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I wanted to post this thread last night, but I was too angry to compose my thoughts in a rational manner. I am still upset with this incident, so please forgive me if I do come across that way.
Last night, Shalena and I went to the local PetCo to pick up a few new odds and ends for a new addition that we will be receiving next week. As usual, we had to look at the animals in the store before we actually gathered the items that we were going to pick up.
This is where shopping trip goes down hill.
As we were looking at the Ball Pythons and Corns, I began to smell what I believed was a dead animal. We walked to the other side of the reptile display and checked were looking at the Garter snakes when I told Shalena that the dead animal smell was getting stronger.
The Boa tank was a little further down and Shalena beat me to it. As she looked in, she pointed out one Boa specifically and said how bad it looked. I walked over and looked at the boa, agreed that it looked horrible. It looked horrible because it was dead! The way the boa was laying in the tank, it was intermingled between some vines and its head was toward the back of the cage. (Note: The Boa’s head and upper body were lying upside down.) Shalena couldn’t see the Boa’s upper body or she would have realized instantly that it was dead.
Of course I became angry. It wasn’t the fact that the boa had died that angered me, but the fact that the boa was lying in the cage long enough to produce that stench.
I walked to the front of the store and, in a not so happy tone of voice, asked the employee how frequently they checked on their animals. She told me that they check their animals at least twice daily. I asked if, during any of their checks, they had noticed the dead Boa Constrictor that was producing the stench. She immediately notified another employee to check the Boa cage.
The other employee comes over and she tells him about the dead Boa. His reply: “Another one?” Of course that didn’t help decrease my anger level! While we were walking to the Boa cage, the employee tells me that this made their third dead Boa this week. He said that one was found dead in the cage and that another died on its way to the vet.
As we got to the tank, I had to literally point out which Boa was the dead one. Now, at this point I’m sure that I looked like the good old mercury thermometer. I’m sure you could see my ‘red’ level going up. Shalena stepped back and watched. I would imagine that she was expecting the steam to come shooting out of my ears at any second.
I asked the guy if the first two dead Boas failed to render a clue that something may be wrong and also asked what the Boas symptoms were. He told me that from what he had seen, the boas were “acting very weird.” He said he had noticed the Boas “flipping backwards” and “rolling over” along with one Boa pushing his face into the substrate with an open mouth causing one employee to remove substrate from the Boa’s mouth on apparently more than one occasion.
At this point the assistant manager comes around and I explained the symptoms of Inclusion Body Disease (which nobody else in the store had ever heard of). After explaining the neurological symptoms, I asked if any of the Boas had regurgitated their meals. Guess what…. Nobody had a clue when the Boas had last been fed, let alone if any had regurgitated.
I explained that IBD was a virus that was more than likely already spread to the other boas that were housed with the dead one. I advised them to bag and tag the dead Boa and explicitly list on the tag that the Boa was probably infected with IBD. I also advised them to remove the two other boas from the enclosure and quarantine them. I told them that the responsible thing to do would be to post a notification of the possible IBD exposure and requested that they do so to advise any other customers in case they had purchased an infected animal. His response… if the vet agrees then they will have to post it.
So, this morning I have printed off some IBD information and am typing a letter to the store’s management. Hopefully they will do the right thing.
I realize that most employees don’t make a career of working at PetCo, but come on…. Is a little education about the animals that they are keeping in the store to much to ask for? And why would they not get a vet consult bases on the other two Boa’s deaths?
I’m sure this post is long enough so I’ll end it here. I’m going back to PetCo shortly to deliver the IBD information and my letter and hopefully explain things more thoroughly to the store’s management.
Last night, Shalena and I went to the local PetCo to pick up a few new odds and ends for a new addition that we will be receiving next week. As usual, we had to look at the animals in the store before we actually gathered the items that we were going to pick up.
This is where shopping trip goes down hill.
As we were looking at the Ball Pythons and Corns, I began to smell what I believed was a dead animal. We walked to the other side of the reptile display and checked were looking at the Garter snakes when I told Shalena that the dead animal smell was getting stronger.
The Boa tank was a little further down and Shalena beat me to it. As she looked in, she pointed out one Boa specifically and said how bad it looked. I walked over and looked at the boa, agreed that it looked horrible. It looked horrible because it was dead! The way the boa was laying in the tank, it was intermingled between some vines and its head was toward the back of the cage. (Note: The Boa’s head and upper body were lying upside down.) Shalena couldn’t see the Boa’s upper body or she would have realized instantly that it was dead.
Of course I became angry. It wasn’t the fact that the boa had died that angered me, but the fact that the boa was lying in the cage long enough to produce that stench.
I walked to the front of the store and, in a not so happy tone of voice, asked the employee how frequently they checked on their animals. She told me that they check their animals at least twice daily. I asked if, during any of their checks, they had noticed the dead Boa Constrictor that was producing the stench. She immediately notified another employee to check the Boa cage.
The other employee comes over and she tells him about the dead Boa. His reply: “Another one?” Of course that didn’t help decrease my anger level! While we were walking to the Boa cage, the employee tells me that this made their third dead Boa this week. He said that one was found dead in the cage and that another died on its way to the vet.
As we got to the tank, I had to literally point out which Boa was the dead one. Now, at this point I’m sure that I looked like the good old mercury thermometer. I’m sure you could see my ‘red’ level going up. Shalena stepped back and watched. I would imagine that she was expecting the steam to come shooting out of my ears at any second.
I asked the guy if the first two dead Boas failed to render a clue that something may be wrong and also asked what the Boas symptoms were. He told me that from what he had seen, the boas were “acting very weird.” He said he had noticed the Boas “flipping backwards” and “rolling over” along with one Boa pushing his face into the substrate with an open mouth causing one employee to remove substrate from the Boa’s mouth on apparently more than one occasion.
At this point the assistant manager comes around and I explained the symptoms of Inclusion Body Disease (which nobody else in the store had ever heard of). After explaining the neurological symptoms, I asked if any of the Boas had regurgitated their meals. Guess what…. Nobody had a clue when the Boas had last been fed, let alone if any had regurgitated.
I explained that IBD was a virus that was more than likely already spread to the other boas that were housed with the dead one. I advised them to bag and tag the dead Boa and explicitly list on the tag that the Boa was probably infected with IBD. I also advised them to remove the two other boas from the enclosure and quarantine them. I told them that the responsible thing to do would be to post a notification of the possible IBD exposure and requested that they do so to advise any other customers in case they had purchased an infected animal. His response… if the vet agrees then they will have to post it.
So, this morning I have printed off some IBD information and am typing a letter to the store’s management. Hopefully they will do the right thing.
I realize that most employees don’t make a career of working at PetCo, but come on…. Is a little education about the animals that they are keeping in the store to much to ask for? And why would they not get a vet consult bases on the other two Boa’s deaths?
I’m sure this post is long enough so I’ll end it here. I’m going back to PetCo shortly to deliver the IBD information and my letter and hopefully explain things more thoroughly to the store’s management.
i work for a petstore and our animals are NEVER anything like that, thankfully. 
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