Question:
You guys pretty much heard my rants on the Pets-Unlimited in my area. Well, that exact store is now going to be under new management. The assistant manager got fired and the manager gave his two weeks.
They are the only store who sells Ultra-Blend 8-in-1 Hedgie food and wax worms. So when we went in, the manager told us the updates and we were quite content. The manager was a good person ... but favored his reptiles/fish over rodents/livestock ... so I'm glad he found something better, and I'm hoping the new management is going to be much much better!


Answer:
thats awesome Rob, maybe they will finally get their act together and turn the store around


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Great news!!!


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That's great. Let us know how the change goes.


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I hope it changes for the better!


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Hopefully he will run it much better, and will make sure the employees know something about animals!


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The manager decided to stay ... which I'm not sure if it's good or not.
Heather and I went in the store the other day ... and checked out their hedgehogs ... they had the same 6 for sale since we both left Pets Unlimited ... and usually they don't last much long ... which is good in a way ... cause more and more people are looking online and researching and seeing that pet store hogs arnt the greatest.
But anyways .. upon our inspection ... we noticed that the mother and sister were both well over the half way mark of hog pregnancy ... good job Pets Unlimited. They didn't bother to sex the one male and seperate him ... and Hegdehogs are quite simple to sex ... the hard part is just getting them to uncurl ... on top of that there is another female in the cage ... so she's at risk as well.
The youngings are all from the same litter, and are only about 3 months and a half. Usually female hedgehogs should not be mated with prior to 6 months at minimum. So apart from the possibility of having deformed babies with genetic problems ... and the first mother is blind in one eye ... the young pregnant female is at risk of some definant health issues ...
Doesn't look like its getting better, though the staff morale looked much cheerful ... animals morale dont seem to have changed much. But I was glad to see that the young hedgehogs did have good temperment ... which was a little surprising ...


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Wow that's horrible! There's a pet store similar over here in Toronto. It's PJ's pets at the Yonge and Eg mall. All the PJ's pets are pretty grungy, but this one takes the cake! I saw two spiny mice from there and when I asked if the cage they had was males or females they said "Oh, they're male and female, from the same litter". I wanted to ask them what they would have done if they had mated. They don't know ANYTHING about their animals there. :\


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Actually ... PJ's owns Pets-Unlimited ... and I beleive Hagen owns +50% of the shares ... could explain the similarities ...
But yeah ... willingly place a male and female from the same litter together ... thats just bad ... its surprising the things you hear at a pet-store ...


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Most pet stores out this way have an adoption program for their larger animals (meaning the animals, mostly cats and dogs, don't stay at the store, but come in at predetermined hours. Usually these animals are from local shelters and the proceeds go to the shelters), but their small animals still suffer. Most staff don't know anything about sexing the animals, let alone breeds (like rabbits!).
I wish we could appeal to someone to make some laws about this kinda thing. Not that it should be illegal to sell pets in a store, but perhaps for them to not have a knowledgable person on staff.
Perhaps it should be arranged that all pets come through "pet adoption" agencies from local breeders, etc, so that the animals never have to stay there, or at the very least, to make sure that the proper facilities are provided and that the information is correct!
I know how frustrating this is, as we were once thinking of selling our rabbits to a chain of local petstores, but after looking at the facilities and the feeble attempts at naming the breeds of rabbits they had, we were no longer interested.