I work at a Petsmart and a large part of my job is educating people on properly caring for their pets. I've only worked there about two months, but I'm already frustrated with a huge problem. Many many people are buying baby red eared sliders from the China Town in Chicago. These turtles are too young and small to be sold legally, but the real problem is that they are being sold to people with no clue about all of the things these little turtles need to survive.

People who recently purchased these turtles continuously come in to Petsmart thinking that they can keep them in tiny plastic critter carriers (2 gallons!) or sometimes they think a 10 gallon tank is sufficient. They come in and think that they can get everything the turtle needs for under twenty dollars and are really upset when they find out that getting a properly sized tank, the correct lighting, a filter, food, some sort of landing dock, etc will cost upwards of $100. Most of these people have great intentions and really want to properly care for their new pets, but they simply can't afford it. They were severely misled by the people who sold them the turtles and made it seem like an empty room temperature 2 gallon tank and some pellet food is all they need. They are led to believe that the turtles will always be that tiny and are really cheap and easy to care for, but they grow to about a foot and aquatic turtles have really complicated needs!

These people are not entirely without fault since you should never buy a pet on impulse without doing the proper research first, but the sellers' neglect is criminal! Is there anything that can be done to keep this from continuing to happen? I'm tired of hearing about these turtles being horribly neglected through lack of knowledge.