knowledge (ever read a Petco care sheet?) and the other is that few serious, intelligent hobbists want to work for minimum wage fighting the BS that customers come in with day in and day out. So you get the high school students that think they have some knowledge. We repeatedly get folks wanting to work in our pet store.....and they look at you totally funny when you ask them what is their area of expertise....fish, birds, herps??? They just have a couple pets they haven't killed yet and are therefore experts.
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Sonya

I'm not mean. You're just a sissy.
Happy Bunny

ive applied at this store idk about 200 times or at least it feels like ive told the manegers that im no expert but i know enough to keep the animals happy and alive with no probs ive showed the pic of all my pets ive showed the dfeeding logs ect ive even brought some of my animals in the store and i always got the same response "hey nice lookin animal, what you feeding that thing" several of my friends who also are fairly expereinced herpers have also applied and got the same response as i did. i know most pet shops only pay 7.50 an hr (mass) but im not looking for a full time job just part time plus i get to wdo something i like. ive told tthem its not about the money just the work itself i enjoy doing what i do. oh!!! get this my friend alison who has breed sevearl dif kinds of snake, i.e ball pythons,corns african house snakes, ect had told me the same kid was spaying and misting the desert kings its good to doit once in a wile but he said he was trying to get them to breed by simulating the winters in the desert by makeing it rain(wtf) she just shock her head and walked away. the kid has been working there for about 4 months maybe. what the hell is going on ive never seen anything like this before... sigh...

yeah, I've seen that crap too, it's very frustrating. I've seen it everywhere from the chain stores to private ones. And it usually doesn't do any good to offer advice, because in many cases they are too arrogant to listen to anyone. It's especially frustrating because in this day and time, it's so easy to find info out...I could probably find many accurate care sheets about any species out there in less than 5 mins on the internet, but also like you said most stores have books right there by the reptiles that say the same things but they have the attitude that they already know it all, so why bother wasting time looking it up! I've heard many employees give wrong info out, and have seen setups that are completely inappropriate. The worst I've seen was one store had a columbian rainbow boa on a dry sand substrate, with no hidebox and a very small water bowl! I don't think you could have that setup any worse if you were trying! Anything thing that really pisses me off is dirty cages...and I don't mean a spot here and a spot there, I've seen them so bad that there's not a single clean spot. It's discusting, and I don't know how they really think they are going to sell the animal like that. I'm mean, even if they really don't care about the animal, they DO care about making money so you would think they would keep it clean. Same goes for the ignorant employees giving bad info...I like to check out my local pet shops quite a bit to see what they have in, and the ones that keep the cages clean, and have knowledgable people sell the most snakes! Ones that let the cages get and stay nasty, and give totally bogus info usually can't sell anything.
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-David

Check out my pet pics at:
http://www.myspace.com/obx_fisherman

1.0 ball python (Pandora - don't ask)
1.0 argentine boa (Prometheus)
0.1 hogg island boa (Andromeda)
0.0.1 brazilian rainbow boa (Inara)
1.0 kenyan sand boa (Diablo)
1.0 normal corn snake(Cypress)
0.1 amery. corn snake (Morgan LaFay)
0.0.2 baby corns (Romulus and Remus)
- 1 normal, 1 ghost
0.0.1 banded cali. kingsnake (Cain)
1.0 tangerine honduran milksnake (Narcissus)
0.0.1 snow corn snake (Valkyrie)
1.0 amazon tree boa (Pegasus)
1.0 colombian boa (Poseidon)
0.1 albino san diego gopher snake (Athena)
0.0.1 sandfish skink (Slick)
0.0.1 fire skink (Phoenix)
1.0 dog (Luke)

the wife's pets:
1.0 bearded dragon (Leonidas)
1.1 ferrets (Ares, Enyo)
0.0.1 betta fish (Captain Morgan)
1.2 cats (Galahad, Ripley and Sassy)
0.1 Boxer

Sold one of my Brazilian Rainbow Boas to a local pet store. Been dealing with them for years and they were one of the better stores, clean cages and had staff that knew at least a little. Still, new girl in the reptile dept so I gave her the full run down on care and habitat. Seemed to get it.

Got a call several weeks later that he hadn't eaten for them. I went in to find him in a screen topped aquarium with an overhead heat lamp. He was all dehydrated. When I pointed out the errors in the setup she said they misted him twice a day. I told her about my tub racks and she said they were cruel, nothing for the snake to do. Long story short, I took him back home. Within three weeks in the "cruel" setup I had he was back to his normal self, all re-hydrated and eating. When I brought him back in there was not much she could say and they did change the setup closer to what I said in the first place. Never been back since and have not sold any more of my babies to them.
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Thanks,

Dave Colling

www.rainbows-r-us-reptiles.com

0.1 Wife (WC and still very fiesty)
0.2 kids (CBB, a big part of our selective breeding program)

LOL, to many snakes to list, last count:
24.36 BRB
19.19 BCI
And those are only the breeders

lots.lots.lots feeder mice and rats

i get the same thing at my store, everybody wants a job but they dont know a lot about anything. then you get the costmer that will not listen to what you tell them, because the other store knows better. example 3'corn eating fuzzys still, snakes/sm animals on cider, bearded dragons only need 3 crickets a week, my snake only eats once every 3 or 4 month. i could go on forever about the miss info i here, my people are trained if you dont know the answer look it up ask me if i dont know ill look it up. also not all pet stores are bad, but i do agree there are some bad stores.

Last night, I had to go to a large pet store to buy dog food. It was depressing to see the animals there. Their enclosures were filthy and they all looked unhealthy. The only corn that didn't look dead had a bad case of mites. The others were stuck in a small space between the back wall of the tank and the sliding door. I wished I could get those animals out of there, but then I'd be supporting the store, and bringing parasites home to my healthy snake. I didn't even talk to any employees. I only saw one or two in the whole store.

Sounds a lot like the petsmart near my house...i hate going there because the employees know next to nothing, but its the only place near my house where i can buy the birdfood my birds like.

Theres a local pet shop here I'm having bad dealings with at the moment who are just like what you described...

Most of the herps don't have water dishes or hides in their enclosures, they have a constant heat lamp on them, with no means to escape it if they wanted to cool down...the cages are usually full of droppings....it's a sad sight...

Once I went in there and a young couple with a small boy (probably 6-7) were in there looking for a nice first snake they could all take care of ....and the teenager was trying to sell them a baby burmese python, saying they stayed very small and could easily be managed it's whole life by the boy....I couldn't take that, so I interuppted , which they weren't too happy about...

Recently I bought a female yellow rat snake from the same place, because it had been there for almost a year and I was feeling very sympatheic that day, and not only did I listen to ''yet again'' another kid spout off complete BS about it's care, but he sold it to me as 100% healthy, which it is definitely NOT....over $100 in vet bills can tell you that...

I'm waiting on a written statement from my vet's office, and then I'm taking all my bills and my statement back to the shop, and [bleep]s gonna go down....

Most all of the issues come from husbandry problems....the employees have no idea how to take care of reptiles, and they pass that on to the customers....I'm not singling out young people, since I'm in my early 20's myself,and I'm not singling out all pet stores either... but the majority of pet shop employees are young kids who have a pet dog and that somehow qualifies them as experts in all fields...I just think the owneres of these places should do some regulating in who works for them.

There is one really nice family owned shop here, with great staff, and great looking animals, but it seems when shops go away from that family owned, small business into something corporate geared only for profit, then the quality of care decreases.