Evil Den of Pet Torture
So Alex and I were up to Walmart last night to finally get me a mouse (Alex hates the track pad on my laptop and I will admit it is easier to play games with a mouse). As we were leaving Kelsey Drive we noticed a new store, Petcetera. Seeing as we're very into fish these days we decided to pop in.
Here are the two things there that really bugged me:
1. Bettas in plastic cups. Like the kind of cup you get at outdoor events, the fish couldn't lie straight in them and there was maybe two inches of water in the thing. Now I know that most pet stores keep bettas in small containers and frankly it's still inhumane in their case but at least the fish can move. I was thinking of how to explain the cruelty of it this morning and I think I've come up with something fairly apt. Imagine your in a hot tub (but the jets are turned off and there is no chlorine) so here you are hanging out in nice warm water, but you have to pee. You don't want to leave to tub so you just go ahead and pee in the tub. Now imagine that you get stuck in the tub (someone takes away the ladder and puts a wall up around it because their pissed off that you peed in their tub) and you're stuck there all day. So by the end of it your sitting their with your own urine and feces hanging out around you. How would you feel? Would you be happy? Would you feel healthy?
If you wouldn't want it done to you why would you do it to a fish?
But you counter: Bettas live in rice paddies, just little puddles. But it’s a puddle that is infinity wide when you compare it to the size of the fish. A betta could probably swim for days (in it's leisurely pace) before reaching an edge. And living in that rice paddy are all sorts of organisms that process urine and feces. The water is much cleaner than what is in that little cup.
Also, you probably think bettas are rather lethargic because they hardly move in their little pet store bowls but I beg to differ. My little guy, Fishy, lives in a 3 gallon tank at home and he's quite active and curious, I could watch him for hours. He’s active because he has room to move!
2. In the main fish tanks I saw a fish with its entire tail bitten off, I could see the white stuff inside. This deeply disturbed me (seriously I felt sick). The fish were so crowded in the tanks that they had become violent towards each other. Seriously, the tanks might have been 3 gallons and there were ten of these heavy bodied fish in there. Heavy bodied fish like this guy need about 75L (20 gallons) of swimming space. And that's just for one adult fish. Sure you could probably put two adults in a 20 gallon but you'd have a lot of work to do keeping it clean. To appreciate the situation put ten humans in a backyard swimming pool for a day. Gross.
Now I realize that we eat fish and fish in the wild will get eaten by something. But if you're going to take the responsibility of raising a fish as a pet you might as well have it as comfortable as it would be in the wild. Sure it may be about to be eaten but it had a good life up til then. It's the same problem I have with how we raise food for slaughter, sure you're going to eat it but the least you can do is treat it well until the time comes. It's called respect. Respect for the way nature works. We have the power to capture animals and we have the choice not to torture them.
So, I ask you all. Not to buy anything from Petcetera. I admit I want to go and buy up every poor fish in there and find it a good home but the store will just buy more. So please, just don't buy things from there. Let's show them that Newfie's are a humane people.
Here are the two things there that really bugged me:
1. Bettas in plastic cups. Like the kind of cup you get at outdoor events, the fish couldn't lie straight in them and there was maybe two inches of water in the thing. Now I know that most pet stores keep bettas in small containers and frankly it's still inhumane in their case but at least the fish can move. I was thinking of how to explain the cruelty of it this morning and I think I've come up with something fairly apt. Imagine your in a hot tub (but the jets are turned off and there is no chlorine) so here you are hanging out in nice warm water, but you have to pee. You don't want to leave to tub so you just go ahead and pee in the tub. Now imagine that you get stuck in the tub (someone takes away the ladder and puts a wall up around it because their pissed off that you peed in their tub) and you're stuck there all day. So by the end of it your sitting their with your own urine and feces hanging out around you. How would you feel? Would you be happy? Would you feel healthy?
If you wouldn't want it done to you why would you do it to a fish?
But you counter: Bettas live in rice paddies, just little puddles. But it’s a puddle that is infinity wide when you compare it to the size of the fish. A betta could probably swim for days (in it's leisurely pace) before reaching an edge. And living in that rice paddy are all sorts of organisms that process urine and feces. The water is much cleaner than what is in that little cup.
Also, you probably think bettas are rather lethargic because they hardly move in their little pet store bowls but I beg to differ. My little guy, Fishy, lives in a 3 gallon tank at home and he's quite active and curious, I could watch him for hours. He’s active because he has room to move!
2. In the main fish tanks I saw a fish with its entire tail bitten off, I could see the white stuff inside. This deeply disturbed me (seriously I felt sick). The fish were so crowded in the tanks that they had become violent towards each other. Seriously, the tanks might have been 3 gallons and there were ten of these heavy bodied fish in there. Heavy bodied fish like this guy need about 75L (20 gallons) of swimming space. And that's just for one adult fish. Sure you could probably put two adults in a 20 gallon but you'd have a lot of work to do keeping it clean. To appreciate the situation put ten humans in a backyard swimming pool for a day. Gross.
Now I realize that we eat fish and fish in the wild will get eaten by something. But if you're going to take the responsibility of raising a fish as a pet you might as well have it as comfortable as it would be in the wild. Sure it may be about to be eaten but it had a good life up til then. It's the same problem I have with how we raise food for slaughter, sure you're going to eat it but the least you can do is treat it well until the time comes. It's called respect. Respect for the way nature works. We have the power to capture animals and we have the choice not to torture them.
So, I ask you all. Not to buy anything from Petcetera. I admit I want to go and buy up every poor fish in there and find it a good home but the store will just buy more. So please, just don't buy things from there. Let's show them that Newfie's are a humane people.