Pet shops or local reptile breeders?

[Nephil]

Hello reptile owners, and welcome to my second thread. This question might sound dumb, but it's just out of curiosity and know about people's opinions. I got a ball python from a pet shop in a miserable condition, but he's getting better bit by bit with his weight, though i know getting a pet from a reptile breeder would be the best option. The problem is i live in a country where reptiles are rarely kept as pets (especially snakes), so reptile owners are even frowned upon cause the pets they are keeping are referred to as "belonging to the wild therefore they suffer in captivity". I feel really bad about animals getting neglected in pet shops, and i'd like to hear out your opinions from this question: if you can help a neglected animal from a pet shop get better in a loving home with the right determination, aren't pet shops better to buy from? And even if you are aware of the possible negative consequences from buying a pet in a bad condition, why are reptile breeders better? Im not saying pet shops are better, i just see people getting ready to even argue about how you shouldn't buy from a pet store no matter what. No arguing under this thread though please ^^'

[KMG]

If you buy anything from a place that is doing that thing poorly you are merely perpetuating a terrible cycle.

That said some pet shops can have nice snakes from reputable sources... Or even breed them themselves so you can't lump them all together. A local pet store to me has some great snakes. They are private owned and not the big box ones. I bought me Brooks Kingsnake from them and she is thriving wonderfully.

[Bleh]

Reptile specialists / hobbyists is my preference.

A hobbyist has spent quite some time learning about their desired animal types and are much more likely to have an animal in the correct condition to be rehomed.

I used to use a 'popular' pet supplies shop around here for my dog and cat food, and regularly would walk around their stock of animals with the kids because the kids enjoyed it. They didn't stock loads and loads, mainly rabbits, guinea pigs, hamsters, fish and a few reptiles sort of thing.

One day, I clocked they had a BP. It was the first time I saw they had a BP available so decided to ask about him. He couldn't have been much older than 3 months, and if he was he was probably too small.

Anyway, the staff didn't really know anything besides what information was on the plaque, and that he seemed 'a bit aggressive'... I asked the staff member to open the enclosure, informing him that I regularly handle BP's, and that I would accept all responsibility if he'd struck me (as per their warning signs that animals can be unpredictable).

Anyway, the lad opened the enclosure and I distracted the young BP with one hand while picking him up with another. In less than two minutes the BP was exploring my hands and the staff member commented that nobody else has been able to handle him in that way. I explained that he wasn't actually aggressive, but scared!

But to the point. It was blatantly obvious from that experience that nobody in that shop had the slightest bit of experience in handling BP's and therefore his welfare wasn't prioritised but ability to produce profit.

If a pet shop has an animal enthusiast there who has some knowledge about the animals being sold, then you can almost be assured the animal will be happier and better looked after, but sadly many pet shops employ 'staff' and not enthusiasts so I'd suggest a good 'general' pet shop are few and far between.

This is why I'll only go to hobbyists / reptile specialists for my snakes.

[Hugsplox]

If you buy anything from a place that is doing that thing poorly you are merely perpetuating a terrible cycle.

That said some pet shops can have nice snakes from reputable sources... Or even breed them themselves so you can't lump them all together. A local pet store to me has some great snakes. They are private owned and not the big box ones. I bought me Brooks Kingsnake from them and she is thriving wonderfully.

100% agree with this. Kind of like some of the big fish youtubers that go "rescue" all the beta fish from some of the big box stores. When you buy an animal from a petstore, especially the big ones, you're just telling their system that that animal sells and that they need more. As much as we'd all love to walk into these places and save these animals from what sometimes really is terrible care, we'd just end up going back to save the next one they get since the last one sold.

Now, like KMG said that doesn't go for EVERY pet store. The place I get my feeders from I'd 100% purchase animals from them. The difference is if I wanted to I could arrange to meet the breeder they get their animals from because they're all local. Of course I'm not going to be able to get some of the harder to find species that way, but if there's something in the shop that grabs my attention, I don't have any reservations about purchasing there.

[TofuTofuTofu]

I have looked into a few local pet stores about an hour in my vicinity, namely reptile specialty stores. Despite good reviews online, they have all been, as a rule, shockingly terrible. I don't throw around the word animal abuse often, but the last place I went to fit that bill (cohabbing iguanas--by the way, they are and were illegal to sell then! A terrified live rat inside of a ball python cage with no hides, fungus gnats in all of the enclosures, aspen bedding or literally no bedding with just glass on the bottom, and uh, a black nearly dead chameleon in a taped up screen cage sitting outside their front door?). And they have a 4.5 star rating out of like over a hundred reviews. The owner was also clearly on drugs lol, and had a criminal record when I looked into it further. Florida. Or at least, my area of Florida.

So yeah. I could have purchased an animal from there because I felt bad for them. But I would have been giving that guy money, as well as likely introducing diseases to my reptiles at home. Who deserves your money: a pet store owner whose goal is to maximize profits, or a small breeder who specializes in taking care of a smaller number of species and actually knows how to take care of them? Like, I know not all breeders are the best either, but the good ones are just reptile nerds who want to spread the word about a specific breed or morph or whatever.

A specific kind of person will start a pet shop. They will be more business-minded and profit-minded, viewing the animals more like objects to sell. A local smaller-scale breeder, while they also sell their animals, are less on that large scale, automated kind of thing. The breeders I have talked with at expos (actual breeders, not some exhibiting store that has employees at the show), love to talk about the animals and have a ton of knowledge and enthusiasm. We have some really great, really nice local BCI and ball python breeders (unfortunately not species I was looking into purchasing at the time). Pet store owners can be like any variety of friendly, hostile, drug-addled, uninformed... lol. I don't know. My pet store experiences have been truly bad.

[Nephil]

I'm thankful for all the replies i got and yeah, thwt makes sense. Though oftentimes it feels hella sad to not be able to help any neglected animals in a pet shop, but i won't support those stores anymore in the future. I really would like to get a BP morph in a good condition for an affordable price, but 1 normal BP is enough for me and i got him not only out of pity but also cause i had no other options since good reptile stores and good reptile breeders aren't a thing at all here unless you enter a big city of the country. Thanks for the answer!

[Nephil]

I have looked into a few local pet stores about an hour in my vicinity, namely reptile specialty stores. Despite good reviews online, they have all been, as a rule, shockingly terrible. I don't throw around the word animal abuse often, but the last place I went to fit that bill (cohabbing iguanas--by the way, they are and were illegal to sell then! A terrified live rat inside of a ball python cage with no hides, fungus gnats in all of the enclosures, aspen bedding or literally no bedding with just glass on the bottom, and uh, a black nearly dead chameleon in a taped up screen cage sitting outside their front door?). And they have a 4.5 star rating out of like over a hundred reviews. The owner was also clearly on drugs lol, and had a criminal record when I looked into it further. Florida. Or at least, my area of Florida.

So yeah. I could have purchased an animal from there because I felt bad for them. But I would have been giving that guy money, as well as likely introducing diseases to my reptiles at home. Who deserves your money: a pet store owner whose goal is to maximize profits, or a small breeder who specializes in taking care of a smaller number of species and actually knows how to take care of them? Like, I know not all breeders are the best either, but the good ones are just reptile nerds who want to spread the word about a specific breed or morph or whatever.

A specific kind of person will start a pet shop. They will be more business-minded and profit-minded, viewing the animals more like objects to sell. A local smaller-scale breeder, while they also sell their animals, are less on that large scale, automated kind of thing. The breeders I have talked with at expos (actual breeders, not some exhibiting store that has employees at the show), love to talk about the animals and have a ton of knowledge and enthusiasm. We have some really great, really nice local BCI and ball python breeders (unfortunately not species I was looking into purchasing at the time). Pet store owners can be like any variety of friendly, hostile, drug-addled, uninformed... lol. I don't know. My pet store experiences have been truly bad.

Dang, the reptile side of alot of pet shops is really messed up ngl

[Hugsplox]

Dang, the reptile side of alot of pet shops is really messed up ngl

Yea some are worse than others. Don't get me wrong though, there are plenty of shops that do it really well, there are even some box stores that don't do a bad job. I have a smaller box chain where I live that takes amazing care of their tropical fish section. Now, that's due to the employees being in the hobby and knowing what they're doing and has nothing to do with the guidance given by the chain, but still. It's really up to you at the end of the day to visit any store you're potentially going to be spending money at. I wouldn't even by dry goods from a store that I didn't think was taking good care of their animals.

As many folks like to say on here, you show your support by spending money. So my advice to you is if a reptile shop is your only option, just do your research, spend some time in the shopping looking at the animals and talking ot the employees, and spend your money somewhere you know cares about what they're doing.

[Snagrio]

I'm assuming online breeders are not an option for the OP? Because that would've been my suggestion if all local options were exhausted. Obviously there can be bad folks there just as much as in-person, but you often have a much bigger net to cast to find a breeder of integrity and quality.

[Nephil]

I'm assuming online breeders are not an option for the OP? Because that would've been my suggestion if all local options were exhausted. Obviously there can be bad folks there just as much as in-person, but you often have a much bigger net to cast to find a breeder of integrity and quality.

Hello there, sorry for the late reply, i forgot bout my thread cause of my pretty busy life going on. But ye, i did think of the online breeders but the only site that looked like the most known one that has the ability to sell BP's was kinda suspicious to me.. I actually find online animal shopping suspicious in general, i never tried that method and it might sound weird but i can be really paranoid bout things. The site didn't display the sellers' info, too many pricey adult BP's with no much backstory, and the only seller that interested me was someone that sold gorgeous baby BP morphs that costed only €40, though they had no reviews and even if they looked pretty legit i still felt very insecure. Plus another problem was that to get the animal from the seller you had to go to one of the biggest cities of the country (as i said, owning a snake here is kinda like being special cause of the lack of reptile selling business in general, you might see leopard geckos, iguanas and chameleons much more often in ownership and selling but still not very common). The seller of the morphs was kilometers and kilometers away from me, like many others were too. I found it like a big stretch especially in such burning weather that i literally can't stand at all, and since a big popular pet shop wasn't that much away from me that had a very underweight 3-4 month old BP i really wanted to save it (no worries, won't do that again). He has a monster like appetite (i feed him 2 hopper mice every 5 days) unlike in the pet shop where he never ate without force feeding, and is very chill though he still seems not very trusting since of the pretty heavy breathing he has with me out of his tub. Didn't listen to the pet shop care guide and i followed my research (blame snake discovery for making me a snake freak lol) and im trying to do the best for my tiny baby.