# On a petco note.



## Cara (Apr 27, 2014)

I stopped in at Petco to get a moss ball and a piece of driftwood planted with anubias. In the process I ended up chatting with their aquatics specialist while I was waiting for it to be bagged and priced. I mentioned that it was for my 5 gallon betta tank, at which point the "specialist" told me that 5 gallons is much too much room for a betta and it will cause him to get stressed, I should look into a smaller aquarium. Fred didn't get the memo that 5 gallons is too much room.

He went from this when I bought him:

















To this in my 5 gallon in rather short order. This is a 3 day difference, he just came home on the 29th april. :lol:









Excuse the cloudy water in the second picture, I had just finished rearranging the tank and the water hadn't settled yet.


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## VivianKJean (Aug 20, 2013)

I've noticed (both) of my petcos doing a similar thing. I went there about 3 weeks ago to buy some plants and a spare heater since I had some extra cash and a spare heater is always something good to have on hand. While I was looking around the aquatics section, I noticed a young girl and her mom there looking for their first betta fish. I witnessed as the "aquatics specialist" told the mother that all she needed was a small .5 gallon tank. When the mother asked about water changes the "specialist" said to just "top off" the water when it looked low.
After he walked off and the young girl was looking at the bettas, I approached the mother and told her that he had given her wrong information. I told her i've kept healthy and happy bettas for years. I pointed over to the Aqueon Bowl 2.5 gallon and said that tank would be okay and to do one 50% and one 100% per week. I also pointed to the 5 gallon ones and said those would require less water changes. I also told her to get a heater since the fish is a tropical fish and needs warm water. Also (i had some OO pellets in my hand cause I was planning to pick up extra) I handed her the OO pellets and said these are good food for your fish. She thanked me and went with her daughter to grab the tank and such. 

I also went up to the "specialist" and told him this information too and he basically shrugged me off and said to pay and leave.


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## alyymarie (Oct 17, 2013)

You'd think they would promote the biggest tanks possible for each customer - then you need more stuff to buy for it!
The poor bettas' amazing ability to live in the worst conditions really works against them at these places.


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## Wiggyl (Feb 13, 2014)

I had the same thing at PetCo specifically. They must tell their aquatics people that bettas can't do anything more than 5 gallons. 

I heard a kid ask what tank to get for a betta and the person said anything up to 5 gallons. When the kid walked away I talked to him and his mother a bit and told him my betta loved his 20 gallon and now has friends in that tank. They were astonished!


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## rpadgett37 (Jan 1, 2014)

My local Petco people are funny to me. On occasion I ask questions I already know the answer to just to see what they know. It helps me decide who to deal with, and often where I shop. The amusing part is when I not only get wrong answers, but the answers are delivered in such a manner as to make me out to be the idiot. It takes skill to pull that off 

The one thing I can say about the local Petco is they get in some really beautiful Bettas. Unfortunately, they curl in on themselves after a couple of days from very poor care. There's only one girl there who cares about them. The rest are just like the people you described above. "Oh they're fine. They live in mud puddles." Not a big fan of that myth.

Gorgeous Betta BTW. I am not a fan of Crowntails, but yours has really filled in and perked up nicely. Really nice proportions to him. Digging the color, too.


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## aselvarial (Feb 21, 2014)

wow, they don't do well in 5 gallons? My 3 bettas in the divided 29 gallon must HATE having almost 10 gallons each. I wonder if THEY know that? (and by they, i mean the bettas of course). I don't understand why a petstore would encourage SMALLER tanks. A) they cost less, B) one has to buy less accessories, and C) they are more work!


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## 1RainbowBetta (Feb 4, 2014)

Gee, my betta seems much happier (by this I mean better color, more active, and more interactive with me) since I moved him from his 1 gallon unheated bowl to a heated and filtered 5 gallon tank. Yeah, same experience here. When I went to Petco to get a 5 gallon tank, heater, and filter and said it was for my betta, I was told this was "overkill" for a betta, and all they needed was a little bowl.


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## KFoster (Mar 26, 2014)

I don't have a petco, but same thing at the chain in my area (petvalu), they told me I was nuts when I was putting a betta into a 10 gallon aquarium; what on earth are they going to do with all that room?! Look at this one, he's in a cup! (Ugh) 

I agree they would make more money per fish if they gave the correct information....

My thought is they probably would sell less fish - because the incorrect popular belief about their living conditions makes them desirable to people who don't know any better and just want something pretty on their coffee table... (Put flowers in a vase - they're pretty too...and belong in vases)

Maybe they think if they push the bigger set ups, it would deter people from buying them in the first place? I dunno...

Unfortunate either way.


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## VivianKJean (Aug 20, 2013)

KFoster said:


> I don't have a petco, but same thing at the chain in my area (petvalu), they told me I was nuts when I was putting a betta into a 10 gallon aquarium; what on earth are they going to do with all that room?! Look at this one, he's in a cup! (Ugh)
> 
> I agree they would make more money per fish if they gave the correct information....
> 
> ...


Im almost positive that is why stores push smaller tanks. Sure they would make more money if they told people bettas needed a larger tank, filter and heater but the assumption is that bettas are hassle free pets to own, also that they are suitable for kids who just want a pretty fish pet. Much of their business comes in from uninformed parents coming in, buying a small tank and a fish, and going home to their small children and showing them what they got. 

Also think of it this way, all of us here now that bettas can live for a long time if kept under proper care. However, if they care kept in small tanks then they pass on quicker and the parents need to replace the fish. Its terrible but I think that they stores would rather sell a betta a family every month rather than a betta to a family every year or so.


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## kevinap2 (Apr 3, 2014)

IMHO, the reason they push the smaller tanks is because of scale. Think about it- how many people are inclined to spend $60 outfitting a 5 gallon tank with a heater, filter, substrate, and decorations for a $2.50 fish? They're much more inclined to spend $15 on a .5 gallon tank with a few pebbles and a fake plant. They sell more fish this way, in turn, more tanks as well. They also benefit because the fish move faster and they don't get backlogged taking care of more little cups than they can handle.

It's not right, but it's a business.


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## Blue Fish (Jun 11, 2012)

At my petco, it's just the opposite, they actually know what they're talking about in terms of fish...it's the PetSmart you have to watch out for around here.  Some of them are okay, but there's this one employee who follows me (and everyone else) around and tries to force moss balls and tiny tanks on them...  It was funny at first, then it was just obnoxious, particularly when she got super pushy about the brown, over-priced moss balls. 

Anyway, it's not a chain problem, it's a store problem.


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## VivianKJean (Aug 20, 2013)

I agree that it's a definitely a store to store problem. My dad went into the Petco near my parents house to see look for a few things for me (for some reason both of my petcos are never fully stocked with everything) and the empolyee's there were VERY informative and knew exactly what they were talking about.


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## KFoster (Mar 26, 2014)

There's hope!


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## TheBlur (Apr 16, 2014)

A little hope. My local PetSmart is TERRIBLE about bettas, but the local PetCo is...decent? I went to PetSmart to get my community tank stocked and stupidly mentioned that I had a betta. The guy literally acted like I was committing animal abuse by putting a betta in a 10 gal with 4 cory cats and some platy. He then tried to tell me that my betta would not only kill ALL the fish "because, you know, they're fighting fish. Thats what they do, they kill everything" but that he would also commit suicide because he would attack his reflection in a square glass tank. He told me not to A. get other fish, and B. to not have a 10 gallon glass tank. He pointed me towards a .3 gallon plastic cube.

...

I literally laughed at him and just walked away.
My betta live happily in 3 gallon tanks currently. Waiting for them to grow a little before they go into the community 10 gal.


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## VivianKJean (Aug 20, 2013)

KFoster said:


> There's hope!


Yes there is! My dad knows a little bit about bettas but not about cycling tanks. So when I told my dad to check to see if they had a freshwater master test kit he was so lost. Luckily the employee knew exactly what that was and was able to show him were to find it. My dad mentioned that it was for my bettas and the employee seemed relieved that my bettas were in large tanks with filters and heaters. 

Now we just need to get EVERY petco/petsmart to see this way.


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## rpadgett37 (Jan 1, 2014)

One thing I can say about my local Petco is every Thursday, they get in some really beautiful Bettas. Just came from there and I had to leave behind (tank not quite setup yet) the most beautiful royal blue rose tail. The fish and fins were perfectly proportioned. Just gorgeous.

I was planning to get my boy from aquabid, but since these guys get in some really beautiful butterfly bettas and some decent HMPK's on occasion, I'll be buying locally.


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## Cara (Apr 27, 2014)

I'm highly disappointed. I finally checked out our LFS and their bettas are kept in worse shape than Petco's. One fish was severely bloated and appeared to have dropsy, another had evident body rot, quite a few with fin rot, etc. They also market entirely too small of bowls, don't carry any tanks under 20 gallons and only had four different heaters, all of which were ridiculously priced. Sad sad sad.


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## MiniMango101 (Jul 16, 2014)

My local PetCo is very good to the bettas as it seems because I have not seen one with dirty water or any diseases that I could recognize. It's kind of sad though, that the bettas are only sold because they are beautiful (don't get me wrong- they are). I can safely say this assumption because the male bettas are in the middle, eye level to children and parents alike. However, the females are either at the very bottom or very top. I adopted my royal blue veil tail female from PetCo, and she is very active and she can learn easily (I taught her to follow my finger in a day!)

Walmart, however, is a different story. Their bettas are stacked and piled up in containers. They can die from suffocation and disease, and the ones at the bottom hardly get picked.

Overall, make sure that you go to a store where people know their stuff and bettas are treated properly. Don't feel the need to "rescue" bettas from abusive sellers, as this will encourage them to mass produce and sell bettas in terrible conditions.


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## VivianKJean (Aug 20, 2013)

My petco does a similar thing. They have like a 3 sided display thing where the two sides wrap around the corn and down the isle. The front always has the healthiest (and most expensive bettas, like Elephant Ears, Half-Moons, Dragonscales), while the sides have Veiltails and Crowntails. All of these are male though, occasionally you'll find a female or two mixed in. The females however are kept in a completely seperate rack that is 5 feet away from that display and is behind a pole so no one can really see them. I actually used that rack to hide the EE HMPK i was going to come back for later that day (I went to petco on my way to class and saw him and knew i had to have him so I hid him until after my class so i could go back and get him). Also by the sink where they bag all the fish, they have a shelf that is STACKED with bettas (like in Walmart) and Im pretty sure no one ever sees those fish.


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## givemethatfish (Feb 10, 2014)

The "good" Petco near me actually takes really good care of their bettas, but they also have a weird display arrangement. I know it's just to sell the most expensive ones, but it's sad for the not-fanciest ones. There's one large display on the center of one endcap that holds maybe 25 fish but then the babies, the females, and all the veil tails are on these weird hard to see hidden shelves closer to the ground down the aisles. And they also have the weird shelf that time forgot over by the sink where they seem to just put random fish. I think it might be a holding area where they swap out fish that have been sold because my last 3 bettas have come from that area.


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## CoyDahlia (May 30, 2014)

Has anyone gotten a part-time job at Petco just to try to make sure their fish are cared for? It can't be hard, considering the people they have...

I'm wondering if you could show that encouraging people to get a $60 setup for their fish will get them "hooked" on learning more, and eventually they'll start wanting more plants, more decorations, bigger tanks, etc.


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## VivianKJean (Aug 20, 2013)

When I looked into applying at petco, you weren't allowed to "choose" or say which section of the store you were looking to work in. It just asked if I wanted to work as cashier or on the floor.


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## MiniMango101 (Jul 16, 2014)

Update: (I posted on page 2)

I was visiting PetCo again and I was impressed by an employee. There was a small family and they wanted to buy a Molly. He asked which tank size they had and they had a 1 gallon. He told them o buy a larger tank with a filter and then they could buy a fish. The family asked if they could buy a betta instead and he told them that they need at least 5 gallons with a heater/filter and recommended a tank that was appropriate for them. At least one employee was well informed


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## VivianKJean (Aug 20, 2013)

FINALLY! WE FOUND ONE! (a well informed employee)

usually the employees at petco near me are SO bad. Aqueon makes a .5 gallon "tank" WITH a divider and I heard an employee saying to a women with twins that she could put 2 fish in there.


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## CoyDahlia (May 30, 2014)

VivianKJean said:


> When I looked into applying at petco, you weren't allowed to "choose" or say which section of the store you were looking to work in. It just asked if I wanted to work as cashier or on the floor.


They have cashiers, but they also have "Aquatic Specialist." At least the ones here do.


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## VivianKJean (Aug 20, 2013)

Mine do too. But none of "aquatic specialists" could tell me how they got their job....


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## CoyDahlia (May 30, 2014)

I mean on the website, it's listed as looking for an aquatics specialist. BUT all the stores are looking for someone, so I suspect they don't have them. 

Like this: http://careers.petco.com/job_detail.asp?JobID=4241162


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## VivianKJean (Aug 20, 2013)

oh maybe I was looking at part-time jobs instead of full time. Its listed as a full time job.


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## CoyDahlia (May 30, 2014)

yeah, you'd probably have to discuss working part-time instead of full time with the manager. I was just curious if anyone had done it.


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## Thothgirl (Jul 12, 2013)

At my local Petsmart, I darn near kissed an employee! I was in the store getting a 5.5 for my betta musical chairs because I need to get Fritz and Saki their own tanks. They just weren't jiving with a divided 10. so I grab the 5.5 and went to get Ghost Shrimp for the other betta tanks and Mollies for the 30. The when I asked for 6 mollies the girl helping me stopped cold in her tracks and asked if I had another tank at home because if I didn't I couldn't have the mollies. 

I blinked and told her I had 2 10s and a 30 at home and that the Mollies were going into the 30 for a few months before being upgraded to a 55. She glanced at my freind with me who nodded. then said. "okay."

I told her how happy I was that she did that and she thought I was crazy for thanking her! apparently she only ever gets yelled at. The next day when we had to return a plant I pointed her out to my husband... who went and thanked her. She thinks we are nut jobs, but it was SO nice to be told "No. if you can't take care of them, you can't have them."


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## VivianKJean (Aug 20, 2013)

Thats good though!

I wish other petco/petsmart employees were like that! When i bought my last betta (who had a 3 gallon heated and cycled tank waiting for him home), I also bought a 1.5 gallon kritter keeper to use as a QT tank and a extra heater and the petco employee told me that my tank was TOO BIG for a betta and that I didn't need a heater.


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## BettaStarter24 (Mar 24, 2014)

So I just looked at the betta care sheet from Petco...

"Male Bettas are usually housed in individual small containers and do best in containers of 1L or a quarter of a gallon." Um...LOL...

"for containers under 2 gallons do a WC a week" um...LOL...

http://www.petco.com/assets/caresheets/fish/Betta.pdf


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## VivianKJean (Aug 20, 2013)

I've seen that betta care sheet. They have it posted EVERYWHERE at both of the petcos i frequent.


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## BettaStarter24 (Mar 24, 2014)

VivianKJean said:


> When I looked into applying at petco, you weren't allowed to "choose" or say which section of the store you were looking to work in. It just asked if I wanted to work as cashier or on the floor.


I applied and was turned down when they found out I was a college student. Im going to school to be a vet so it would have been a great job


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## VivianKJean (Aug 20, 2013)

thats so strange since ALL of the petco employees at my location look like/and act like college students.


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## hrutan (Jun 25, 2014)

Some places will automatically turn down college students because they don't want to have to deal with a changing class schedule. It's probably something determined on an individual location basis.


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## LadyRaven (Mar 7, 2014)

This thread makes me glad we don't have petco tor whatever over here. The stores where I shop here are all locally owned and their stock are very well looked after. The closest one which I frequent a lot has some dopey employees, but there was one who was there when a friend of mine was getting her first fish, she told my friend that she was better of buying a bigger tank because it was easier to maintain and her fish would be happier. 
Most of the pet store people here have some great knowledge, its a shame your big chain store (some of them) have such silly employees.


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## Waldobubbles3 (Jul 19, 2014)

My friend got a betta, snail and "tank" from petco. The front was the size of my palm. It was a cube... Maybe a sixth of a gallon tank that she had a snail with. The tanks they sell are aweful


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## nel3 (May 29, 2011)

one LPS (no petco around here) also caters to the uninformed buyers with small tanks and no heaters. I know 1 employee that isn't a fan for a decent size tank nor heater, not sure of the others. he even said that a 5g tank was good for 1-2 goldfish without any equipment ie air pump.


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## aselvarial (Feb 21, 2014)

My petco recently got redone, and all the tiny tanks disappeared. Now the smallest I've seen is a 5 gallon! Which is kinda weird, as I'd think they'd have a few in the 2-3 gallon range, but nope. 5 gallon is the smallest, and that's a kit. Otherwise they start at 10 gallons and go up. I guess they figured to get you to buy a larger tank and then you'd have to get plants, or decor for a bigger tank.


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## ZentheBetta71614 (Jul 17, 2014)

Thothgirl said:


> At my local Petsmart, I darn near kissed an employee! I was in the store getting a 5.5 for my betta musical chairs because I need to get Fritz and Saki their own tanks. They just weren't jiving with a divided 10. so I grab the 5.5 and went to get Ghost Shrimp for the other betta tanks and Mollies for the 30. The when I asked for 6 mollies the girl helping me stopped cold in her tracks and asked if I had another tank at home because if I didn't I couldn't have the mollies.
> 
> I blinked and told her I had 2 10s and a 30 at home and that the Mollies were going into the 30 for a few months before being upgraded to a 55. She glanced at my freind with me who nodded. then said. "okay."
> 
> I told her how happy I was that she did that and she thought I was crazy for thanking her! apparently she only ever gets yelled at. The next day when we had to return a plant I pointed her out to my husband... who went and thanked her. She thinks we are nut jobs, but it was SO nice to be told "No. if you can't take care of them, you can't have them."




This is freakin awesome! When my husband and I go into the store he gets so annoyed with employees who do not know their stuff. I have seen him school some of these young kids who get these jobs and have no idea what they are talking about. He always tries to find the one old retired guy who works there because they enjoy keeping tanks and fish. You know the one's who always know WAY too much and are very over qualified for the job but they work their for the discount for their own tanks?! Those are the guys my husband always seems to find and he knows their names and talks with them every time. So funny to me. Fish people, know fish people!


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## SkyDye (Jun 29, 2014)

It's the complete opposite for me. My petco actually does care for their bettas, they have a nice shelf so all of the bettas can be seen individually, no stacked on top or behind each other, my petsmart however, ughhhhh don't get me started I can rant all day about it. The bettas are stacked on top of each other with some behind, they are not fed, rotting dead fish are left on the shelf, it's just terrible :-/


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## BettaStarter24 (Mar 24, 2014)

Mine can be ok at times but most times I'm just sickened. I've seen at least two dead every time I've been there, otherwise half are very sick and only about 6 or 7 actually look like they'll make it. One of the reasons I now have 3 instead of the 1 I was ok with three weeks ago


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## ZentheBetta71614 (Jul 17, 2014)

Bettastarter24 I know. I look at them every time i go in now. It is so sad =(


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