Sadly in New Mexico, reptiles aren't considered animals…. So it's very hard to get anything done about reptiles in poor conditions. Believe me I have tried. I try to talk (kindly!) to the employees and managers if I see an issue, but a few of the stores wouldn't do anything. I write to the main offices in these cases, but I usually get replies from them assuring me that their stores hold their animals first and that they do the best to provide adequate conditions for them. I won't give these stores my money. In general, I try to take my busniess to anywhere other than big pet stores, but sometimes I have to. In these cases, I try to stick to stores that keep their animals in good conditions (and we do have a few that do).
Found these guys a year ago… Haven't set foot in that store since. Manager just didn't care. One of the animals truly looked dead, but I didn't get a picture of that. Pics don't show just how awful the cage was. Waste caked on all the walls…. Smelled awful. Humidity gauge pic didn't come out, but it was at 0.
And this guy was at a big store in Florida. It was barely able to hold on to me. He was wheezing pretty bad too. The boa wasn't in awful shape yet, but it had quite a bit of stuck shed. Guy tried to tell me that's just how snakes shed their skin, it isn't all at once.
I am glad that these two snakes specifically have a good home now, but I don't support buying snakes in that condition. As other people said, all it does is fund the next one.
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