Buying fish from Petco

[FishyFishFish]

My nearest LFS is over 2 hour drive away. I have bought one fish from there and it didn't travel well and didn't survive the night. I have just bought some mail order sexy shrimp and one of the three didn't make it either.

With these things combined, I am concerned about mail ordering fish and the round trip to the LFS might not be worth it if I go all that way and the fish dies again.

I do, however, have a Petco nearby. Now I know what everyone will say but my thinking is that I'd rather have a poorly fish than a dead one. I have a QT and this fish will not go in my tank until it has had a full QT with copper/parasite treatment.

The questions are:

What should I look for if buying a fish from Petco?

If the fish gets through the QT procedure, could it still cause problems when moved to my DT?

 

[TheWalkingCoral]

I have a sixline wrasse I got from petco. Monitored him for six weeks and then in he went to my display tank. No symptoms of any kind of fish disease. Petco gets their fish from live aquaria and my local petco has a very knowledgeable staff.

Quick Edit: I would make sure he is eating, looks active and does not show any kind of known fish disease. Also check all the other tanks, its a good indicator of what you will be getting.

 

[tamanning]

Petco can be very hit and miss. If you see a fish doing strange things say rubbing on a rock or has spots . There are a lot of people here who are better qualified than I to help with this answer.

 

[secret_reefer337]

I have a clown fish that I bought from Petco four years ago and it is still alive. Actually I have some fish that was bought at Petco and never qt and they live a healthy life in my tank. They only died because I moved and didn’t set up my tank sooner and my fault not taking care of them while in the tub. Not all Petco are the same, yes QT them to make sure they don’t harbor parasites when you put then in your DT.

 

[Sharkbait19]

I got all my original fish from petco. I also didn’t quarantine, so lost them all to velvet. However, if you qt, I don’t see a problem with buying from petco. Today, if I saw a fish or coral that I really liked at a petco, I’d get it, especially now that I have a quarantine tank. I will say this—some petcos are complete dumps when it comes to their fish sections, whereas some others have more variety and rare livestock than the lfs! If you find one petco that is knowledgeable and clean, I recommend buying from them. I originally got all my fish from different petco stores, so even though some were healthy, another fish that I brought in wound up introducing parasites. Today, I stick to one lfs and get all my livestock there. But again, if I was ever in a petco and really liked something, I wouldn’t not get it...

 

[Ed olson]

One of these best things you can do is ask to see the fish eat. Ask them to feed the fish you are interested in. And if the fish doesn't eat pass on it. Don't let the staff tell you it's not hungry because it was fed earlier. Almost all fish who are healthy will at least eat a piece or two of whatever they drop in.
Many of their tanks are connected so pay attention to what the fish in the tanks on either side of the one you're wanting are doing as well.

 

[FishyFishFish]

I'm thinking that mine is more towards the poorer end of the spectrum.

I have been in there before and some of the corals look pretty rough. I'm going to go and have a look today (but not buy anything!) to see what they have and how well they appear to be.

 

[Sharkbait19]

One of these best things you can do is ask to see the fish eat. Ask them to feed the fish you are interested in. And if the fish doesn't eat pass on it. Don't let the staff tell you it's not hungry because it was fed earlier. Almost all fish who are healthy will at least eat a piece or two of whatever they drop in.
Many of their tanks are connected so pay attention to what the fish in the tanks on either side of the one you're wanting are doing as well.

+1
When I first got into the hobby, I saw one tank with brooklynella, but figured “oh, this royal gramma isn’t in that tank”! Well, what would you guess happened to my fish?

 

[Sharkbait19]

I'm thinking that mine is more towards the poorer end of the spectrum.

I have been in there before and some of the corals look pretty rough. I'm going to go and have a look today (but not buy anything!) to see what they have and how well they appear to be.

My favorite thing about petco is the price. I’ve seen yasha gobies for $30! Everything is a steal there! As long as you have the means of qt and medicating, I think some fish there are more worth it than spending a fortune.
For example, some of my first corals were from petco. It took months to see any sign of polyp extension on some of them. However, after much love and attention, I couldn’t be happier with them.

 

[iMi]

I bought fish from high-end fish stores that did poorly and had fish from Petco that did great. It really depends on the Petco. The quality of their livestock depends greatly on how the store is being managed. And guess what, that is pretty much how LFS work as well. Some are great, some are not. You should alway quarantine, regardless of source. So, what’s the difference?

 

[Sharkbait19]

Also, if you’re super concerned about where to get your livestock, plenty of online vendors offer a variety of fish with affordable shipping costs. That said, I avoid online vendors nowadays, because I’ve experienced DOA more so than not...

 

[albano]

I’d guess that there are at least 10-15 Petcos within a 60 min drive from me. So I know which are the better ones.

I’d suggest asking the employees or even better the ‘fish’ manager, what is the usual delivery day for their new shipments, so that you can get it BEFORE it goes into their tanks. At a couple stores they actually give me copies of their wholesalers availability lists (there are no prices on them) and allow me to order what I want. If I don’t like it when it comes in, ‘No problem’, they put it in their tank for sale!

 

[Sharkbait19]

I’d guess that there are at least 10-15 Petcos within a 60 min drive from me. So I know which are the better ones.

I’d suggest asking the employees or even better the ‘fish’ manager, what is the usual delivery day for their new shipments, so that you can get it BEFORE it goes into their tanks. At a couple stores they actually give me copies of their wholesalers availability lists (there are no prices on them) and allow me to order what I want. If I don’t like it when it comes in, ‘No problem’, they put it in their tank for sale!

Man, if only the customer service was half as good at the petcos by me.....

 

[laverda]

Each Petco is different as is the knowledge of the people working in the fish department. This makes a huge difference. Just like any LFS. Petco gets a lot of captive bred fish at reasonable prices. Which I like. Only 2 of the Petco's near me carry saltwater fish. Just one carries corals, which always look dismal. Not enough light over the corals or anemones. One store is consistently much better than the other. But they both change as employees change. I am guessing they don't pay well or something as employee turn over is high at both stores. Both stores are willing to order things for me although it can take a while. One is capable of getting a much wider variety of fish. They even called me when they got something I was looking for and held them in the bag for me. An other employee at the same store refused to sell me a fish that was still in the bag, until they put it in the tank first. For the life of me, i could not understand that logic! Said it was store policy. I left empty handed that day. Just this week the had a really nice lemon peel angel that I have been looking for. Several other fish did not look well, so I passed. Plus my qt still has fish in it I need to move first.

 

[FishyFishFish]

Well I am back and it wasn't great.

To be fair the saltwater fish didn't look that bad. They had a blue tang, that was hiding behind a rock, that I wouldn't guarantee was parasite-free (but I'm only a beginner so it could have been fine). They also had a couple of engineer gobies and some nice looking cardinalfish. There was one dead fish in the tanks (I couldn't see what it was but maybe a watchman goby) but there was also a dead fish in my LFS tank last weekend too.

The corals were awful. It looked like they didn't have enough light and they were just withering away. There was also an anemone that was half buried in the sand that looked quite rough.

The worst part was actually their freshwater tanks. I heard a little girl shout 'eww, dead fish' and an employee came over and scooped several dead fish out with her hand. I then looked at the freshwater fish and saw at least 3 of the 12 or so tanks with dead fish stuck in the overflows. I have no idea why they wouldn't check the tanks for dead fish before they opened (assuming they hadn't all died within the previous hour).

I might have been tempted to risk one of the cardinalfish but that's not what I'm looking for at the moment. I guess I'm back to the decision between online ordering and the 5 hour round trip to my LFS.

 

[terraincognita]

anyone else read the title and just had the words "uh-Oh" or "oh no" be the first 2 words in their head?

lol all jokes aside.

It's 100% on who's managing the saltwater department.

If you have an avid Salt head or hobbyist in there it's probably as good as any other LFS.

But that's about 1 in 30 petcos.

 

[FishyFishFish]

anyone else read the title and just had the words "uh-Oh" or "oh no" be the first 2 words in their head?

Unfortunately not everyone has a good LFS (or any LFS) nearby and these people have extremely limited options. As I said in my opening post, I'm currently forced to decide between poorly fish or dead fish, neither of which are great options.

I mentioned the issue of my Clown Goby not travelling well (not making the 2 hour trip home from the LFS alive), and my concern about shipping, to a mail order vendor. They told me that is true and they usually ship 2 Clown Gobys per order in the hope that one gets there alive. This is awesome business sense, but these are living things and it does make me wonder whether I should be ordering fish by mail order at all if that is the success rate.

The 5-hour round trip to my LFS might be the way to go; if I was confident I could get them home alive (and I knew what I wanted was in stock and wouldn't be sold) then it would be worth it.

 

[Frogspon]

Honestly, every fish I've gotten from petco or petsmart has outlived many times over the fish I've gotten from an LFS.

Observe the fish for a few weeks at the store. If they are doing well over that period In those store's tanks, then they are bullet proof in a well maintained tank.

 

[terraincognita]

Honestly, every fish I've gotten from petco or petsmart has outlived many times over the fish I've gotten from an LFS.

Observe the fish for a few weeks at the store. If they are doing well over that period In those store's tanks, then they are bullet proof in a well maintained tank.

Sorry wasn't trying to harp on your situation I edited it after initial post with more info.

Otherwise In your shoes I'd probably shop from Liveaquaria

They supply petco's and instead of it going to Petco, and being in their tanks which may have X or Y problems, they'll go straight to yours.

Additionally they give a 14 day live gurantee which no other vendor gives on a fish.

After 14 days if the fish dies, I'd also agree it's most likely 99% your fault.

Happy reefing!

 

[FishyFishFish]

No problem, I am just frustrated with this (self-induced) situation.

The LA arrival guarantee is now only 7 days. That in itself is not a problem but it does make you think what caused them to drop it from 14 days. The latest reviews on R2R are pretty bad as well, otherwise I might have given them a try.