Family-Owned Petstore

[crazywiggy]

Wheeky: I understand where you are coming from - all pigs deserve a good home, and yes I do feel sorry for the ones sitting in the pet store.

BUT - say I buy that one pig and give it a good home. That one single pig may be better off for it. But by doing so I affect a number of other pigs...

I give the pet store my custom which encourages them to buy more pigs in. Pet stores usually give very poor care, so this means more pigs have to suffer in the store.

The breeder gets more custom (when the store orders more) so they breed another litter. That causes suffering to the sow and puts her life at risk. Even if she survives, she may have 3 babies. All of these babies are condemned to life at the crappy breeders, then the pet store, where they get poor care.

Pet stores encourage impulse buying AND give out false info, so these new babies will probably go to crap homes when they are sold.

Finally, by buying one pig rather than adopting, you sentence one pig to death in a kill-shelter, or to being dumped or killed because shelters are full. Not only that, but those three babies bred to replace it means three more homeless piggies killed.

Conclusion? If you buy just one single pet store pig, you could be condemning 5 pigs to death!

If on the other hand you adopt, you not only save that one piggies life but you reduce demand for breeding, prevent more overpopulation and save many lives! If people stopped buying animals from pet stores they would stop ordering more in. If pet stores stopped ordering more from breeders, the breeders would stop breeding. Simple.

[wheekypigs]

Susan, I understand your passion for rescues and I hear your rationale. I think you do good work with the forum and with Guinea Cages, and appreciate that you keep up the vigilance on issues as these.

Like I said, the decision is with Ramon who raised the question, and hopefully it is not too late for him to do the right thing.

Thanks to all who contributed to the discussion.

[luvmyzoocrew]

Ramon please dont count out a rescue that is farther away just because you might not be able to get there, there are many rescues that will transport and deliver a pig to you or meet you half way. If you come across one on petfinder that is farther then you want to travel contact them anyway.

[Alusdra]

Perhaps in this instance it would be a good idea to talk to the petstore more. If you ask them where they get their pigs and they get all skeezy on you, then you can probably infer that they are buying pigs from pretty deplorable conditions. Besides all the rescue points- a pig from that sort of situation is bound to have all manner of health and behavioral problems. If they do tell you- go check out the place. Maybe it's super snazzy. Maybe it's horrendous. If it's nice, then you can ask them about rescues and how they feel about the abandoned guinea pigs and the likelihood that, without screening, the homeless pigs might be ones they produced. And either way you can discuss with the store about rehomed pigs and ones let loose or abused and even this website. We all on here think C&C cages are a given, but I met a lady in the ER with her piggie's little leg healing from being broken and in a cast that had no idea about this website. Obviously she feels that they are great animals worth (really expensive) vet care. But she just doesn't know.

If this store (or even the breeder) is really really great- maybe they just don't know about the guinea pig population problem. Maybe they would be willing to have actual contracts instead of just discouraging. Maybe they would switch over from a breeder to rescue pigs. Maybe even you could convince the breeder to do the same (or get them shut down). I don't see a problem with patronizing this good store in general. It's not neccessarily the pet stores themselves, but the animals-as-merchandise culture they are the face of. Though as you get more involved in rescue looking at any animal at a pet store becomes downright painful as you imagine what's ahead for them (potentially).

Everyone (me for sure) starts off with thinking "petstores are where you get pets" and then slowly morph into "petstores aren't perfect, but I don't see anything wrong with buying an animal from them" to "petstores probably shouldn't sell pets, but I have to rescue just this one." And then the final (or at least the one I'm at now) stage- you realize that that poor animal that has been sitting there for months or a year or more is not a pathetic case that needs to be rescued. He/she is a victory. That means enough people got the message that pet stores should not sell live animals.

When an animal is sitting there, bored, alone, growing old in a store... I'm sad, I hate it, but I'm happy, too. That animal is telling the store that it's not ok. They are desperate to get rid of it- might offer it for free, even. But every day it sits there it makes the pet store think, "what a waste this was! I'm going to stick to something that flies off the shelf not sits here and eats my money and my profit until I'm losing on it. Screw this, I'm only going to sell feeder fish (or maybe even just supplies!)."

[Susan9608]

When an animal is sitting there, bored, alone, growing old in a store... I'm sad, I hate it, but I'm happy, too. That animal is telling the store that it's not ok.

I have to quote this, because I think it's a really, really great line that should be seen/read again. I really appreciate this line of thought, as I've always thought this myself.