What do pet stores do with unsold parrots/animals

Just curious.

I've been visiting the local PetsMart recently in preparation for my new caiques. There's this adorable cinnamon GCC baby that has been there FOREVER and today when I went, they put up a $80 dollar discount on him.

He looked as if he's craving some head rubs but unfortunately PetsMart put Plexiglass up in front of all the cages =( booohooo. Just the cutest little thing ever.

What will happen to him if nobody ends up taking him home?? I've always wondered about this.....Is it the same as to what happens to unwanted cats and dogs???

Pet smart policy is to reduce the price of the animal until it sells; I have asked them this before when they were given a pair of canaries to sell by a private individual. The manager refused to separate them. Originally they were over $100 each, but eventually were marked down to $50, and buy one get one free. Then I noticed that one was suffering, brought it to the attention of the manager, it was taken to the vet, had the band removed and was treated for leg I juries, and the manager adopted them.

That's a very good question and one that more people should ask! My best friend worked for a family owned pet store for just over a year when she discovered that they were getting dogs from puppy mills and other animals from similar situations. She actually got them shut down. It's also a little scary to realize that Petsmart keeps them in the store Til they sale them because they always have TONS of budgies which must mea they restock regularly and I wonder what kind of homes all these budgies are going to!

Two words: MYSTERY MEATLOAF!

Dad, how come my meatloaf tastes like chicken?!

I often notice a few "lifers" in the budgie box at pet smart, particularly mature grey or green hens.

An interesting question. I never pay attention to the animals at petsmart because it just hurts me,
But I did go in today with the plan to get a small school for my 55 gal tank. They were SOLD OUT of every fish. Literally. All empty tanks. So they said. I find that awfully hard to believe.

At the Petsmarts and Petcos in our area there are actually very few cages for bigger birds, and although some stores have glass, you can always ask the manager to open the cage and interact with a bird. There was a wonderful Nanday whom I often visited and he loved to spend time on my shoulder and play with me - he went from $500 to $300 until someone bought him. I think they just have the bird until it sells.

I just feel soooo bad for the little guy, every time I come by he would stop what he's doing and come right up to the window wanting head scratches. I really hope he finds a good home soon. It makes me feel a little better knowing that at least he's not going to be "discarded".

Birdman666 said:

Two words: MYSTERY MEATLOAF!

Dad, how come my meatloaf tastes like chicken?!

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That's true....I actually heard some horror stories of unsold/ unwanted pets from petsmart. ( from a person that actually was up there on the employment ladder, no longer works there because of what they found out)

And I...won't ever ever step foot into a petsmart....EVER!

My boyfriend worked for Petland, and they would cycle the birds through the city if mark downs no impact on the sale of the animal. If they didn't sell in the city at all, then the bird would be shipped out to a place that had good sales of that species. It rarely gets to that point though. Most of the employees would take on the animal if it was discounted far enough, or someone would eventually buy it. I know I got my rabbit for $15 (babies are $60) because he was "old" and had been there for about two months. Birds take longer to be marked down, though. They make such a stupidly high profit off them that marking them down $100 does little to their actual monetary gain.

I don't really care for the way pet stores sell animals at all. They hardly model appropriate care. And the employees know jack all unless the manager is actually caring. I honestly wish they'd stop selling anything with fur or feathers unless it's through the SPCA or surrendered animals. There's enough out there already that need good homes. And I HATE seeing the poor "fancy" conures at Petsmart. The clips are poor, they look horrendously ratty, and the poor things get fed a terrible diet in a puny plexiglass cage with zero appropriate toys.

/endrant

Doublete said:

An interesting question. I never pay attention to the animals at petsmart because it just hurts me,
But I did go in today with the plan to get a small school for my 55 gal tank. They were SOLD OUT of every fish. Literally. All empty tanks. So they said. I find that awfully hard to believe.

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Translation: The tanks got contaminated and had to be decontaminated before they could go back to selling fish.

Our Petco drops prices from outrageous to so so. They then xfer unsold birds to other stores.

That's the translation I took away as well. They said they were getting fish in today.

Doublete said:

That's the translation I took away as well. They said they were getting fish in today.

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I always see a bunch of dead fish and other fish feeding on the dead fish in the tanks and these employees just go about their business as if they don't see it.........

I mean yes they are "just" fish but still!!!!

SilverSage said:

I often notice a few "lifers" in the budgie box at pet smart, particularly mature grey or green hens.

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Aw... The "lifer" budgies that no one wants lol. Poor little things!

Fish are actually hard to keep alive.

I kept two ponds in California. It's even harder when they're outside, and you have 'coons and heron in the area.

But one sick fish can kill off a whole tank (or pond!)

I don't miss that...

Fish are harder than any other animal. I've had my 55 gal tank since 2007. Only about 3 of the 10 current inhabitants are "originals".

My parrot supply options are now extremely limited where I moved to so I went to the local "exotic pet" store...I was so absolutely heartbroken. It smelled rancid and there was just poop everywhere. The birds were on a diet of just frozen veggies and seeds and looked so scraggly. There were two U2s in a cage so small I wouldn't even keep my CAG in it with no toys and one of them was making a very obviously stressed screeching sound. There was an absolutely precious B&G that was a plucker and had terrible-looking feathers...he let me give him lots of love and was super sweet his poor head was absolutely covered with pin feathers. It's unfortunate because all the employees were nice and seemed to care but just not enough. I want to go in there and scrub everything down so badly!

I try my best to avoid big-name pet stores like the plague. Next birdy purchase, I'll probably end up driving 2 hours to the rescue-run store in scottsdale.

My petsmart just recently sold out of fish but they remodled the whole fish tank area so at least they were sold. At my petsmart they remove dead fish ASAP. I think they keep the birds until they are sold.

There was an aquarium shop that I use to go to but it's now close down and not because it was dirty or the owner was lazy, in fact it was one of the cleanest shops I had seen. Some nasty person went into this aquarium shop and dropped a number of small copper discs into a number of the marine tanks. This killed off the whole marine section of the shop. every single marine creature. The owner was devastated.

The owner had to clean the whole marine section and this included the filtration systems because he needed to find all the copper discs before he could re-stock. This cost the owner tens of thousands dollars (nearly 50 thousand). around two weeks after he had decontaminated and re-stocked the marine section, it happened again and put him out of business. His tanks were contaminated twice by a very nasty person.

I think it's an individual thing in how a pet shop staff look after the animals and not just the big name pet stores. But the big name pet store should do more checks on how their staff are looking after the animals. The pet shop that we use mainly for animals needs, focuses on re-homing / adoption of cats and dogs rather than the puppy and kitten mills. Yet they don't seem to get many birds to be re-homing or adopted.