fun at petco

Screwgunner · Mar 28, 2021

I called them and asked if they had a purple tang different store of course she said yes it is 103 dollars I said put my name on it on my way. 30 miles away I get there my name on the tank with a blue hippo tang swimming around in it. I asked the guy there he was very apologizing. I was there so I got a frag to small to tell what it was he said 25 but for your trouble 19 and I got some frozen fish food. Got home ,he opened up whammin watermelon zoanthid

Jedi1199 · Mar 28, 2021

You guys are lucky.. The Petco and Petsmart around here don't carry SW fish at all.... and a VERY limited supply of SW supplies... :-(

Sharkbait19 · Mar 28, 2021

Let me tell you just how much petcos can vary. There was one petco store in which I bought many of my first corals that was gorgeous. Both the FW and SW tanks were stocked with rare and beautiful variety, at such reasonable price! If any of you know what an ornate bichir is, they had a 4” one for $10! They also had some of the more designer clowns for only $20-30! It was epic. That said, the customer service was quite bad (except one knowledgeable person), and the fish were not totally healthy. Now that I have a QT tank, though, I would maybe consider buying from that particular store again (only if it was something extremely rare or cheap).

Now let me talk about one of the more laughable petcos. The one closest to me is where I truly discovered the horrors of petco, and is the sole reason why I would never buy from one again. Death and disease everywhere, and horrible customer service. Here is the tale of a poor petco....

Back in the beginning of my reefing career, I really wanted a neon goby. I found some there, but on my way out looked in the bag, and noticed the poor little fish was swarming head-to-toe with ich!! I brought him immediately back to the person who sold it to me, and said, “your fish have ich.” In fact, upon looking back into the tanks, I only then noticed that the goby wasn’t the only fish infected. The engineer gobies, clowns, dragonets and damsels were all near death (to name a few).
As I returned to the employee who sold me the fish, he responded “those fish are meant to have white bumps.” Then I pointed out all of the fish, and he simply said “petco would never carry sick fish. Neon gobies naturally have white bumps.” I demanded that he’d take it back, and disappointedly walked out without any goby. It was then that I realized just how terrible petcos could be. However, as I stated before, the stores vary greatly, from very pleasing to extremely terrible...

Sharkbait19 · Mar 28, 2021

GaryE said:
I picked up a rock at Petco that had a small maxi mini on it, the guy had no idea what it was, so he gave me a deal on the rock and "misc salt water". $30. Turns out there was another maxi mini on the bottom that moved to the top. They both have grown to about 3 inches across.

The next trip there I got a Lawnmower Blenny and another random critter they they couldn't identify. Blenny was $25 and random critter was $5. Random critter was about the size of a dime.

He has since opened up a bit.

I stop there once every couple of weeks to see if they have anything they don't know what it is.. ;)

Their $15 misc coral bin is something I just love to take advantage of lol

Firstxreefer · Mar 28, 2021

I got my tank set up and was wanting something to put in it and my mom in law was coming through town (we live appox. 2 hours from a sw lfs ) so she stopped at petco and picked up a couple fish and a piece of live rock. I put the live rock in the tank and out comes an emerald crab!! We still have the Bangaii cardinal she bought for me that was 2 years ago.

Screwgunner · Mar 30, 2021

I like the good stuff but when you bring home a fish for 50 80 dollars and it dies a couple days latter. Petco keeps there salinity at very low peramiters. 1.014 that is very hard on fish to go back to 1.025 its fine the other way. But I take my time and try to acclimate for 3 hours to bring salinity up slowly. But I have lost a green chromis and a nasso tang from petco. But 7 chromis are fine and I replaced the 50 dollar nasso with a yellow that cost me 300.00 I think I might be crazy,but I am in it this time for a mixed reef that is healthy and beautiful.