Boycott the walmart fish!

[GuppyDude]

i was at walmart the other day and almost threw up. the fish were in awful condition. their fins were wilted and chewed up and ich has taken over 4 of the 8 tanks. even the goldfish that sum kinda crusty eye disease. the betas were not moveing half were dead and looked like they had been that way for a week, plus their blue wtf is with that.

 

[Darcie]

wow thats bad. I am happy to say though our wal mart here in Halifax is pretty good. The fish are always taken care of. There is one woman there who is really good and knows what shes doing. I think shes the only reason though the fish look so good !

 

[abe]

Mine are the same way, which is suprisingly strange since they are usualy decent. The goldfish were gasping at the bottom of their tanks, female bettas had no fins, the mollies looked like they had dropsy, & the rest were generally unhealthy.

I thought I was lucky cause most of the time my local wal*marts have nice & healthy fish, but I don't know now. I don't get how all of a sudden all in my area can go bad like this...

 

[Inchworm]

Hi

This is the summer and the time when bacterial infections can run amok through newly shipped batches of fish.

Can you imagine what it must be like for the fish who are being shipped from the distributor or a central warehouse by truck? It must get very hot in there, and that alone can stress the fish to the point where they become ill.

One of our members, walmartfish, is a fine lady who runs a pet department in one of the stores and she has had problems with the fish in her department. Look at this thread:

http/fish.orbust.net/forums/index.php?sh...=0&#entry283208

And this one:

http/fish.orbust.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=37859

So you see, it's not that the people that run these departments don't care; many of them do. But disease can spread like wildfire among the tanks.

If the pet department in the store you patronize is not up to par, complain to the manager. Or give the person who runs the department the address of this forum. Perhaps we can help, or perhaps walmartfish can help them with her experience. I'm sure that she would if she knew who to talk to.

I do feel so sorry for the fish, and for the people who try to keep their pet departments clean and healthy as well.

 

[Neoman]

My wal-mart fish are half and half. I never buy any fish from it n e ways.

 

[ProtegeRacer]

I would say it is the store and at times it may not be, the store where I am has done a crappy job at fish keeping. The one 25 miles away has done a great job, they even have gravel in the tanks LOL

 

[GuppyDude]

well i think if a place is going to be keeping and selling fish they need to hire an expert that knows wat their doing, at this walmart it look like there were fish dead at the bottom of the tank that had been there for atleaste 2 days. and the betas shouldn't have to swim in blu water.

 

[sadfishowner]

Walmart has one filter for all those tanks. I know that if u see one tank that has sick fish in it, that same water is cycled through all the other tanks putting the same illness in all tanks. If I wanted any new fish I had to go to wal-mart or petsmart, one was as bad as the other. I would lose 4 or 5 of my fish just to get a new one....so I started a q tank for new arrivals they stay in there medicated for a week to 10 days before going into my main tank...now I raise some fish for my friends, if figured if i can't buy healthy fish then i will raise them. Good luck

 

[plysha]

we have two walmarts here in Zanesville ohio, The super wal mart takes care of the fish but not the other walmarts. my mother got me two fancy gold fish from walmarts on my 18th birthday I had got 4 or 5 more from there, and all of them lived till about 4 weeks ago. I now have guppies I got from a friend her brother knows a guy who owns a fish store they were very well taken care of.....

I told the manager at wal marts that all his tanks had white spots and that he should stop selling them because there fish killed all my fish in my tank at home..
the next day i went back and they had a sign up saying "sorry can't sell any fish do to white spots "tanks are being treated 8)

 

[Sharlene1385]

Our walmarts here are usualy bad too, Betas always look dead, not well treated. I saw a beta in with an angel fish, (male beta) and male betas with very small danios. Sadly they have been known to sell painted glass fish and I think thei fruit tetras are painted. All look sick. Though at one of the Boise ones they had a sign on the feeded goldfish "Sorry can't be sold, we are sick". So at least ONE walmart here is treating them right. I tryed to get a job their and I wanted to take care of the fish, but they wouldn't hire me. They must have known I would of had to 'yell' at them for the inhumane treatment of them, same as our lfs here. Not all walmarts are bad, but some of the employees don't seem to know much, even in other departments. Not sure how many times we've asked to find something and they don't even know what we're talking about. Sad that most of the employees are so poorly trained. I know some are good though, some are very nice. Even one man in fish told us to go to petsmart and get better healthier fish from them for less. lol, even he didn't trust the fish there.

 

[wrs]

boycotting them will do nothing. Just buy the good fish and SAVE them. thats what really helps the fish. You could still boycott, but your just one person, and theyre not going to stop selling them just because one person doesnt buy them. And no as many people own fish. Alot of people dont even care about fish because they dont have any. So if you really wanted to save the fish and make walmart write to the president or woners of the stores and tell the about it, and tell them that they are living and didnt do anything wrong to anyone so they should be alowed a chance to live and be nice. And you could also buy them so that you can save them them and doctor them up with the correct meds that they need etc. Does your walmart have a hospitale tank by anychance? i know mine does and if you say that the fish looks bad or sick they take them out and put them in there and treat them. But sooo many lfs are horrible to fish. I have one that NEVER feeds the fish, The fish are all anerxice looking and the goldfish all have gashes and cuts on them. So just dont critize walmart because some of the are really good, there are some lfs that need to be told off as well.

 

[GuppyDude]

im not sure where ur from but most lfs around here are great to the fish. iv never seen a walmart with decent fish but if u say u have then perhaps there are ok walmarts. i think treating fish badly is no better then treating a dog or cat badly.

 

[wrs]

but are the walmart fish at least feed? yeah they are. the ppl. cant help that they die though or get diseases. that just something that happens. and u can yes its mistreat, but you cant help it if u get sick can you? and you cant help it if you die. so its kinda the same thing with fish, but you gotta remember that fish are harder to take care of than cats and dogs.

 

[Nemo99]

The walmart aaroud here is pretty bad. The bettas look like someone needs to kill them to end their misery and suffering. The other fish look bad but after you buy them they look okay for a couple of days. Then they suddenly die after the 48 hour guarantee ends.

 

[Guppy Mama]

I always go to the smaller local fish stores where you can ask when the fish arrived. They have more time and specific knowledge to help you, too. It has just worked better for me, You still have to look out, though. We have a store in my town where it is appalling. Just gross and sad. So no Wal-Mart fishies for me, but at the same time a local fish store isn't a sure solution all the time!