Negligent care in Fish Store

beetlenut33

beetlenut33

Premium member
Hello fellow reefers,

This week I visited a fish store which has been on the decline since it recently opened. When it first opened the store was taking very good care of their fish and offering some great deals. My last few visits have been the complete opposite experience.

Currently, the fish store has been negligent in the care of their fish. I visited the store on Monday, and there were at least 4 dead fish in the display tanks. The display tanks had partly cloudy water in them. Each display tank had multiple fish which were infested with ich. Some of the tanks had fish which were struggling to breath due to infestation or missing fins and tissue.

After pointing out to the employees that their fish are infested with parasites, they either have no response, or proceed to tell me fish are able to live with ich and you should only be worried if the fish stops eating.

Now, as a community, is there anything we can do to hold this fish store accountable for the improper care of their animals? Is it fair to say that improper care of fish should be considered animal cruelty? It is really sad to see animals struggling to survive, and then to see employees willing to sell these fish to their customers.
 
I got velvet from one and im not sure ill even bring it up to the store.

Its on me for not QT.
Lost 7fish i a week and still have some to catch or lose.
After this is said and done. Im goint fallow for 4 months and getting 1 fish at a time ...with a 30 day hospital/Qt with chloroquine phosphate regardless of visible or not.
Im going the aquarium care route.
 
beetlenut33 said:
Now, as a community, is there anything we can do to hold this fish store accountable for the improper care of their animals? Is it fair to say that improper care of fish should be considered animal cruelty? It is really sad to see animals struggling to survive, and then to see employees willing to sell these fish to their customers.
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To be honest, not really. There's no government oversight on the health of fish unlike dogs/cats. As a community as we can do is spread the word about the store to others helping ensure they'll get less business, leading to them bringin in less fish to kill.
 
Most stores do not QT their fish. And they do not use reputable distributors with good QT procedures. If you don't see any Ich, it's because they use non therapeutic dose of copper. Trust me when I say most fish stores around here are selling diseased fish whether symptoms are visible or not. You are far better off getting your fish from LiveAquaria or Petsolutions who use reputable distributors.
 
beetlenut33 said:
Now, as a community, is there anything we can do to hold this fish store accountable for the improper care of their animals? Is it fair to say that improper care of fish should be considered animal cruelty? It is really sad to see animals struggling to survive, and then to see employees willing to sell these fish to their customers.
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Yes, there is absolutely something we can do. In a free market, we can choose not to spend our money there. I've already made the personal decision not to spend my money a Xzotic Aquatics again. I assume that's the store you're talking about.
 
Mr. Thingdoer said:
Yes, there is absolutely something we can do. In a free market, we can choose not to spend our money there. I've already made the personal decision not to spend my money a Xzotic Aquatics again. I assume that's the store you're talking about.
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To me they are all about the same - really bad. Is there a single LFS around here that is using proper QT procedures? It seems idiotic to me that it is left to the customers to treat diseased fish.
 
Mr. Thingdoer said:
Yes, there is absolutely something we can do. In a free market, we can choose not to spend our money there. I've already made the personal decision not to spend my money a Xzotic Aquatics again. I assume that's the store you're talking about.
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Yes, that is the store I am talking about. Like you, I think I am going to make the personal decision not to spend my money there also. This is a good long term solution to the problem. However in the short term, many fish will be killed and also disease and parasites will be spread to a lot of their customers. Many new hobbyists do not quarantine and also might not know about parasites and how quickly they can spread and kill all the fish in their tank.
 
There are a few that use Prazi/Cu, or other effective treatments, and have fish displayed that appear healthy for the most part. There's only one store that I've been to recently that has mostly gravely ill and infested fish. They used to tout their QT procedures as some of the best, and advise customers to skip the at-home QT because it's unnecessary stress. What a load of bologna!
 
Xzotic's QT procedure is inadequate. But they don't keep their fish in copper full time after the "QT" period. To me this is better than other stores who just keep their fish in copper full time. This will cause liver, kidney, and other long term issues. I am still looking for that one store to spend my money. I haven't found one other than online. Let me know if you guys find a good store.
 
Kevin Says said:
Xzotic's QT procedure is inadequate. But they don't keep their fish in copper full time after the "QT" period. To me this is better than other stores who just keep their fish in copper full time. This will cause liver, kidney, and other long term issues. I am still looking for that one store to spend my money. I haven't found one other than online. Let me know if you guys find a good store.
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Thats true copper should be temp treatment but u can still use safer meds in the display tanks to prevent this crap. Issue is people complain about blue water or yellow water so stores dont . But one sick fish in system means all r infected since most r all conected to same sump. Imo id buy they blue water fish before id buy clear water fish . No pleasing reefers were completely insane people to begin with
 
Mr. Thingdoer said:
There are a few that use Prazi/Cu, or other effective treatments, and have fish displayed that appear healthy for the most part. There's only one store that I've been to recently that has mostly gravely ill and infested fish. They used to tout their QT procedures as some of the best, and advise customers to skip the at-home QT because it's unnecessary stress. What a load of bologna!
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I agree, definitely a load of bologna. They even showed me their quarantine tank and told me how great it was. I actually overheard them talking about taking down the quarantine tank.

It would make sense if the quarantine occurred at the supplier level, then all fish going out to EVERY store would be disease and parasite free. A top down approach.
 
Ich is understandable, but it's not necessarily always a killer. I think most reefers know there's a good chance the fish they buy will be carrying ich. I'm more bothered by the parasitic Flukes, or internal parasites. There really isn't any excuse to have flukes in a stores display tanks, is there? Some store, like Beyond The Reef run Prazi for days to treat for parasites.
Additionally, there's no reason to have decaying dead fish, or fish with open sores on display.
 
beetlenut33 said:
I agree, definitely a load of bologna. They even showed me their quarantine tank and told me how great it was. I actually overheard them talking about taking down the quarantine tank.

It would make sense if the quarantine occurred at the supplier level, then all fish going out to EVERY store would be disease and parasite free. A top down approach.
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Good distributors like Quality Marine (used by LiveAquaria) do just that. But they are expensive to deal with and not foolproof. So our local stores buy fish from cheaper sources and put them in copper dosed water.
 
That's sad it is Xzotic again. WHen they reopened, they bragged about their extensive QT process. I got a few fish from them in the beginning. But after seeing ich in their tanks more than a month ago and it is still not treated, I will not be returning to them anymore. They are close by me so that was great. I guess it's now back to long rides to Aquapros and Reefwise on the weekends. I know it is not 100% guaranteed fish are disease free from Aquapros and Reefwise but I just trust them a lot more than other LFS in Chicagoland.
 
You might want to check out your local Petco. No joke. After Petco purchased Liveaquaria last year and put Kevin Kohen in charge, I am seeing some positive changes at my local Petco store. They will also custom order fish for you and they get them from Apet if I am not mistaken. Deliveries are usually made at the same time every week and you might even be able to pick up your fish before they go in their tanks.
 
None of the stores in Chicagoland does proper qt, some just do dips, baths , etc. Some just " condition" fish. At least when fish is conditioned and eating it has a better chance to fight disease in qt. I learned hard lesson and qt all fish. Recently I got $700 fish from one of best LFS and I am fighting bad case of ich and flukes. CP and General cure is working for me great in this case.
 
I have see dead fish everywhere i go. I once worked at a pet shop when i was in my teens it really was up to us workers to keep the dead out the tanks its just doesn't help seeing dead fish floating around and keeping the sick fish out the tanks is a must someone should go around passing some good info to our LFS something like Reef life matters no joke

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Aquapros is good IMO. I'm not sure they do full QT but they treat unhealthy fish to get them back up to par and I wouldn't hesitate to purchase from them. I would always QT myself though.

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