Thoughts on buying from Petco?

[RunBikeSwim]

I prefer WYSIWYG at a local fish store (Petco or independent) over any mail order. If you take your time, observe, and choose wisely, you can find healthy fishes, corals, and inverts at Petco for a good price (especially during sales).

At my local Petco (and I'm assuming others are the same), I can put in a request to order a fish not in stock with the aquatic salesperson. No guarantee, but they check with their distributor and give me a call once they are able to order (about 1 week wait).

 

[scooter31707]

Yes, I brought a couple of fish from Petco, a Chevron tang and a Yellow Tang. Both had ich. I picked an argument on purpose with the manager, stating "how can you sell fish for the original price?" So needless to say, I got the Chevron for 79.99 and the Yellow tang for 19.99. I got them home and ran them through a series of quarantine procedures. Did TTM twice, treated with Prazi-Pro, did Formalin baths, 2 rounds of CP. After all of that 12 weeks of observation, as I usually do 8 weeks.

 

[sdbc]

As most people said, it depends on the store. The couple close by where I live are good, although my LFS is almost always cheaper. The one thing I won't buy there is coral. The frags always look a little rough and overpriced and they won't do trades.

 

[WatDatThing]

At the end of the day, if you QT all your fish then it doesn't matter if you buy it from Petco or lfs. Chances are the fish at petco, lfs and online retailers come from the same wholesaler. If I can save money on the fish and shipping, I can buy a nice frag or 2.

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[ncaldwell]

I don't like buying from petco regularly because my wife managed a petco locally and she always came home sad for the treatment of the animals. Their basic husbandry was to sell the fish before they could die in a week or 2. She was always bringing home fish that were on deaths door because they aren't allowed to treat saltwater with any medication. I don't personally like supporting a place with that type of business plan. They had many rules and regulations for reptiles and mammals but fish weren't important. Pretty much everything will die if not sold within 2 weeks

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[hart24601]

You can't really make an accurate generalization about a place like petco with 1300 locations. Of course not many sell saltwater, but that is still a lot of stores.

Honestly despite the metro area here having around 650,000 we do not have any good LFS. I visit each one at least once ever two weeks and the quality of livestock at Petco often times exceeds the LFS (especially inverts for some reason).

Better off buying online? Sure. But shipping on small orders can be expensive and some like to see the stock. I wanted a single trocus snail and one tux urchin for a small system. Guess what, no LFS had either of those, but Petco did. Under 10 bucks and I was done and they are alive and well 3 weeks later.

 

[Jon0807]

I've been to 3 locations that sold saltwater life and all 3 didn't look good. Neither did the corals/anemones Even in a newer location. Personally, I bought 4 snails, and due to me not quarantining them, my 2 clowns came down with ich and one of them lost their tail fin. Luckily I was able to save them and they are both doing fine, even the tailless one. If you do buy from them, as others have said, QUARANTINE! Their fresh water fish seem to be fine, personally I'd only buy equipment from them and who doesn't love the $1/gallon tank sales!