The wife and I went shopping for plants today and stopped in at a Petsmart. They had several Bettas in the little plastic, lidded containers. Any Betta for $2.99. I have never seen fish so mistreated in my life. All were in blue water, I assume it was blue from medication, and the fish were literally falling apart. One in particular would move and scales would drop from him. I saw this and left without looking at the plants. I will never step into that store again. I did find some plants at a Petco store and that isnt all rosey either lol but at least their fish seemed well cared for. I suppose it varies from store to store but I miss the old days when every small town had a LFS.

That's terrible.. i know the petsmarts here have better care for their bettas that that. If I were there, I would have raised concern about the fish. Its never too late though. But yes, LFS are wonderful in comparison to the larger pet stores!

I remember when Petsmart first came to Des Moines. Petco had been around for awhile and was not a place to buy anything that was alive but had good prices on equipment. Petco actually closed the store for a month or so and did some remodeling and cleaned their tanks in anticipation of the Petsmart opening. Having just recently gotten back into the hobby I have been looking around and while Petco has maintained a pretty decent fish dept. (in fact Petco is where I purchased my Betta and he is doing great) Petsmart has degraded into what I described above.

little corrections here and there

first off Betta in any store are kept the same way in small containers with lids having holes cause bettas need a separate tank for each fish and .............
and the blue water is not cause of medication it is a special kind of dyed water which makes the Betta to be calm and less prone to diseases
and the scales dropping as it moves i really doubt it, may be the food or waste is getting stirred off

i initially thought the same way you did but one time at a petsmart i saw how they took out the betta into some basin kinda thing to feed it and then refill the small container with blue water and transferred it back again.
bettas arent highly active fish and the blue water makes them sleepy i guess lol

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~ Max
29 Gallon Tall Planted and running Eheim 2217
~~ a German Blue ram pair, 9 Harlequin rasboras, 2 octilincus, 2 Dwarf neon rainbows and a honey sunset Gaurami

16 gallon Bowfront tank ~~ 3 Neon Tetras, red tailed shark, 1 angel (its a real bully), BN pleco and an albino BN pleco.

I know what I saw but people can believe what the want, they usually do. rug*

This is why my husband and I opened our store, The Betta Boutique. Check out the website, see our Bettas and you'll feel better.

thebettaboutique.com

Melissa

PS. The water is blue due to being medicated.

I have worked if 2 fish stores. The blue water is from Methyline Blue, which a previous poster correctly pointed out that it is a disease preventer/stress reducer. They are shipped in little more than a shotglass of water. They are quite inactive. usually just staying in one place for hours. But the original poster was absolutely accurate in saying that it is not a good idea to buy fish at the "big box" pet stores. They don't, for the most part, have knowledgeable fish people who can correctly diagnose and treat sick fish, often resulting in sick fish being sold to the customers, which of course could make all the existing fish in the customer's tank to get sick also!

It's horrible how some fish are treated. One must raise a red flag or nothing would be done.






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Sorry to dig up an old thread... but it is entirely possible that the fish was losing the scales as stated. I had that happen to my poor mollie once. She died later. And we don't know why.

WRONG. WRONG WRONG. Bettas ARE highly active fish, and any chain pet shop is going to treat them like crap because they get them for $0.15 they dont care, the employees dont care, they are paid minimum wage, work crap shifts and dont get full time, just like any other big chain.

Dean good to see another Iowan on the boards! out in Coralville here, with a petco. The are the same company by the way, so when the petco closed down to renovate it was probably a generally funded upgrade.

We (my family and I) Volunteer at the local petco, however unaffiliated with, for a local rescue shelter, cleaning and feeding cats they have for adoption there. I have OFTEN walked past and through the fish area, to find many many dead fish, tanks kept at store temps (around 65 or so) snails the size of a softball crawling around the plant tank, and plants covered in algae. I would never buy a fish or plant from a petco/smart or from a place like petland (LFS that is outgrowing its roots) and i would gladly pay an extra buck or two per item to support Coralville bay our specialty LFS. Rd and the guys there are killer. I have also brought a water sample into pet smart from the tap to have tested and the young lady told me i was good to start buying fish! Which is BS because of how our local water is. I use RO/UV purified water from coralville bay because our tap is so bad... dont ever shop at stores like that, they are horrible just like walmart and other big chains...

**spelling corrections, apparently i was drunk when i tried to type this...?

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When you pay that cash or swipe that card you are making a bond with that animal that you will treat it with love and respect, and its needs will be met, first and foremost (unless you have kids...) I don't care if you have to eat ramen noodles or nothing at all to feed your cat dog fish rat whatever. That's the bond you made! Life is precious!

I liberated a red one from Petsmart and put him in a 55gal community tank last year. He is very active and loves it. Just because they can survive in those small containers does not mean they will thrive. Heck, people can survive in a 6x6 room but it doesnt mean they want to! I wanted to get another one and put him in my 75gal but I have a large Syndontis in there and am afraid he would become dinner.

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75gal - 3 tinfoil barbs, 2 convict cichlids, 1 syndontis, 1 fire eel, 1 pleco
55gal - 6 black neon tetras, 3 lyretail dalmation mollies, 3 emerald green corys, 2 albino corys, 1 zigzag loach, 1 kuhli loach, ,1 rubber lipped pleco, 1 otocinclus, 1 goldfish

poor fish. So sad.

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"Being ignorant is not so much a Shame, as being unwilling to learn".-- Benjamin Franklin