Amnagrla

Okay. Now, just hear me out....

When we go to Wal-Mart or PetCo or a Dollar-Store... and we see poor little bettas in cups or worse... And we "rescue" them. We are saving that one betta, yes. And that is an amazing thing.... but what are we doing in the long run? Aren't we just rewarding these stores by purchasing their products no matter of the care given?

As much as it hurts us... I think that we should NOT "rescue" these fish. We don't buy fish from tanks with sick/dead mates for their health and to sort of boycott the store... why would bettas be any different?

We are never going to find a store that has a nice 5 gallon tank for every betta they sell... but we should be giving our business to those stores who are doing it the best!!

Tom

That acutally makes sense. I think you make a very good point there, it is like rewarding the store for being bad.
Tom

Amnagrla

Exactly!!! Glad you get my point... someone has to!!

COBettaCouple

well the stores care most about money and if we take our business to online stores, that will hurt the profits more than not buying fish. They make all the money on the stuff for a fish.. if we all stopped buying anything from them, it will send more of a message. deathco loses a fair amount from us, with all the tanks and supplies we need. given the way they take care of them and how many they lose, i'm not sure that they really care about how many fish they sell.

voiceless_kat

You have an excellent point - in a way, that is why I am willing to drive 3 hours to buy supplies - because this small independent has clean tanks, clean cages, everything spotless, and incredible customs service. A pet store that doesn't smell like a pet store. His prices are higher than the Walmart in that town, and the other fish/pet store is disgusting. But when I find a place like that, I will pay more. He looked at me like I was nuts when I showed up for Bio Spira last week -- driving 3 hours for it!! LOL He only sells male bettas, and they are in very large rose bowls, and the water is pristine, and the fish are active and healthy.

However, when it comes to buying bettas, our Walmart is the only game in town. Living in Canada, online live fish purchases would cost too much, and living in a small town, overnight delivery is actually 2 days................

I agree with you totally and it does bother me to give Walmart my business for your same reasons!!

And Dave is right, they certainly don't make money on the fish, it is the $200 in accessories and meds that come with each little guy/girl!

COBettaCouple

that's what stinks about this town.. deathco's the only game in town and the manager runs the store like he knows that..

sirdarksol

I swear we had this conversation a couple of weeks ago.

COBettaCouple

deja vu - the feeling you're doing something you've done before... deja vu - the feeling you're doing something you've done before... deja vu - the feeling you're doing something you've done before... deja vu - the feeling you're doing something you've done before...

Miriam

Unfortunately there's also the rest of the population who don't know anything other than what the stores tell them about Bettas. Our local Petland is actually really good with their Bettas, they even advertise and display some in the 3 gallon tank setup kits. And the rest are in bowls about 6 inches wide and 6 inches tall with pristine water in a warmed section of the fish department, so it's better than the tiny cups with barely any water at PetSmart and Wal-Mart. I'm more than happy to drive the hour or so to give them my business.

sirdarksol

My wife and I drove a total of four hours to get her betta, Keiji. We went to the store that we wanted to get him from, but we went too early in the morning. They didn't open until the afternoon, so we went home and then came back. It's an hour each way.
But we are so happy with the result. There has been no fin rot or any other illness.
I feel really, really horrible when I go into Petsmart, some of the worse LFS's, and especially Petco. If I thought I could get away with it, I would probably steal them. I've actually thought about trying to talk them into giving me (not selling, giving) one of the obviously sick fish, but I haven't had any luck with nursing sick fish (I'm not patient enough, I think). As bad as I feel, though, I just can't bring myself to support the way these fish are treated.

chickadee

Well I got real when I saw the pictures of the breeder tanks for males that were used in a big breeders location. The rows of containers were probably only 2 quarts of water but no decor or gravel BUT they also had (every one of them) heated water pumped through them and filtered and UV sterilized water in every tank. The men working in there wore white lab coats and gloves and goggles and those fish looked healthy and the packets of food in front of every box were Atison's Betta Starter which is a perfectly respectable starter food for fry and tiny bettas before they are ready for baby betta food or brine shrimp. The tanks for the females were larger maybe 150 gallons but set up with the same UV sterilizers and protein skimmers and filteration in every tank in each corner (large sponge) They were cleaner than my tanks and had spotless floors. The show quality bettas and pairs were kept in individual tanks like the male bettas and were fed the same foods and that told me that they value all their fish. This is after all their livelihood and while they may sell to stores that choose to treat their stock badly, I truly do not believe it begins at the breeder level unless you happen to buy from a family or small scale breeder where they get a pair and have no clue what they are doing and do not bother to get the correct equipment and buy bettas that have been inbred to the point of ridiculous. This is another reason that anyone who buys a breeding pair and sees that they are getting a brother and sister combination needs to insist that they know how far back the brother and sister combinations have been bred. Failure to do this can lead to diabled or deformed fish or fish that may carry the genetic instruction to have offspring for those characteristics.

Rose

sirdarksol

Out of curiosity, Rose, do you know if this breeder was in the US, Europe, or Asia (or somewhere else)? I've heard at least one horror story about a large-scale Korean breeder. I do not doubt that there are similarly bad breeders in the US, where the majority of people don't care too much about how animals (especially "lower" animals like fish) are treated. In Europe, however, I can easily see there being regulations, at least in some of the countries, on how the animals are treated.

Chief_waterchanger

Inbreeding of closely related fish can cause problems, however seeing as most debilitating characteristics are recessive it generally takes -atleast- 4 generations of inbreeding within the same gene pool for these characteristics to be expressed. Because they are recessive characteristics, adding new blood to the line reinforces the dominate characteristic. Thus making the chance of two fish, both carrying a bad recessive characteristic less likely to have offspring that have a double-dose of the bad characterstic. Example: if curved fins are recessive, by continually breeding fish that have this gene, you will get a larger and larger proportion of your stock that express it. By introducing stock that does not have this characterstic the majority of fry produced, even if they carry the characteristic, is not expressed. Sadly, in some cases the fish are so rare or difficult to come by that you just have to make do.