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as long as you can attain a work permit from your high school, then it is fine to get a job anywhere. I think it would all be great for us to get jobs at different lfs. In the darkness we are forming. The battleground, the common fish store. And not always does an lfs have the inch per gallon rule in effect, but they have money on the brain as opposed to goodness in the heart.

I have found that whether a 'fish specialist store' or a 'pet warehouse', there are always going to be examples of 'people just there to take the money'. Personally I've experienced instances whereby I've gone into a shop and known more than 99% of the staff. Once, even the owner didn't know that African cichlids were 'specialised' and tried to offer them to me when I was browsing for a pair of convicts. He actually thought that they would be compatible because 'cichlids are cichlids.... same species, same needs'. I left the shop QUICK!

On the plus side (and answering the idea of 'customers always being right' and 'shops not refusing to sell')... a huge aquatics outlet that I use the most has a policy that is displayed as soon as you enter stating that 'the well-being of the fish is priority' and that 'they will not sell livestock if it is deemed unhealthy to it'

It is a very helpful, friendly and professional store and the questioning is genuinely out of interest and not just for the sake of it.

i've applied for jobs at three of my local stores, never got a job, but when i go in i also hear the most stupid things, from the people who get the jobs. the mangers must look at my applicataion and say this lad has kept fish for 12 years knows quiet a bit so can't have him he'd advise the customers well!!]:|

at one of the local large chain stores, which i never buy from, i just look every so often, a couple had come in to buy fish, the assistent didn't ask what size tank, if it was cycled, then the couple picked a betta, 2 black neons, a dwarf gourami and 3 danios the assistant then put them all in the same bag!! he gave no advise. i stood behind talking loadly to my girlfriend saying that betta is going to make mincemeat out of the gourami! i just got a funny look and i left.

another think that annoys me, i helped setup a 10g tank at my girlfriends parents, when i set it up there was no problem, then the mother started talking to LFS idiots, and now my adivse is wrong, and they don't listen top me now. they have had more fish in that 10g over last few months then i have every had, all becasue the lfs have said, oh that fish will be fine in 10g, and only feed your fish 2 flakes every other day!!!]:| the best though sand is bad for tropical fish, is aborbs the ammonia then releases it in one go, this kills the fish. i told they had ammonia problem when i tested it, didn't listen] the problem came from to many fish and clean filter to often. they have now changed sand, i've told them they might have problem again, mini cycle.

[span class="edited"][Edited by shekoi 2004-07-21 05:28][/span]

www.blooming-brilliant.co.uk

My LFS has a sign up that says as long as you have a filter you can have 4" of fish per gallon. No joke. It is laminated and everything and has been there for awhile. I will try to get a picture of it and post it.

GreenFootball - Our LFS sells electric yellow cichlids as feeders.

Some guy has some, and they produce massive amounts of fry. We can't really sell them all for pets even though they are very nice looking (they are well-bred and come from good parents). They just get tossed into whatever tank is empty and we sell them as feeders. There are just so many of them...

I wouldn't mind using fancy guppies as feeders though... I hate those fish.

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

One of the greatest moments at the LFS is when I get to reject the sale of a fish, especially when the customer brings in a water sample. Fish like arrowanas (sp?) and discus require a water sample and must test okay for pH ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate. One guy came in one day with a nitrite of more than 10 ppm and I forced him out of the store.

thats good with water sample... but man... 36 fancy tails... i dont know about the price around the world, but here, they sell 4 dollars per pair, so 36 would cost him 72 dollars!!!! while he couldve gotten some feeder guppies for like 1 dozen for a dollar.:%)

I was at a big chain pet store the other day where the employee knew nothing about fish, and just tried to get the customer to buy the most expensive set up he had in stock. The employee told him that he needed to wait 24 hours before adding fish, and that the fish he could add to this 10 gallon were lots of goldfish. Well I got very angry at this employee, so afterwards when the customer was on the checkout line I approached him and got into a deep convo about cycling, and about how goldfish are messy fish that need A LOT of room, and I advised him to get a bigger tank and buy things seperately b/c most of the things in the kit he got weren't going to get him too far. I also recomended him to this site, I hope he remembers. I'm not a fish expert but I'm def. more reliant than some of the ppl they hire at these places. Its not very easy to get a job at a pet store for teens bc of the age requirement, I think at most stores around here including PetCo you have to be 18 years old...or else I would have had a job a looooong time ago.

-Formerly known as the Ferretfish

i was at wal-mart the other day, this customer asked the guy to get him 36 fancy tail guppies, so i stood there and watched them wondering where he is going to put all 36 guppies in one tank at the same time, 1, 2, 3,...,36, then the customer said.. "damn its so expensive to feed my fish nowadays" and then the fish guy said "well, good luck, i'll see you again next week" so i guess this customer comes to wal-mart and buy 3 dozens of fancy tail guppies ALL the time to feed his fish... to save the whole shipment of guppies, i stepped in, and told the customer go somewhere else and buy FEEDER guppies, or FEEDER goldfish, or FEEDER rosey reds... and asked the wal-mart dude why they dont have any feeders... turned out... they do have those feeder goldfish, but they lost the tag for it, and all it says on the tank is "children under 5 with adult may get a free goldfish" :%):%) so they thought those goldfish were giveaways.

Mmmm feeder plant!

I just wish more employees would let customers know that most of those cute lil fish will GROW..they are juveniles. I watched a woman buy three baby bala sharks for a 5 gallon hex...and the worker said nothing. Also the small 2 or 3 inch Oscars or plecos..they need a sign on the tank..."these fish are going to be <-------------] big."

___________________________________________

If at first you DO succeed, try not to look astonished.

One thing that I think will always be bad about LFS is there in the mind frame of 'Inch per gallon rule' and putting fish tanks in 'groups' I went into my LFS and in there 'community fish' section they had I think a few gars...pacus...and I think a few bichirs(spelling.) It's pretty bad.

16 in most places.

I just started working at my LFS like about a month ago. I feel kind of good today, I talked some people out of getting two glass cats for their 6 gallon.

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

I completely agree with guppielove!
how old do you have to be to get a job at a FS?

But there are some good ones out there....my local chain pet store won't sell any more than 3 fish at a time to one person. Except regulars who seem to know what they're doing; they ask stuff like "Where are you putting them?" and "What's in your tank?"

My Wally World sold a diseased angelfish to a young cuple who had a 1g plastic container in their hands without thinking. No water conditioner. No equipment. No decorations. Plus the fact that the fish was taller than the container was.

And that great dane would also bite and mame anything it could from going insane in solitary confinement.

On the great danes in the closet...


Surely they'll only grow to the size of the room!!

That settles it.

All the members of Fish Profiles must volunteer/get a job at their local Fish store.

tut tut! No arguments!

We must rid the land of this terrible plague of fishy ignorance

My LFS is pretty good about fish. The employee who runs the fish area is pretty knowleagable about fish.

She also uses some kind of chemical in her tank (suggested by the same LFS) so she only has to "change the water every couple of months".

I have heard of that. It is called EasyBalance. It is made by the same people who make AquaSafe. All it does is keeps a steady pH for about 6 months. You still need to do water changes to rid ammonia from fish waste, rotten food, etc.

I can't believe the nerve of some people at pet store who do that kind of stuff. So ignorant!]:|]