So on Saturday silly ol' me thought it may be a good idea to walk into a pet shop. Sigh. It's one of those aquarium specialist places. I was actually happy with all the fish tanks... they were all very clean, weren't too crowded, no dead floaters. I was a little upset to see 2 gorgeous cat fish in a tank each, but they had their own tanks, could easily turn around and had space to swim a bit. More than I can say for other pet shops.
I was happy with the enclosures for the bunnies. Only 2 to an enclosure and they had about 1/3 the space my buns have on their bottom floor (enough to hop 3 times I'd say). All their bedding was clean. Perhaps they had only been cleaned out for the WEEK?!
I wish I could say more for the birds & rats.
The birds almost made me cry. They all seemed so scared. Some birds will come to the cage and let you pat them, or at least want to see what you are all about. Not these guys. They all flew away and screeched and fluttered their wings around scared. Most had dirty water, or none at all. Seed was minimal. Loosing feathers. One big cocky was in a cage way too small for him and practically in the dark - maybe to keep him quiet? He didn't look very happy.
The rats did make me cry! They were in the smallest tanks ever. They stank sooo bad. I mean need to be cleaned out 3 days ago bad. Definitely over crowded. Some tanks were hidden in a dark corner with big blocks on top, obviously to stop escapees, but also not allowing much fresh air in.
I wanted to buy them all! Apart from the fact I don't have a cage for them, I wouldn't purchase anything from that shop (other than the animals just to SAVE them) and not sure how the b/f would react to 15 rats when he came home LOL.
I am trying to compose a letter to the said pet shop, but who else can I alert? RSPCA? Do they have the power to do anything? I'm afraid all they will do is walk in, issue a warning, walk out and forget about it.
Letters to the editor are great - if they get published!!
I think it's great that you are going to write them a letter and I suppose you could alert the RSPCA as well, but I'm not sure if they have power over pet shops. You could let the shop know you are reporting them (even if you don't), it might make them think about the state of their shop.
Yes yes write to your local newspaper, which generally welcome the opinions of readers.
I absolutely hate the conditions of pet shops, not only how animals are cunningly advertised and projected for impulse buys, but the "breeders". Have you seen the ACA footage from Animal Liberation Victoria's raid of a puppy farm? Its horrible. Sometimes the cockatoos & rare parrots arent bred at all... they are captured from the wild. These people obviously have no care for the animals whatsoever and prefer to pocket more money.
One thing that really irritates me especially is birds in cages. Birds naturally would fly for x amount of kilometres daily yet are forced to live within metal wires where they cant fly at all! Parrots and cockies in cages especially irritate me so so so so much. We are completely depleting them of a happy life.
A great motto to this: "nature loved birds so it created trees. Men loved birds so they created cages. Its a stupid world we have created."
I always call the RSPCA when I see sad looking animals, and sometimes they can do something, the laws arent strict enough to properly protect the animals, but call the RSPCA!
