Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Has anyone been successful in educating their local Petco / Petsmart on frog care? By extension, has anyone begun to complain to those corporations about pet care policies? I am just curious. Our city is lucky enough to have a pet shop that does reptile (and related creatures) well. Each for sale pet is housed in a clean, appropriate container and animals are healthy. PetSmart is located close to me and is where I buy crickets, dog treats, and cat litter (that's about all). When buying crickets for my scorpions a few weeks ago, I noticed a new shipment of PacMan frogs, just in, each in a tea-cup size container with moist dirt. I couldn't help but choose the biggest and brightest. Then I found you all and learned how to care for the frog well. There are still a couple left on the shelf (I am hoping from additional shipments and not the one that I got Herman from weeks ago), and I have told the employees every time I go in to feed the little guys. Today, I discovered two albino PacMan frogs in the same SMALL critter keeper on gravel in 1/2 inch water with no dirt at all. I wanted to smack someone. Has anyone successfully educated staff or e-mailed the corporation or something? It's kind of frustrating and I hate to turn a blind eye to critters that deserve better.

Sorry this is a little off-topic and only relates somewhat to what you said, but you just reminded me of something.

Who the **** sent out the bulletin to Petco and such that said, "Pacman frogs shall be placed in a critter-keeper with gravel and water by decree of the King of Poor Animal Housing"?!?!

I notice that all the petstores in my area put tiny juv. pacs in gravel and 1/2-3/4 inch water! I would worry about the poor guy drowing! Guess it would cost too much to use Bed-a-Beast and have someone change it every few weeks, they probably also say that customers cannot see them and thus they won't sell. I figure someone who expects to see their pac running around the tank all day doesn't have the info needed to raise one. I shudder to think how many pacs have been bought by people who were told that gravel is safe to use as floor cover and then how many pacs have swallowed pieces and died from it

The power of the damn dollar
*thumbs down*

I have had great success in informing petco about the proper care of stuff. What u do is go there regularly make a friend and tell him/her what they should be doing istead of complaining.Me(12) suggested using something other than eco earth and they changed to aspen. so all hope's not lost just make a friend and suggest stuff don't complain.
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Denise (Mom) and/or Jared (son)
Take care!
0.0.1 Brand new baby Ball Python - Eragon or Saphira
1.0 Bearded Dragon - Merlin
1.0 Pixie Frog - Pixel
2.0 Chinese Fire belly Newts - Fred n' Ed, and Ed n' Fred
1.0 Black Cat - Shorty
0.0.1 Leopard Frog
0.0.4 Tanks waiting on us to decide what is going in them! LOL

At the pet store I work at we let our pacmans burrow and we still sell them at a pretty good clip. I think that there's a bit of an art to making the animal comfortable but still letting customers see it. I'm guessing that the gravel thing is a Petco 'corporate mandate' so that complainnig to the individual store wouldn't do any good.
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Eryx - All the fun of a boa in a convenient pocket size!

I feel ya! Gravel?!
The petsmart I recently visited (see my post below) actually had them on those alfalfa rabbit pellets. And they were bone dry.. grr.
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2.1 Ball pythons: Goblin, Nothing, and Bela
1.0 Boa Constrictor Imperator: Apache
0.1 albino Cranwell's horned frog: Bene
1.0 Tiger salamander: Slasher
1.0 black kittycat, Inky
A bunch of Oscar cichlids, one giant pleco, huge breeding lot of "fancy" (read: deformed) goldfish, and me an' the boyfriend.

Back to PetSmart for crickets (they are the only pet store for 12-15 miles). Those two albino PacMan frogs, still on gravel in the smallest kritter keeper. I told the guy, nicely, that they need dirt. He, very confidently told me that albino ones are aquatic and green ones go on damp dirt with no water at all needed. I, nicely, told him he was wrong, but he told me he wasn't. I just shook my head and repeated that they needed dirt and water, took my crickets, and left. Eeek. I think I will e-mail the corporation. They will probably apologize and give me a free coupon for a frog. Eeek.

the petco where i live keep their frogs pretty good. i mena they have bed a beast wit moss on top for frogs and have god lighting wit fresh water every day. the only problem is thay keep them in too small enclosure.
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1 Baby Whites Treefrog (Faygo)
1 Pacman (Big Mac)
3 Cats (Cindy, Rex, Tabby)
1 Mississippi Map Turtle (Lucky)
4 Fish (Was feeder for turtle but never ate them so now they big and friends wit turtle.)
1 Parakeet (Swifty)

if u r concerned about any shops treatment of their live stock the best thing u can do is boycott them altogether, dont even buy ur pet food there

I recently went to a pet store that was holding a pac man a whites tree frog and green tree frog. all in bout a 5 gallon tank on astroturf. The cage was about 6 inches tall as well. What i did was I ordered a pac man from a pet store and called every day that way as sson as it got in I took it home. That way the pet store doesnt have the chance to kill it.

You still gave them business...Now they will probably just order another frog. It is best to not even buy from stores like that. Boycott them. Supply and demand. You gave them demand. If they have no demand, even if an animal dies, they probably won't buy more.
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Andy Maddox
AIM: thekingofproduct
MSN: Poloboy32486@hotmail.com
Yahoo:surfandskimtx04
Houston Herp Key
The Reptizone

"Some things will never change. They just stand there looking backwards. Half-unconsious from the pain. They may seem rearranged. In the backwater swirling. There is something that'll never change-The Meat Puppets"

where I live you dont really have another option on where to buy.

I went into a Petsmart location in Cheektowaga, NY. They had four horned frogs in some pretty small critter keepers, and the water bowls were way too high for the frogs to get into/out. Three of the frogs were dead, and actually looked mummified frrom being so dehydrated. My boyfriend noticed that one of the frogs was still alive, just barely, and put him into his water bown, but he died anyway. We both angrily confronted a manager who said that they had just gotten the frogs in that morning, which was an obvious lie since they had been dead for quite awhile.
I could literally go on and on for hours about the horrors I have seen in local and distant pet stores. I have not found any real way to impact them, aside from not shopping there, and I called the Better Business Bureau on one extra crappy store nearby. If anyone organizes a movement against bad stores, I'll sure join in.
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2.1 Ball pythons: Goblin, Nothing, and Bela
1.0 Boa Constrictor Imperator: Apache
0.1 albino Cranwell's horned frog: Bene
1.0 Tiger salamander: Slasher
1.0 black kittycat, Inky
A bunch of Oscar cichlids, one giant pleco, huge breeding lot of "fancy" (read: deformed) goldfish, and me an' the boyfriend.

/
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2.1 Ball pythons: Goblin, Nothing, and Bela
1.0 Boa Constrictor Imperator: Apache
0.1 albino Cranwell's horned frog: Bene
1.0 Tiger salamander: Slasher
1.0 black kittycat, Inky
A bunch of Oscar cichlids, one giant pleco, huge breeding lot of "fancy" (read: deformed) goldfish, and me an' the boyfriend.

You know what? I also go into petco for some basic supplies. In their reptile section they actually have a form you must fill out to determine if you are capable of owning some reptiles. The sheet gives you care information. Most of it is correct. For instance for a WTF it tells you to have at least a 20 gallon tank. Now I have heard 25 but for Petco it is close enough. When you walk over to the tank (approx 20 gal.) they have like 15 babies in there? Another popular North East Pet Chain has every frog they sell in like a 50 gallon tank. The bottom is some moss. Some rocks and some water. It has trees and stuff. I am standing there watching a Chubby Frog eat a firebellied toad!!!! So I told the owner and He did nothing. Besides the fact that he knows nothing about reptiles and he is a complete idiot. I am sure reptile sales will sky roket when everyone sees a Chubby Frog dead in the tank. Do yourself a favor. Find someone who cares abou these animals to buy one from. Don't spend your money in some huge superstore where they don't care.

John

find some reputable online breeders and get all your stuff from them. the way i see it its better for an animal to spend one day in the mail than weeks in a petstore being neglected. also i buy my crickets online u can get 1000 for like 10 $.thats 10 times more than u get for 10 $ in the petstore. i have banned 3 petstores in my area. one from the smell ( sheww!)and the others from not knowing jack about what they sell.also, how much is a 10 gallon? like 9.87 at walmart. a critter keeper is like 7 $ why not get the bigger tank and get a lot of them. if i had a dollar for every dead animal i saw in a petstore... i would have enough $ to open my own and do it right. the stored need to learn to do it right or not at all.

Seriously, go ahead and open your own store and see how easy it is. I am the manager of the reptile area at my pet co. I have had 5 years of experiance with herps. With my experiance in working at this store, it is the customers that NEVER listen to my advice and I always end up with dead animals being retured to me because a bearded dragon ate bark, or a pac man frog drowned. People SHOULD listen to pet sotre people, but do their own damned research as well. You can't blame the pet store employees for everything-- especially in a coorporate business.

And I have never seen pac man frogs being housed on gravel anywhere. At my store they have about a 10 gallon tank PER frog. We only have two frogs in the store at a time because of limited space. Pet store enclosures are only TEMPORARY housing for animals until they find their homes. I am very picky about who my animals go to, and I take care of them to the best of my ability. The only time I really see them come up dead is when a customer gets ahold of them without listening to my advice. People should stop telling people to never listen to pet store employees. SOME of us know what we are talking about.