Death at Walmart

[Army_JAG]

If you think your average LFS has fewer losses, you'd be mistaken. Walmart's crime is not removing the dead quickly enough.
If you honestly knew what the mortality rate was in the industry, you'd likely stop keeping fish. For every one that makes it alive in your tank, hundreds die.

This is a good point, I am well aware of the use of dynamite and cyanide to collect fish. I will toot my own horn for a second and say that the only fish I have are 2 tank bred OC Clowns, but my coral came from the ocean and I desperately want to keep a Dragonette in the future. I have heard horror stories of Neon Tetras being shipped from Columbia in used oil drums and they only expect a 33% survival rate. My counter argument would be that it is not the LFS that has the losses but the wholesalers who import the animals. On top of that I believe a LFS cares more about a loss, or at least would do more to prevent a loss. I am going to second that if walmart employed a single, dedicated person who knew how to care for an aquatic ecosystem this would not be an issue.

 

[Maivortex]

petco is no better.

 

[Army_JAG]

petco is no better.

Now this is a true tragedy because they are a pet store, you think they could employ at least a regional marine biologist to check up on their tanks. Not that it would matter, when the livestock come in with cyanide poisoning there is only so much you can do

 

[Caesra]

hehe...I think we just touched on this in another post. Business are in the business to make money. Simple...very rarely does an owner, LFS or big company care one bit about the actual product. Profit - Loss = Bottom line. If it makes money, they win. I am quite sure if they were allowed to sell slaves, they would.

For me their isn't much difference between a fish and a person. Both are lives to be respected and appreciated. I suppose that is what gets me into my little 'saving' syndromes where I buy something because I know it will be dead if it stays where it is much longer.

 

[fauxjargon]

If you think your average LFS has fewer losses, you'd be mistaken. Walmart's crime is not removing the dead quickly enough.

If you honestly knew what the mortality rate was in the industry, you'd likely stop keeping fish. For every one that makes it alive in your tank, hundreds die.

I agree with this. Although hundreds of dead fish per live fish probably only happens with dynamite/cyanide caught reef fish.

Tank raised SW and FW as well as wild caught FW has more like 50-75% mortality. Some hardy species of tank raised FW fish probably have mortalities in the low 30s or high 20s. The deaths in shipping that we don't see at the LFS cannot be more than 50% for most fish in order for the transshipper to stay in business. And then we lose 5-20% on top of that.

 

[Drewbaby]

I work for a LFS. It's been owned by the same couple for 20+ years. We do care alot about fish loss and I myself have actually turned away a sale or two just to prevent the death of a fish. Granted I know that customer will just go to PetCo or one of the other chain stores and kill some other fish at some other time, but I feel as if I'm aiding in the resistance.

If we start getting bad fish from suppliers we complain immediately and being a client to these wholesalers for 20+ years the my boss has some leverage. He has changed cichlid suppliers a few times and we now deal with 3 salt water suppliers. If ones quality starts to drop we stop dealing with them for a few weeks then try again with a few fish. If it hasn't improved we complain and quit doing business for a while. The other added benefit is the owner drives 2 hours to hand pick our salt fish and coral. So in most cases the livestock is healthy. Sometimes they are not displayed in the proper lighting or tank and it makes it hard to judge a healthy fish from a stressed fished, but he usually does well. I'd we ever have a problem we test our water and even if things check out ok we do water changes and monitor the tanks in question thoroughly. Including freshwater.

We are also very quick to turn away freshwater fish if they don't look well. Since all of our freshwater come from one supplier with the exception of cichlids, goldfish and koi the company hand delivers our order so we can refuse ill, wounded or even slightly overstressed fish where they can then take them back to their facility and treat as needed. It works out fairly well.

Out of ~ 150 tanks (you would think I knew the exact number I'm the one that cleans them) we lose maybe 1-2 fish a day. Mostly freshwater with an average of 20 fish in each tank. We may lose 1 salt water fish every few weeks if that. The ones we lose are fish commonly caught with cyanide or explosives. We try to use suppliers that only deal with safely collected or when possible tank bred fish, but it's not always possible.

 

[chrisv]

i was amazed how much better fish survived when i took the bags directly home from the wholesaler than when they were kept at the fish store i worked at.

Putting fish in a centrally filtered LFS tank is like sleeping with a cheerleading squad. every disease that has ever passed through the system lives in the system. Fish that are stressed from shipping go in and many get sick and die there. it IS the fault of the LFS. many also die at the wholesaler and as the result of the collection practices used to catch them...but as has been posted...you would be amazed by how high the often preventable death rate is at your LFS. This hobby is NOT eco friendly in any respect.

 

[Gandolfe]

it's not just walmart, I've seen that at petsmart too... there used to be an Actual pet store by my house(closed now Thank God!) that had dead fish in almost every tank, the place reeked of urine and reptiles, there was even a cage that had about 10 parakeets in it with 4 dead ones on the floor of it..needless to say i left right away and when i got home reported them to the local S.P.C.A., Never found out if they investigated it or not!They actually had a sign on the front window" if pet urine smell bothers you don't enter"

 

[BBraker]

I do not think that the mortality rate of fish at a typical sole propietor LFS is anything like that is seen by the chain stores. It isn't just because the regular LFS pull their dead fish sooner. Here are the reasons:

1) The chain stores demand the lowest price for fish, so they get the smallest sizes. Smaller fish (e.g. neon tetras) have incredably high mortality rates when compared to larger fish of the same species. These small fish just do not stand up to the rigors of the supply chain well.

2) As pointed out - the system tanks they almost all use, in conjunction with no effective fish treatments being used means that every fish that enters that system has "slept with" every other fish. In addition, there is no way to adjust water parameters to match the other fish, so mollies don't get any salt in their water, etc.

3) The chain stores do not know how to match up fish - you commonly see African cichlids in the same tank with platies, and other incompatibilities that a regular pet store would know to avoid.

4) Chain stores order a higher percentage of "painted fish", balloon body fish, etc., all of which are a bit more delicate than their normal counterparts.

5) Meijers stores (not sure about Walmart) offer 7 day unconditional guarantees. They do this not be selling good quality fish, or teaching their customers properly, but by holding their wholesaler responsible for ALL losses. They have no worries - they just tally up every fish that dies, and their wholesaler has to replace all of them. The result is that many wholesalers will not accept these types of accounts, and those that do just try to make a dime by selling the cheapest fish they can to them. If you are a wholesaler with 500 painted dwarf gouramis dropping due to the virus they get - you could either sit on them and watch them all die. or send them to a Meijers store and hope to make a couple of bucks if some happen to live.

Bill

 

[tmgrash]

I work for a LFS. It's been owned by the same couple for 20+ years. We do care alot about fish loss and I myself have actually turned away a sale or two just to prevent the death of a fish. Granted I know that customer will just go to PetCo or one of the other chain stores and kill some other fish at some other time, but I feel as if I'm aiding in the resistance.

If we start getting bad fish from suppliers we complain immediately and being a client to these wholesalers for 20+ years the my boss has some leverage. He has changed cichlid suppliers a few times and we now deal with 3 salt water suppliers. If ones quality starts to drop we stop dealing with them for a few weeks then try again with a few fish. If it hasn't improved we complain and quit doing business for a while. The other added benefit is the owner drives 2 hours to hand pick our salt fish and coral. So in most cases the livestock is healthy. Sometimes they are not displayed in the proper lighting or tank and it makes it hard to judge a healthy fish from a stressed fished, but he usually does well. I'd we ever have a problem we test our water and even if things check out ok we do water changes and monitor the tanks in question thoroughly. Including freshwater.

We are also very quick to turn away freshwater fish if they don't look well. Since all of our freshwater come from one supplier with the exception of cichlids, goldfish and koi the company hand delivers our order so we can refuse ill, wounded or even slightly overstressed fish where they can then take them back to their facility and treat as needed. It works out fairly well.

Out of ~ 150 tanks (you would think I knew the exact number I'm the one that cleans them) we lose maybe 1-2 fish a day. Mostly freshwater with an average of 20 fish in each tank. We may lose 1 salt water fish every few weeks if that. The ones we lose are fish commonly caught with cyanide or explosives. We try to use suppliers that only deal with safely collected or when possible tank bred fish, but it's not always possible.

 

[zoolan70]

I agree with this. Although hundreds of dead fish per live fish probably only happens with dynamite/cyanide caught reef fish.

Tank raised SW and FW as well as wild caught FW has more like 50-75% mortality. Some hardy species of tank raised FW fish probably have mortalities in the low 30s or high 20s. The deaths in shipping that we don't see at the LFS cannot be more than 50% for most fish in order for the transshipper to stay in business. And then we lose 5-20% on top of that.

You are correct, but I would suggest you are a little high. I have worked at a couple of LFS over the years, and the loss rates were somewhere between 25-30%, depending on species, for freshwater, perhaps a bit higher for marine fish and inverts. I would think the wholesale loss rates were similar as well, so overall loss is probably 40-45%. The vast majority of the loss occurs before it ever hits the display tanks in the stores, however. This incident tells me something went wrong in their system...or they completely screwed up the acclimation of new stock.

 

[Tampico96]

Somebody else posted about the employees. They are pread very thin. I rarely ever see any employees in the Pet section. Its also in the back corner of the store.

This could have been anything. Overfed..... Some kid of a customer could have fed the fish.

I think walmart needs to just get out of the livestock trade. I cant ever remember seeing anybody buy fish there. I'm sure that Walmart deducts all of the fish deaths from their supplier. They have "Buying Power" what that means is Walmart can tell suppliers what they will pay. If walmart had to clearance it they pass pass the loss onto their supplier.

But this thread is like so many others. This hobby is far from eco friendly.

The O.P has since been "moved on"

 

[sponger0]

comparing about 30 dead fish to over a million murdered people is a little insensitive. just saying.

Actually there is a huge difference. We put their lives in human kinds hands. If they werent in the pet store, they would be in the wild and most likely not dead and a lot happier.

 

[disc1]

Just as a counterpoint, since not all things are in and of themselves bad, including wal-mart.

When I was but a wee lad, 5 or 6 years old, when mom would take me to wal-mart, she could drop me off in front of the fish tanks and know that I would stay right there, completely fascinated, until she came back for me. I have always loved fish, and water.

Well, at the time there was this nice lady who worked the pet department at our local wal-mart. (Try to find someone dedicated to that dept. nowadays) But back then they had a pet dept manager. Seeing my fascination, and given that I was a quiet and troubled child, she invited me and my mom to her house to see her fish tanks. Gotta love the small town. She was an aquarium NUT. When we got to her house, I saw the most amazing thing I had ever seen. A 120ga aquarium with 2 BIG oscars. Well I was hooked.

I talked mom into a 10 gallon gold fish aquarium and set out to start keeping fish. I was maybe 7 years old by then. The nice lady that ran the pet department, man I wish I could remember her name but 30 years have not been kind to my memory, wasn't there when we came to get it.

Mom bought me two goldfish, which promptly died an hour after being dumped into the tank. I was crushed, so we went back to wal-mart. The pet dept manager lady sat me down and talked to me for what seemed like an eternity. She explained the best she could (and I was already quite advanced even then, my career in the sciences was an easy prediction) the nature of the nitrogen cycle, and acclimation, and temperature, and all the things I needed to do to make my fish happy.

Over the course of the next few years I built what is still my favorite aquarium ever. 10ga with an angel, a goldfish, a couple of swords, and a couple of tetras. Every few weeks we would go to wal-mart and she would ask how things were and never failed to teach me something new. I learned a lot about keeping pets in general, but fish in particular.

Fast forward 30 years and here I am with a reef tank. Her advise is still with me, all these years later. I credit this one woman almost entirely with giving me the ability to enjoy and love this hobby. She taught me that it is more than just putting fish and water into a glass box. The head start I recieved there has been the key to my success both with cichlids and now with reefs.

All this from Wal-Mart. I wouldn't be here without them.

 

[smbrach]

disc1, thank you for sharing that nice story. Those pet employees are definitely few and far between, especially in a big chain store. It's nice to hear of a great experience.

 

[hirez]

1, I have seen worse...
FAR worse...

2 its freshwater gurami nothing excotic, or extinct, BUT not easy to keep.

3, if this much care would go into other discussions, perhaps we would not need to go to war...

Simply wrong focus, this happens.

 

[KafudaFish]

Actually there is a huge difference. We put their lives in human kinds hands. If they werent in the pet store, they would be in the wild and most likely not dead and a lot happier.

How do you determine this?

 

[curlykid]

Disc, that story touched my heart. Amazing that she knew so much, and helped you know so much.

 

[tmgrash]

Somebody else posted about the employees. They are pread very thin. I rarely ever see any employees in the Pet section. Its also in the back corner of the store.

This could have been anything. Overfed..... Some kid of a customer could have fed the fish.

I think walmart needs to just get out of the livestock trade. I cant ever remember seeing anybody buy fish there. I'm sure that Walmart deducts all of the fish deaths from their supplier. They have "Buying Power" what that means is Walmart can tell suppliers what they will pay. If walmart had to clearance it they pass pass the loss onto their supplier.

But this thread is like so many others. This hobby is far from eco friendly.

The O.P has since been "moved on"

Actually, walmart eats the loss

 

[jinks]

Would be interesting to see mortality rates of a fish in our hobby vs a wild fish with predators and what not. Not that it makes killing them okay, but i bet its not far off.