I thought it would be fun to start a thread about stupid things that some people who work in pet stores (in the fish department obviously) have said to us. After all, we all have those stories. To anyone on this forum who works in a pet store please forgive me. I know there is an exception to every rule but most of them seem pretty dense.

My best one was a girl and I was looking for some more community fish and asked her to get me 2 particular fish in the Platy tank and she looked at me and asked if my tank had a heater!!! I said 'yes, they are tropical fish arn't they?' so she went and got the fish. It struck me as a silly thing to ask. No question of if the tank was set up (I've had that one too) or what other fish I have or he size of the tank or anything simply if it has a heater!!!

So anyone else got any good stories??

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10gal fry tank planted with Wisteria, Java Moss, Anuabis and Anacharis
35gal Sponge Bob tank with live bearing tropicals (daughters tank)
15gal planted with Swords, Java Fern, Wisteria and Red Rubin housing 10 fry and 2 bladder snails
55 gal with Oscar (future planted tank with angels and flowerhorns)
55 gal Community tank (platys, mollys, guppys, glass catfish, angels, phantom tetra, red eye tetra and swordtails)

she wanted your new fish to be warm, that's all


A while back and I started my tank, I went to PetCo to pick up an API Master Test kit, and I asked a clerk to show me where they kept them. This is how the conversation went:


Sales clerk - "Hi, can I help you find something?" as we're both standing in the fish section, surrounded by tropical fish...

Me - "Yeah, someone told me you guys carry the API Master Test kit for aquariums, where could I find that at?"

Sales clerk - "Test kit for what? For aquarium water?"






I'm hoping this guy just had a brain fart...


Me - "yes, a test kit for aquarium water; you know, it tests ammonia, nitrate, nitrite, PH, all that good stuff..."

Sales Clerk - "OOOHHH, yeah I think I know what you're talking about, with the little bottles and the little test-tube looking things?"




I'm in no way, shape, or form, a know it all about aquariums, but wow if I worked in a pet store, I'd want to know just a little more about my field of work, and what exactly what I'm selling...





I thought it was funny at the time though... Not bashing Petco or anything, I think I might have either just caught a new guy, or someone that was just having a bad day, lol

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My 30 gallon planted freshwater - CONSTANTLY CHANGING

i could top most story's with all the BS i went through getting my first tank set up.
here are a few of them

1) "you do not need to cycle a freshwater tank, just add water and fish they will be fine" - one of petco's finest workers.

2)Me : where do you have lake Tanganyika cichlid buffer? petland worker: what is your ph now? me :7.0 him: your Ph is too high for cichlids try to get it around 6.2 to 6.4 -_- :(

and #3 was at a EXOTIC pet store that had about 100 tanks... when i was first getting my cycle going the guy helping me from day one who wasted about 3 months of my time. told me fill my tank with water add 5 fish (40 gal tank) then Every other Day do a 25% water change for 4 weeks and then it should be cycled.

took for ever for my tank to cycle... Happy to report they closed there doors about 2 months ago.

No need to cycle...... OMG!! That is definitely one of my favorites!!!! Yeah, just fill the tank with water and put the fish in and if they die simply come back and buy more LOL!!!!

I had this one guy helping me one day at Pet City. When I first started talking to him I felt like I was getting grilled 'what size is your tank' 'what's in it now' 'how long has it been running' etc etc he drove me nuts!!!! But he was also by FAR the most knowledgeable employee I EVER talked to in a pet store!!! Was able to point to towards what was compatible with what other fish and which ones liked to be alone and which ones liked to school. IN FACT he even told me not to buy anymore fish that day. To let the ones I had go home and settle in and come back in a few weeks or a month and get some more.

I'm not sure if this one counts or nor but I went to buy Glass Catfish at one of the stores and they have them kept there in brackish water and swear up and down and sideways that these are brackish fish and need they type of water. I don't know about anyone else or any other stores but mu glass catfish are in my sale free community tank and have been there about 5 months and are doing just fine!!

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10gal fry tank planted with Wisteria, Java Moss, Anuabis and Anacharis
35gal Sponge Bob tank with live bearing tropicals (daughters tank)
15gal planted with Swords, Java Fern, Wisteria and Red Rubin housing 10 fry and 2 bladder snails
55 gal with Oscar (future planted tank with angels and flowerhorns)
55 gal Community tank (platys, mollys, guppys, glass catfish, angels, phantom tetra, red eye tetra and swordtails)

I was at petco in Pa and my wife noticed a beautiful flowerhorn in with the africans cichlids???? I told her to ask the lady what type of african it was and the lady went on a 20 min preaching about the variants of africans and that this was a very common type of african that did not get to big and was not very aggressive,LOL. so the africans were on sale for $1.99 each so my wife immediately said she wanted the flowerhorn then the lady went on to preach that our tank would need to be cycled for 90 days before adding fish which my wife said it was and she told her to keep the temp around 70 and that it would get along fine with just about any fish. So I then asked if we could keep it with convicts, mollies, and bala sharks just as random fish, she said they would make a fine assortment. I mean REALLY!?!

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55 Gallon Planted dirt bottom,Reproducing colony of Heterandria Formosa(Least Killifish), 2 Dwarf Puffers, 5 or so Gambusia, 2 Swamp darters???, Several Wild P. Latipinna(Sailfin Mollies), a handful of Jordanella Floridae(American Flagfish), 1 Lepomis Macrochirus(Bluegill fry)

wow,i was looking for snails that my puff could eat,or start a colonythis went thru 3 peeps to get to the answer..NOOOO.meijers dont put barcode on snails so they cant sell them??!!huuuugh no sir no tag no sale..its like stealing to them----dammit i just want a couple freakin snails no dice

Lol want some Malaysian trumpet snails? i started with 10 have around 100+ now.
they are worse than bunnies.

I was looking at the pics and info on flowerhorn's after you posted this. They are beautiful!!!! A very common type of African?!?!?! I think not!!!! I'm not sure where I would put it in a pet store though probably in the 'other' category LOL!!!

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10gal fry tank planted with Wisteria, Java Moss, Anuabis and Anacharis
35gal Sponge Bob tank with live bearing tropicals (daughters tank)
15gal planted with Swords, Java Fern, Wisteria and Red Rubin housing 10 fry and 2 bladder snails
55 gal with Oscar (future planted tank with angels and flowerhorns)
55 gal Community tank (platys, mollys, guppys, glass catfish, angels, phantom tetra, red eye tetra and swordtails)

My local live fish store recomended to me I should and could safely keep 15 Bleeding Heart Tetras (their latin name illudes me at the moment) in my 76L tank after I had explained my water conditions to them (below). I must have seemed very amateur and that was a rediculous number of fish to keep in a 20 gallon aquarium.

At this point I was curious so I kept asking about higher and higher numbers of BHTs. As it turns out I could easily keep 36 in my tank! I might try it.

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Current tap water conditions. Hardness of <75 ppm. pH of 8.4. Sweet jesus, stocking my tanks is gonna be a party.

OMG!!! What are some of these people thinking!!!

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10gal fry tank planted with Wisteria, Java Moss, Anuabis and Anacharis
35gal Sponge Bob tank with live bearing tropicals (daughters tank)
15gal planted with Swords, Java Fern, Wisteria and Red Rubin housing 10 fry and 2 bladder snails
55 gal with Oscar (future planted tank with angels and flowerhorns)
55 gal Community tank (platys, mollys, guppys, glass catfish, angels, phantom tetra, red eye tetra and swordtails)

My first solo tank as a teenager was a 10G, and being clueless I let the store clerk tell me what would work. I walked out with a new tank and filter, a dwarf gourami, bala shark, and rainbow shark. Nice mix, eh?
After the gourami died, I researched a bit on it, found out what a poor selection the store had shipped me off with, and vowed never to return to that shop.

More recently, the funniest was trying to convince the petsmart guy I was really sure I wanted the little snails he had in the tank along with my other fish. It seems one of his bigger chores during the day is pulling out snails and disposing of them. Not blaming him or petsmart for trying to get rid of them for better presentation, just amusing to have to convince him.

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Matthew
30G AquaClear50: Lightly planted, platies, ottos, kuhli loaches.
10G Sponge filter: Heavily planted, ottos, red cherry shrimp

ROFL this weekend i was at this place and they had the new fluval shrimp tank set up with about 10 RCS in it, they were all bunched up at the top of the water looking like they wanted to get out of the tank i commented on how stressed they looked, the guy said "yeah we just threw them in there yesterday when we got the product, need something to cycle the tank right"

Petsmart will give you free snails no charge. they want them gone too.



Ive heard it all,
most recent at a local petco
me : hey lady this fish aint doing too good, its all messed up
her: is it swirling
me: yes
her: oh it has to die before I can remove it, company policy.

Really now? is losing money REALLY the company policy?
I called petco corporate offices in san diego, and they confirmed this was their policy.
I replied, " its a good thing I hate PETA more then petco"

K so I went to petco 5 days ago to buy some fish right? Before then I had only ever had a beta and so really I had no experiance with fish. So I got there right and asked "what kind of fish go well in a 10 gallon tank that doesn't have a heater but has a filter and a few plants?" and the sells person kept trying to get me to buy this tank that cost 13,000 dollars and ofcourse I only had 30 dollars with me. So the sells person started asking me if I had any experiance with fish or not I said "I had beta" and so he told me "showme which fish you like" I said "I don't know, just whatever can survive in my tank." and so of course he took me to the goldfish and said "you should get the biggest 1 it's most likely to live without a heater." so I said ok. Then ge took me to the guppies and said "these little guys will love a 10 gallon tank and won't hurtyourw goldfishyou should get 2." so I said ok. Then he took me over to the chinese alge eaters and said "if you get 1 of these you won't ever need to clean you're fish tank!" so ofcourse I got 1. Then I nought them (stupid me!!!!!!)
I put them in the tank and immediatly saw they wernt to happy together!
Apparently goldfish eat guppies, the guppies were girls and were pregnant and the alge eater is not a good thing to have!!!!
I had to go back to the pet store to buy a 70 Dollar tank for the guppies, it's a 6 gallon. I'm sooo upset with that petco person!!!!!!!

this is a story told to me by a friend of mine. the friend isnt the brightest guy around, but the pet store employee shouldnt be working in a pet store. my buddy wanted to get a fish to add in with his oscar, so he asked the employee what would work. the guy actualy told him to buy neons! he convinced my buddy that in large numbers they would look like one big fish to the oscar and he would leave them alone, and recomended the rediculous number of 50, which my friend bought. the next morning he told me what he did, so i told him to get the neons out as fast as possible. his tank was only a 40 gallon, nothing in it for the little fish to hide behind, just a big hungry oscar. when he got home, he managed to save three.

LMAO you win the imaginary prize for the best story yet Auban!!

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10gal fry tank planted with Wisteria, Java Moss, Anuabis and Anacharis
35gal Sponge Bob tank with live bearing tropicals (daughters tank)
15gal planted with Swords, Java Fern, Wisteria and Red Rubin housing 10 fry and 2 bladder snails
55 gal with Oscar (future planted tank with angels and flowerhorns)
55 gal Community tank (platys, mollys, guppys, glass catfish, angels, phantom tetra, red eye tetra and swordtails)

And this is why I insist that every single one of my employees knows what they're talking about.

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Was at a store and got a red tail fin shark. She got it in the net, is struggled then went limp. Me and my buddy were like aww poor fish it died but the lady just kept on going. She hands me the bag and asks if there is anything else. I said that i would like a living fish then pointed at the bag. She told me that sometimes they play dead when there scared and it will be ok by the time i get home. So i proceded to poke the fish bag rappidly showing that in fact, it was dead. apperently when i poked it the first time i musta killed it but she said she would look the other way and get me another one.

where do i start????

background: MY 2 LFS are horrible. one is ran by the father of the store and his mail order russian bride. the other is ran by people whom i beleive smoke more weed then mr marley.

by the way the russian lady is like the girl from rockey and bull winkle...i just want her to say squirrel and moose one day.

store #1. me: i need an air pump that will pump thru 2 12" bubble wands.
russian lady: Here this is the cheapest one we have.
me: will it work?
Russian lady: its what i use for my air STONE.

Me: What kind of pleco is that?
Russian Lady: Its just a pleco.
Me: how big will it get?
Russian Lady: thats the biggest it will get.
I walk up to the counter knowing i have a common pleco in hand (he was going to be in my 55 till i could upgrade again)
ME: so i bought an algae eater here and turns out it was a chinese algae eater.
Owners son: So...
Me: well it turned very aggressive and harasses my fish constantly.
Owners son: o you must of not got her from here. but theydont normally do that.
Me: how big will this pleco get?
Owners son: not to much bigger
me: is it a common pleco
owners son: o its pretty common.

after the last 4 fish i bought there and only 1 surviving i think i will do the hour drive to petco and petsmart to get fish from now on.

Not a petstore but walmart.I found a plakat in a female cup.So off to the checkout with my boy i go.Conversation follows

My daughter:See the pretty boy my momma grabbed?(She even know how to tell a male from female)
cashier:No sweetheart this is a girl.See the lid?Its marked female.that means girl,sweety.
Daughter:I know what female means....
Me:Its a male.I raise these fish.
Cashier,peeved by now:Well i worked in the fish dept. for three months.So this is a female,as its marked on the lid.


Took the boy home and bred him to a female,LOL

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http://bountifulbettas.blogspot.com/

"Come to the dark side....we have cookies...and filters/heaters/and water changes!"