Shoutout to my local petco

[Cthulukelele]

I just wanted to give a positive shoutout to my local petco. I rarely went in the past as there are several decent lfs nearby, but I stopped by today to get some frozen calanus. They hired a hobbyist to run their saltwater section like 6 months ago, and it's starting to look nearly as good as my lfs. Healthy fish and coral and even a fairly healthy looking carpet anemone. Figured I should share. Was very surprised. Hadonni had just ate so mouth is a little open.

 

[Steven Garland]

Wow those look pretty good. I went into petco the otyer day to grab some snails and well they had some bubble tips that were just MUSHHHH,I felt so freakin' bad.

 

[Cthulukelele]

Wow those look pretty good. I went into petco the otyer day to grab some snails and well they had some bubble tips that were just MUSHHHH,I felt so freakin' bad.

Yeah I was shocked. They don't have showy blue heavy lighting, but it's clear the dude I met with is doing a great job given the equipment he was working with

 

[Jonreefer]

my local petco has a small saltwater section but no frags but the tanks are clean and the fish look healthy.
I have 2 bangi cardinals i got there a few weeks ago that are doing great.
There is another petco about 30min the opposite direction and their saltwater tanks look awful, not cleaned looking and unhealthy looking fish.

 

[Cthulukelele]

my local petco has a small saltwater section but no frags but the tanks are clean and the fish look healthy.
I have 2 bangi cardinals i got there a few weeks ago that are doing great.
There is another petco about 30min the opposite direction and their saltwater tanks look awful, not cleaned looking and unhealthy looking fish.

I'm genuinely considering coming back some time to grab a few frags. Didn't see a single aiptasia. There was bubble algae on a few frags, but really only a couple, and given the tank size they don't have a lot of natural control options.

 

[vetteguy53081]

A fish department is as good as the person who manages it. Nice to see

 

[sfin52]

Just like everything it's only as good as the person doing.

 

[Troylee]

Fwiw petco owns ora and that’s where their corals come from… I’ve bought a few the last month.. I get there when the shipments arrive and grab the bags before they hit the tanks at petco lol..

 

[RedoubtReef]

I can say the same for the Petco in Coeur d' Alene ID as well. Very well run, decent selection of saltwater fish, and a they even have nice little frag tank.

 

[Steven Garland]

Pretty much the Petco's here in Central Florida have cyano,bubble algae,return lines coated in hair algae fish look half dead zombie fish and just meh.

But their inverts look good lol so I get snails from them. If they can live in their water they can live in mine

 

[Gtinnel]

I have 3 PetCo stores within a 45 minute drive from me and they range from amazing to awful. Not surprisingly the one that’s amazing is managed by a hobbyist.

As already mentioned by a few people the quality of their saltwater section is a reflection of how much the person managing it knows and cares.

 

[Sharkbait19]

I’ve seen some good and bad ones, one of them often has a good selection of rarer fish too.
I still don’t trust any of them to be disease free though, so I’d be sure to qt all fish and inverts.