Been feeling smug, have to eat my words

I know Walmarts in the U.S. sell fish, some of them anyway, and the conditions they're kept under are often not ideal. I haven't seen any pets in any department store in decades. I think the last holdout was Walmart and that was at least 15 years ago. I thought that a law must have been passed ensuring that pets were only sold from places that had knowledgeable staff.

Well...today I happened to be meeting someone for coffee near a Walmart and I was early so I wandered through the store and discovered, to my horror, bettas! In the tiniest cups I've ever seen. I didn't even know you could get betta cups that small! I was horrified. They were dirty and did not look at all healthy. I am very disappointed by this. I was going to complain to the manager but what would be the point of that? I'm going to write to the local humane society but I have a feeling that the decision to stop selling live animals in the first place was voluntary rather than a law and that Walmart has just decided to jump into the void.

Oh, and they were labelled "show bettas"...

 

Yep I saw them at my local walmart a month ago , its actually sick because they don't actually have people who know how to care for fish, in those small of containers.

 

This is obviously very new then. I suppose we're both talking about the one in Langford?

 

Yes the Langford one, such a shame too, I just wish they were community fish I am getting a 75 gallon tomorrow

 

I work at a big box store that sells fish. Well, my store doesn't personally sell fish, but the stores in other locations do.

I've been given permission to write up a sort of paper on proper fish care.

I'm not saying what store it is, but it's not petco or petsmart.

*wanders away whistling*

 

A local Humane Society visit was enough to get the Petco near us temporarily banned from selling most pets years ago until they could prove they could hire individuals who were knowledgeable about the animals to provide proper care, better systems were in place, ones I had struggled for so long to try to get them to fix they were forced to actually fix and they had to prove a little at a time they could handle having animals again after that by only being allowed a few and doing surprise inspections, undercover scouts in plain clothes (as opposed to the usual animal cop that is sent out for routine inspections) and if anything was less than stellar, their permission for that type of animal was revoked for that much longer.

This was only the tip of the iceberg though and while I am glad that they are doing better for the animals now, there is a reason I have yet to be in a Petco in more than 8 years. I would go back to that Walmart with a camera, or even just phone with one if that's what you have, take pics of any you see that are really bad then pay a visit to the local Humane Society. It can't hurt to try and it might end up helping more than you expect.

 

I don't think I have ever been to a Walmart that didn't sell fish. From up north to here in Fla. Alison

 

When I was little our local Zellers (a department store, similar to K-Mart) had everything from budgies to hamsters. All sick of course. For at least 15 years though there have been no animal sales from non-specialty stores and I thought some sort of regulation had been passed to protect the animals. For bettas to suddenly start appearing in a Walmart saddens me.