Ugh Petsmart Plants

[Ficious]

so its hard enough for me to spend my money on my aquariums...ive recently wasted about 20 bucks in fish and plants at petsmart. first off i bought 2 plants they said were aquatic...come to find out theyre NOT. i then buy 4 guppies...they all died overnight! they were very sick and injured (my fault for not looking over them). i managed to find a petsmart that has the nice water display with their plants...so i buy two of these mondo grass plants...THEYRE NOT AQUATIC!!!!!! id love to go back and just show them what i think...i dont even wana go into their store anymore. $*#% them!

 

[dpcamp]

so its hard enough for me to spend my money on my aquariums...ive recently wasted about 20 bucks in fish and plants at petsmart. first off i bought 2 plants they said were aquatic...come to find out theyre NOT. i then buy 4 guppies...they all died overnight! they were very sick and injured (my fault for not looking over them). i managed to find a petsmart that has the nice water display with their plants...so i buy two of these mondo grass plants...THEYRE NOT AQUATIC!!!!!! id love to go back and just show them what i think...i dont even wana go into their store anymore. $*#% them!

yeah tell me about it. their plants suck! the guppies, why don't you just take back and get new ones? they have a 14 day return policy. I'd also bring the water in to get check, fish dying overnight isn't necessarily their fault. You could have bad water. But i feel you, i've had many fish die within days from petsmart.

 

[Queen Bee]

so its hard enough for me to spend my money on my aquariums...ive recently wasted about 20 bucks in fish and plants at petsmart. first off i bought 2 plants they said were aquatic...come to find out theyre NOT. i then buy 4 guppies...they all died overnight! they were very sick and injured (my fault for not looking over them). i managed to find a petsmart that has the nice water display with their plants...so i buy two of these mondo grass plants...THEYRE NOT AQUATIC!!!!!! id love to go back and just show them what i think...i dont even wana go into their store anymore. $*#% them!

Thanks for that little tidbit of info. I was just getting ready to head there myself to get some plants. Saved me some $ which I really don't have enough to throw away like that. Thanks again!

 

[Ficious]

so its hard enough for me to spend my money on my aquariums...ive recently wasted about 20 bucks in fish and plants at petsmart. first off i bought 2 plants they said were aquatic...come to find out theyre NOT. i then buy 4 guppies...they all died overnight! they were very sick and injured (my fault for not looking over them). i managed to find a petsmart that has the nice water display with their plants...so i buy two of these mondo grass plants...THEYRE NOT AQUATIC!!!!!! id love to go back and just show them what i think...i dont even wana go into their store anymore. $*#% them!

yeah tell me about it. their plants suck! the guppies, why don't you just take back and get new ones? they have a 14 day return policy. I'd also bring the water in to get check, fish dying overnight isn't necessarily their fault. You could have bad water. But i feel you, i've had many fish die within days from petsmart.

well i thought about returning them...i didnt know if i had to bring the bodies in? lol id feel stupid doing that if i didnt have to. oh well! im pretty sure they were sick...the male guppy looked like a runt, very small and ugly. the females seemed to be spreading a fin fungas? i just said screw it and eventualy flushed their half wiggling bodies

 

[dpcamp]

so its hard enough for me to spend my money on my aquariums...ive recently wasted about 20 bucks in fish and plants at petsmart. first off i bought 2 plants they said were aquatic...come to find out theyre NOT. i then buy 4 guppies...they all died overnight! they were very sick and injured (my fault for not looking over them). i managed to find a petsmart that has the nice water display with their plants...so i buy two of these mondo grass plants...THEYRE NOT AQUATIC!!!!!! id love to go back and just show them what i think...i dont even wana go into their store anymore. $*#% them!

yeah tell me about it. their plants suck! the guppies, why don't you just take back and get new ones? they have a 14 day return policy. I'd also bring the water in to get check, fish dying overnight isn't necessarily their fault. You could have bad water. But i feel you, i've had many fish die within days from petsmart.

well i thought about returning them...i didnt know if i had to bring the bodies in? lol id feel stupid doing that if i didnt have to. oh well! im pretty sure they were sick...the male guppy looked like a runt, very small and ugly. the females seemed to be spreading a fin fungas? i just said screw it and eventualy flushed their half wiggling bodies

yeah next time (if there is a next time) throw them in a plastic bag (if it's over night throw them in the freezer until you get a chance to head down there) and just show them the fish and the receipt and they either refund your money or let you get more fish. Thats usually how most places with 14 day guarantee's work.

If been wanting to try out liveaquaria.com to buy fish/plants they're prices arent too steep, they have a good selection and they have a 14 day guarantee on both plants and animals, but i've been weary about buying live product on the internet, but with the selection (especially plants) in my area i'm going to have to bite the bullet and buy online.

 

[Tsi_User]

The non-aquatic plants always gets to me, if you want a good time TRY to explain to them that they're non-aquatic..

 

[lljdma06]

To be honest, some of my best plant finds were in a PetsMart. The key is to know the species that you are looking for. You can't just walk into those types of stores and randomnly select plants that please you, and you certainly cannot rely on the workers to help you. They are clueless. You need to research what is appropriate for you tank and what is truely aquatic. My lobelia cardinalis is from PetSupermarket, another chain store, as are my Amazon swords. Here is a list of the plants that I have obtained from Petsmart.

Lobelia cardinalis
Cryptocoryne wendtii
C. lutea
C. lucens
Marsilea hirsuta
Hemianthus micranthemoides
Alternantera reineckii
Bacopa caroliniana
Egeria densa
Cambomba species
Java fern
Water sprite (Ceratopteris thalictroides)

and the kicker...

Hemianthus callictrichoides at $4 a pot. Now, that isn't cheaper than online prices, but I didn't have to pay for overnight shipping, which would make it about the same.

So, you can find a lot of things there, if you know what you're looking for. All of the above are aquatic plants.

I will say, however, that in a new Petsmart, I saw a disturbing trend, they no longer have the aquarium that houses the plants. They now sell mostly non-aquatics in little tubes. This is disappointing as they are blatantly calling them aquarium plants. I spoke to the manager about this when the store first opened, but I was ignored. I only hope that the older Petsmarts do not follow suit. At the hands of a well-maintained store, the true aquatics can be a bargain.

The non-aquatic plants always gets to me, if you want a good time TRY to explain to them that they're non-aquatic..

Oh, I just show them pictures of my houseplants on my cell. When they see that they are the same species, they usually shut up pretty quick. In fact, most of them are outdoor plants in my neck of the woods. Still does't stop them from selling them.

 

[Ficious]

you all had a lot to say about this topic..appreciate your comments and advice! ill do more research before walking in places to buy animals. im still young and realizing money isnt free anymore

 

[Wolfenrook]

I tend to avoid pet store chains like PetSmart and Pets@Home (most PetSmarts became P@H anyway over here) to be honest these days. In my early days in the hobby I had nothing but bad experiences with them, with fish dying whilst they were still in the bag (and yeah they went back for refund), aggressive fish sold as safe community fish etc. Never bought any plants from them though even back then, as bought a books before I even owned a tank, and everything they had were house plants. lol

Plants I get from Greenline, most fish from my LFS (Hollybush Garden Center) where possible as they are always healthy and in my experience they actually check where they are going and wont sell them if there is a problem (once saw them refuse to sell a lady some largish angel fish as she was also buying small neon tetras at the same time.), their plants stink though been a mix of terrestrial plants and half dead (not enough lighting for even java fern) immersible ones.

Find a good, smaller, LFS and stick with them is my advice. You know a good one as they find the time to have a natter with you and actually give you decent advice without trying to sell you things. Good test when first going to one is to ask for a goldfish and tell them it is going in a small goldfish bowl (a good one will advise you that goldfish need larger well filtered aquariums), and then ask them if a young oscar or the like will be safe with your neons and guppies. lol

Ade

 

[chesterscot]

i have a degree in horticulture and selling plants that they called aquatic which are not is against trading standards get in touch with your local office at the council and see what they advise had this trouble b4 in that store and the debate i had with the manager was enlightening came away with a bigger value of random fish stuff than i had spent its amazing what can happen when an official body gets involved odds on if they go see for themselves theyll still be selling the stuff misslabelled and well in a word there would be words said lol
worth ago regards scoti

 

[dpcamp]

I made the mistake of purchasing those plants in the tubes at petsmart and none of them ever survive. I actually found out that PetCo keeps a good collection of plants in tanks, i'm probably gonna go check that out this weekend

 

[KraKen]

The Petsmart around here is terrible for plants, all they have is amazon sword, anacharis and a bunch of terretrial plants. The Petco that recently went in used to have decent plants until thier plant tank became a cyanobacteria tank.

The trouble is that I don't have any good lfs's around here either, one is mostly ponds an saltwater with no plants, and the other is just plain terrible.

 

[jennakid]

is non aquatic plants not ment for water?
hmm
its not your fault that they died over night.
i would take them back and ask for replacements.
thats what a petshop over in australia does.
if they die within a week.. just take them back and get replacements!
xo

 

[Amunet]

Yeah as lljdma06 said, you gotta do your research before buying.
The Petsmart we frequent has gotten better with their quality. They still sell the non-aquatic plants, but at least I know better not to get them heh. And their plant tanks used to be infested w/ pond snails, but that has also improved a great deal. Yeah there are still snails in the tanks, but not nearly as many as before.
We recently bought a very nice sword plant (had 2 of those shoots coming from it w/ about 4 sister plants on each stem), some pretty water wisteria and some hornwort from Petsmart.
We just got it this weekend though so we'll see how well they do in a week or so, but so far so good

I wouldn't totally write off a Petsmart. Are they perfect? Certainly not, but you can still get great fish and great plants from them. YOU just have to do your research though b/c well... most of the time their employees know squat.