confusion
Fishaholic
I've primarily been using petsmart by my house as my source of fish. It was apparent from the day I started going that they didn't have much of a clue - when I first started, I didn't know what a cycled tank was, and neither did they apparently. I bought some swordtails from them, and every single one died within 3 days from a serious columnaris outbreak.
So last Friday, I had bought 6 black neons from them - they were the only tank in the store that didn't have floaters. I looked at them in the tank and they seemed healthy - swimming well, appeared interested in eating, good coloration, etc.
By today, 2 of them had died. I took them back to the store, and per their policy, I have to bring a water sample. So I do, and the department manager gives it to a new employee and tells her to test the water and come tell her the results. She does. The water is perfect according to my reagent based tests 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, 0 nitrates. They use the strip tests, probably due to cost. Anyhow, the tests come back perfect except their strip tests show that I have about 10ppm nitrates. The dept. manager tells the new employee "his tank isn't fully cycled, once it is, that will be 0". I let it slide, but was saddened because I know these are the people that give advice to dozens of people a day. Also, I made a point to show my 6 year old son the horrible ich breakout in the glassfish tank with the employees in ear shot. Before I left I suggested they might want to take a closer look at their supply chain for those fish.
To interject a question - do places like petsmart do something to the water to make the fish seem healthier than they are, or is the trip home really so stressful that so many of them die? They seem to be able to suppress things like fungus and columnaris really well.
I went to another petsmart by my office on the other side of town, where I had been before - their tanks seemed immaculate, and they have a much better selection of fish. The once the heavily tattooed lady was helping another customer who wanted to but an algae eater for her boyfriends tank. The customer asked about a common pleco, and the saleslady told her that they get to about 10" to 24". The customer said that she thought that was probably too big. So, I walked up and suggested she get some otos, a few tanks over. The saleslady was pretty short with me saying something like "I'm helping her pick out her algae eater, we're good, thanks". So, the sales lady spent the next 2 minutes convincing the customer how cool a 24" pleco is going to look in her boyfriends tank.
So, once she decided to help me, I asked her to get me 4 black neons and 5 rosy tetras. She had a really hard time netting the black neons out, but once she got the massive net out, she was able to get them into the small plastic bucket.
She then takes the bag, opens it up, puts it on a table and pours the water and fish in from about 12" or so - I really couldn't believe it. Basically, the fish were hitting the table as she poured them. They still have nice fish there, though.
So, I went to an actual "local" fish store by me when I was having trouble getting my tank cycled to try to get some gravel from a cycled tank. I went in and asked, and they looked at me strange. I told them I was trying to get my tank cycled and that would help. So, the salesguy says "the bacteria you need don't live in the gravel, they live in the water. if you want to get it set up right, you can buy some of our aquarium water which will have the bateria you need." So, I was suspicions, and he headed off to the back of the store. At the back was a faucet that was labelled "RO freshwater" and another labelled "RO saltwater". They were going to sell me their pristine, bacteria free RO water for &.75/gallon, and that was going to cycle my tank apparently. Their tanks were mostly in bad shape too - typically, you think of a place like that as being a cut above some place like petsmart.
There is another lfs between my office and my house which is absolutely impressive. Their main focus is salt water. They have tube worms and other tube type life forms for over $2000 each. And entire coral displays. They do have some freshwater fish, but they're all higher end like bosami (sp?) rainbows for $16 each, and that was the cheapest thing they had.
I'm thinking about starting to order on-line. Do the on-line places typically have a better reputation than what I'm experiencing as far as diseases, etc?
So last Friday, I had bought 6 black neons from them - they were the only tank in the store that didn't have floaters. I looked at them in the tank and they seemed healthy - swimming well, appeared interested in eating, good coloration, etc.
By today, 2 of them had died. I took them back to the store, and per their policy, I have to bring a water sample. So I do, and the department manager gives it to a new employee and tells her to test the water and come tell her the results. She does. The water is perfect according to my reagent based tests 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, 0 nitrates. They use the strip tests, probably due to cost. Anyhow, the tests come back perfect except their strip tests show that I have about 10ppm nitrates. The dept. manager tells the new employee "his tank isn't fully cycled, once it is, that will be 0". I let it slide, but was saddened because I know these are the people that give advice to dozens of people a day. Also, I made a point to show my 6 year old son the horrible ich breakout in the glassfish tank with the employees in ear shot. Before I left I suggested they might want to take a closer look at their supply chain for those fish.
To interject a question - do places like petsmart do something to the water to make the fish seem healthier than they are, or is the trip home really so stressful that so many of them die? They seem to be able to suppress things like fungus and columnaris really well.
I went to another petsmart by my office on the other side of town, where I had been before - their tanks seemed immaculate, and they have a much better selection of fish. The once the heavily tattooed lady was helping another customer who wanted to but an algae eater for her boyfriends tank. The customer asked about a common pleco, and the saleslady told her that they get to about 10" to 24". The customer said that she thought that was probably too big. So, I walked up and suggested she get some otos, a few tanks over. The saleslady was pretty short with me saying something like "I'm helping her pick out her algae eater, we're good, thanks". So, the sales lady spent the next 2 minutes convincing the customer how cool a 24" pleco is going to look in her boyfriends tank.
So, once she decided to help me, I asked her to get me 4 black neons and 5 rosy tetras. She had a really hard time netting the black neons out, but once she got the massive net out, she was able to get them into the small plastic bucket.
She then takes the bag, opens it up, puts it on a table and pours the water and fish in from about 12" or so - I really couldn't believe it. Basically, the fish were hitting the table as she poured them. They still have nice fish there, though.
So, I went to an actual "local" fish store by me when I was having trouble getting my tank cycled to try to get some gravel from a cycled tank. I went in and asked, and they looked at me strange. I told them I was trying to get my tank cycled and that would help. So, the salesguy says "the bacteria you need don't live in the gravel, they live in the water. if you want to get it set up right, you can buy some of our aquarium water which will have the bateria you need." So, I was suspicions, and he headed off to the back of the store. At the back was a faucet that was labelled "RO freshwater" and another labelled "RO saltwater". They were going to sell me their pristine, bacteria free RO water for &.75/gallon, and that was going to cycle my tank apparently. Their tanks were mostly in bad shape too - typically, you think of a place like that as being a cut above some place like petsmart.
There is another lfs between my office and my house which is absolutely impressive. Their main focus is salt water. They have tube worms and other tube type life forms for over $2000 each. And entire coral displays. They do have some freshwater fish, but they're all higher end like bosami (sp?) rainbows for $16 each, and that was the cheapest thing they had.
I'm thinking about starting to order on-line. Do the on-line places typically have a better reputation than what I'm experiencing as far as diseases, etc?
