Silly advice from the lfs

[dwarfgourami]

Bristlenose mottled colouration was due to inbreeding because they'd got it from a local hobbyist
(it was, of course, normal stress colouration).

It is good that the fish in this tank are eating their dead tankmates because that's natural behaviour.

 

[kubora666]

I here Pets At Home mentioned a lot. It sounds like they are really bad. They actually sound comparable to the bigger LFS stores we have in the states like Pet Co and Petsmart. They have reasonable prices on supplies but you wouldn't want to get advice there.

Now where i live in addition to the big stores like Pet Co and Petsmart we have at least five small mom and pop LFS's with people who have been in this hobby for a long time, some 20-30 years or more. Those are the places i like to go.

Petsmart is pets at home. the one in my town changed the name about 6 years ago. i have no idea why. like asda and wal*mart

 

[Essjay]

We used to have a petsmart near here abot 8 or 10 years ago, then it was taken over by pets at home, who then closed it as they already had an existing shop nearby. The quality of fish was pretty much the same in both! I don't know if the petsmart was the same company as the US one but the descriptions on here sound very similar.
Here's a link as to the timing -
http/www.ukbusinesspark.co.uk/petsmart.htm

 

[divisible by zero]

"where did you get that earing" is about the craziest thing i've heard, but i think she was flirting with me.
although the same girl told me that they have been told, and tell all the customers that all of the cichlids they carry are mixable, other than the Oscars. They did all seem to be doing fine mixed, and i'm no cichlid expert yet. but she also showed me some eggs that a female Ahli(i think) had layed and that she could give me the fish when my tank was ready because they don't sell the females.

whenever i ask for advice on fish, i also try to ask them what type of fish they have at home to get an idea of their knowledge.

 

[ShoC]

just today I was at Pets at home (dont know alot about plants but I think I knew what plant I was looking at but any how here it is short but sweet)


Me " Excuse me I would like to buy some plants please"
her " how can I help"
me " Is this a Java Fern"
her " this plants name?"
me " Yes"
her " I don't Know all I know is that its green and it grows"


Says alot..

 

[littlest]

Pets at Home (again)

I was looking to buy treatment for lice (argulus) but couldn't find any so I asked.
The bloke came over and looked at the various treatments for a long time then presented me with a bottle of Interpet Anti-Internal Bacteria and said:
"This one deals with lice"
me: but it says anti-internal bacteria
him: yes
me: but I have external parasites
him: yes
me: so how would this work?
him: it probably wouldn;t
me: so why try and sell it to me?
him: because we don't have anything that that treats lice and we're told we should always sell customers something
me: even if it's useless?
him: yeah.

in the same store I overheard a member of staff tell a customer she could keep 4 fancy goldfish in a 35 L tank, or 6 common goldfish, because commons are hardier.

Heard a member of staff tell someone you couldn't keep male bettas together, but you should keep them with females as they feel safer that way.

and their website even says that you can keep a goldfish in a bowl, as long as you only keep one.

Oh, and a friend I had pointed out a goldfish with very obvious ich and was told it wasn't a disease, it was a new breed of spotty goldfish.

 

[Tobigara]

got another one from Petco. the guy helping me asked if i have marine. when i told him no he went on to brag about his 490 gal reef tank. then he told me about all the trouble that marine tanks can be. when i asked what the main problem he's had, he told me that every marine tank crashes at least 6-7 times before it's stable. crashes as in wiped, everything dead when you wake up in the morning.

you'd think someone that is willing to spend hundreds of dollars on that big of a tank would learn at least a little bit about cycling.

oh...then he tried to give my advice for my tanks. i had stopped listening by that point so i don't have any more to tell.

 

[-Ian-]

I have also pointed out that fish were dead and they assure me that they were sleeping

For some reason when I read this I though of:

 

[arvlyn]

This afternoon at PetsMart...

After the guy in the fish department asked if he could help us find anything and I told him no, asked what size tank I had. I replied "I have 4 set up right now - a 37 gallon , a 29, a 5 and a 1." He said "How many gallons do those hold?" HUH? So I said "37, 29, 5 and 1". Geez.

I saw some customers ask him for his opinions of the various Ich medications. The fish dude says "Oh Ich, that's always fatal, I'm sorry......" Then I stepped in and said "Only if it's left untreated or not treated properly..." and went on to tell them how I'd just successfully treated it with Kordon's Rid-Ich+ and daily water changes, on and on. They walked away with the Rid-Ick+.

I was looking at the male guppies and trying to remember how many males and females I already had. Fish dude says, "It's good to figure that out first, you need to keep the EXACT same number of males and females." I just looked at him silently for a second or two and then said "No, you need a minimum of 2 females to each male, but 3 is best." He looked at me like I was green.

My husband then asked him what size tanks he has and what kind of fish does he keep. Fish dude said, with much authority, "I don't have any, but my brother has a 30 gal. at his house." Oh so is that all that PetsMart takes as experience?!?!

He then asked me to explain again how many male guppies you need per female..."It's 3 males for each female, right?" I set him straight and left the department.

Gawd!!!

 

[fatfishman]

I was told that cycling was completely unneccessary and that it was just a common myth. And that neon tetras were hardy fish and could go in my tank the day i filled it up.

 

[Denk15]

yea pets at home sucks for advice.......they just employ students with no knowledge.

my friend got a job there....and has never owned any pets.......heres some of the convo's ive had with him!


*while shopping at another lfs to get myself a new fish*

my friend - "why dont you get these fish"
Me - "because it isnt a community fish"
My friend "whats a community fish"

hmmmmmmm after working with tropical fish for over 3 months you would think he would know what community fish are lol

*while telling stories about our experiences at work*

Me - "yea im lovin the new job, dont have to deal with customers"
My Friend - "tell me about it, they always come in asking questions bothering me"
Me - "you just dont like it because you havnt got a clue what your talking about"
My friend - "yea, most of the time i just make up the answer, they always ask me weather the fish is a mid swimmer or a bottom swimming fish, so i just look over at the fish and see where he is swimming at the time and tell them that *laughs*"


needless to say i have never brought anything from pets at home lol everytime i go in there, there is atleast 3-4 dead fish per tank

oh my friend also told me they have to do a dead fish count every hour.......every hour how many fish do they have die per hour???

 

[Mr._Fishy]

I live in a smaller city with only one pet shop within 20 mi. Petsmart. Since my mom doesn't always go to denver that often, i usually have to go to petsmart. Needless to say, i have gotten some strange advice from there. One is that if i put some feeder fish into a tank with an outbreak of something, they will eat the bad bacteria that is causing the disease . Another is that neon tetras would be the perfect and only tank mate for a full grown bgk. I was also told that a 6 inch bgk would get eaten by a 4 in silver dollar. I was also told that i could never keep a spiny eel in sand because the sand would scratch his skin. Gravel, he said, would be the best. They have also tried to tell me to put a jd, 4 tinfoil barbs, a common pleco, and an oscar in a 40g. And the same person told me that my uncle was way overstocked and the "worst fish keeper she had ever heard of" (yes, these are the exact words) because of his 100g with a severum.

 

[modaz]

yea pets at home sucks for advice.......they just employ students with no knowledge.

my friend got a job there....and has never owned any pets.......heres some of the convo's ive had with him!


*while shopping at another lfs to get myself a new fish*

my friend - "why dont you get these fish"
Me - "because it isnt a community fish"
My friend "whats a community fish"

hmmmmmmm after working with tropical fish for over 3 months you would think he would know what community fish are lol

*while telling stories about our experiences at work*

Me - "yea im lovin the new job, dont have to deal with customers"
My Friend - "tell me about it, they always come in asking questions bothering me"
Me - "you just dont like it because you havnt got a clue what your talking about"
My friend - "yea, most of the time i just make up the answer, they always ask me weather the fish is a mid swimmer or a bottom swimming fish, so i just look over at the fish and see where he is swimming at the time and tell them that *laughs*"


needless to say i have never brought anything from pets at home lol everytime i go in there, there is atleast 3-4 dead fish per tank

oh my friend also told me they have to do a dead fish count every hour.......every hour how many fish do they have die per hour???

and count every hour, like they are gunna make a massive loss on consolidated imports anyway

 

[modaz]

the only thing if every experienced at pets @home is when i purchased 1 male and a female betta at the same time, obvious Q was " your not gunna put them into the same tank together are you?" my reply was "NO, gunna put the male in first" he freaked and started to rant at me about how irresposible i was putting them in together, i then replied " aint you ever heard about spawning and conditioning?" he then looked at me blankly and said "spawning, what?" bless him he was half way there but just misunderstood my sense of humour.

 

[kribensis12]

I was at petsmart and i said i would like to get a mollie( female), so she asked me about all the things i had in my tank( which is a first), so then i tell her that i have 1 male and 2 female dalmation mollies. SHe looks at me like i am stupid, and says that mollies are a egg layng cichlid that need a 55 gallon tank with alot of filtration and a temp of 100 degree's. She said that you cannot keep 2 of the same fish becasue they will beat eachother up and lay eggs inside of eachother. So then i point out that they keep like 50 in one tank and they are laying eggs inside of eachother( i was almost bursting with laughter),she said taht is becasue i shook the bag up real well before i put them in, and i i catch them everymorning and take them outta of the water for 30 seconds so they dont fight. Dont you think she was retarted. Also, half the mollies were dead so i left the room.