PetSmart/Petco hamster ages.

Trixafena2 · 07-02-2012, 09:01 PM

I'm just honestly curious. I've gotten all of my rodents from Petco/PetSmart and was curious on the age group or so around when they were sold. My hamster Arhi was separated and alone when i got her, and she was only 6 dollars. So I'm sorta assuming she might be older. I wanted to know a about age so I can give them birthdays XD

Mikayla · 07-02-2012, 09:21 PM

They are sold from 4-10 weeks. Usually around 6 weeks.

Poetgonemad · 07-02-2012, 10:10 PM

Petco doesnt really take care of there pets. Thats probably why yours was cheap because he was alot older. In smaller stores someone is hired to come in everyday and take care of the pets. In petco they are there to sell items and thats about it and maybe clean the cages once and awhile. Everytime i go into petco there are flies all over the place around the pets and in their food.

Mikayla · 07-02-2012, 11:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Poetgonemad

Petco doesnt really take care of there pets. Thats probably why yours was cheap because he was alot older. In smaller stores someone is hired to come in everyday and take care of the pets. In petco they are there to sell items and thats about it and maybe clean the cages once and awhile. Everytime i go into petco there are flies all over the place around the pets and in their food.

Uhm...false. Small pet stores are (in my experience) much, MUCH worse than chains. No details as they are rather upsetting but I've never found a pet store with better standards that petco/petsmart. I don't agree with their decisions, but they are better than most. There's always the odd one out, I'm sure there's a good small pet store somewhere, but as a general rule, small pet stores are terrible.

Poetgonemad · 07-02-2012, 11:22 PM

Every single petco ive been too has had many animals cramped into small living spaces. While the small petstores(which i would rather go to then the chains) have a whole wall full of animals with one or two too a tank depending on the animal. And smaller stores. Buy from better distributors who dont Inbreed.

Bozly's Family · 07-03-2012, 12:49 AM

Bozly goes to the same vet my local Petco uses (Petco actually referred us to this vet and this vet is amazing with small animals!). The vet told me our Petco probably sold us Bozly around 4 weeks, I think, as he was small and certainly a baby when we got him. He was also alone in a tank by himself though!

mommyzoo · 07-03-2012, 02:37 AM

I got very upset with Petco one time and if I had another place to go I probably would, but there is nothing else close to me. When my kids had hermit crabs, we were walking around thier cages just looking for stuff to put in the tank and of course my kids had to go check on the hermies. They still do. The humidity was at 30% (suppose to be 80) and there was a dead hermit crab. I was busy consoling my then 4 year old who knew all about hermit crabs. My then 5 year old ran to get help for the little guys as there were associates in fish where I could see her. It took them 15 min. to come see what was wrong. I refused to leave. Then the chick told me that they only needed to be sprayed 2 times a day and that it wasnt her fault the hermit crab died. I told her I was not moving till they fixed the humidity which took her about 15 more min. including her arguing. We were still there about 20 min later looking at fish tank stuff when my daughter overheard her trying to sell a lady her a hermit crab. It is sad when a 4 year old knows more about correct pet care than some one who is suppose to know. We ended up taking one of the crabbies home and he lived for a few months, he never came up from his molt, but atleast he had a few months with a good well informed home. I did have one good experience from that I emailed petco and the guy over that areas petcare called me. He said he had corrected the situation and if I ever saw anymore problems I was to call him directly. I checked back every couple of weeks till we moved and they had improved thier care, but I didnt go back to shopping at Petco till we moved and there is no really good petstores near us.
We actually got our hamsters from them and they were in the same tank. But they had not started fighting yet. If I catch really deplorable conditions I make sure it is corrected no matter what. It shows my kids animal care is important too. I am assuming my hamsters were under or around 6 weeks as they were not fighting yet. But I am not a good judge.

Kissa · 07-03-2012, 02:44 AM

I don't know about Petco, but I think P@H start selling their babies at six weeks.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Poetgonemad

Petco doesnt really take care of there pets. Thats probably why yours was cheap because he was alot older. In smaller stores someone is hired to come in everyday and take care of the pets. In petco they are there to sell items and thats about it and maybe clean the cages once and awhile. Everytime i go into petco there are flies all over the place around the pets and in their food.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MMMTDF

Uhm...false. Small pet stores are (in my experience) much, MUCH worse than chains. No details as they are rather upsetting but I've never found a pet store with better standards that petco/petsmart. I don't agree with their decisions, but they are better than most. There's always the odd one out, I'm sure there's a good small pet store somewhere, but as a general rule, small pet stores are terrible.

It depends on the branch, I suspect -- or at least, it does for the big green pet store over here!

Poetgonemad · 07-03-2012, 03:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mommyzoo

I got very upset with Petco one time and if I had another place to go I probably would, but there is nothing else close to me. When my kids had hermit crabs, we were walking around thier cages just looking for stuff to put in the tank and of course my kids had to go check on the hermies. They still do. The humidity was at 30% (suppose to be 80) and there was a dead hermit crab. I was busy consoling my then 4 year old who knew all about hermit crabs. My then 5 year old ran to get help for the little guys as there were associates in fish where I could see her. It took them 15 min. to come see what was wrong. I refused to leave. Then the chick told me that they only needed to be sprayed 2 times a day and that it wasnt her fault the hermit crab died. I told her I was not moving till they fixed the humidity which took her about 15 more min. including her arguing. We were still there about 20 min later looking at fish tank stuff when my daughter overheard her trying to sell a lady her a hermit crab. It is sad when a 4 year old knows more about correct pet care than some one who is suppose to know. We ended up taking one of the crabbies home and he lived for a few months, he never came up from his molt, but atleast he had a few months with a good well informed home. I did have one good experience from that I emailed petco and the guy over that areas petcare called me. He said he had corrected the situation and if I ever saw anymore problems I was to call him directly. I checked back every couple of weeks till we moved and they had improved thier care, but I didnt go back to shopping at Petco till we moved and there is no really good petstores near us.
We actually got our hamsters from them and they were in the same tank. But they had not started fighting yet. If I catch really deplorable conditions I make sure it is corrected no matter what. It shows my kids animal care is important too. I am assuming my hamsters were under or around 6 weeks as they were not fighting yet. But I am not a good judge.

I talked to them about the flies and they said they were calling about it and had no idea. I gave them the benifit of the doubt that they were atleast trying to fix it. I lived right around the corner and go there sometimes because they have good deals on tanks. And the flies were still all over the place. Again i asked them and they gave me the same run around. So i called the number that are on the tanks where they are held that say call if the animals arent being treated well or something along those lines. And the next week i came back and the problem was fixed. I was alittle upset for being lied to but atleast it got fixed. And the animals are clean and healthy

**kyrilliondaemon** · 07-03-2012, 03:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kissa

It depends on the branch, I suspect -- or at least, it does for the big green pet store over here!

Very much so... Says a lot when we travel 1.5 hours to go to a decent branch rather than the one 20 minutes away.

Er... As far as age goes, we just ask before purchase. Scamp was 6 weeks, Dusty, Scruff, Timmy and Bump were 11 weeks (and the ones out front were 13 weeks, we demanded the younger ones), some roborovskis they had for a while were 12 weeks, 5 months and 6 months of age, Muffin was 4 months old when we got him. All from the big green pet store in Aberystwyth (Muffin being one of the last times we ever set foot in there lol).
Skip, Whizz and Fwirl were rescues.

They get them in at 5 weeks and wait about a week for quarantine before they'll sell so the youngest they can sell them is about 6 weeks.