I am thinking about getting a pet so I spent the whole day looking thru the store at Daves petfood city ,

Tomorrow I was thinking about going to petco from what I have read the top rate/best pet store is petco. What is your thoughts on the best store for getting pet stuff? Do you prefer anything over petco for animal supplies ?
Is petco the biggest retail pet store around the US.


Second based animal question
My other question is for you farmers or zoo people where would you normally go for your less domesticated animals or larger size domesticated animals supplies? From the looks of it petco , daves , us pets ,...etc are more geared to just cats,dogs,fish,birds, some rodents , and a few other traditionally home based animals.

I would imagine for the farmers horses , pig's , ducks , sheep ,...etc you must go somewhere else to get there food / vaccines / supplies

And for the zoo people I would imagine for your lions , cheetahs , camels , elephants ,...etc you would have to go to another supply store that I am not aware of. ( is it like individual stores for each animal at that point or a few large stores like petco for the big animals )

Maybe you order online don't know but anyway there must be some manufacture for these animals that are not so traditional for home based pets ... i.e the less domesticated or to big ones ....
And they must be located somewhere in the world though for retail not to sure you may have to have an account with them or something and show proof that you are a zoo owner / animal farmer don't know how this all goes.

Thanks for any answers to these questions.
Very curious

 

Zoos tend to have a veterinarian on staff.
Most zoos contract for their food and consumable supplies. They get an individual (or several) to supply a particular item on a schedule.
Small farms tend not to buy feed and call a veterinarian when required.

 

Ok but then where does the other people get the supplies ( note not only restricting to food )

If the animal farmers or zoo owners don't know where to get the supplies and need a veterinarian then where does the veterinarian go to get their supplies ?

Small farms tend not to buy feed and call a veterinarian when required.

what about the rest i.e the medium to large

Another question
Is where do animal farmers and zoo owners get there animals its not like they can walk down to the mspca or aspca or a breeder place like you can with the standard domesticated home animals that people buy. So is there any standard store to get farm animals or zoo animals?

I know craigslist has some farm animals but if you want babies or good quality.
And I have know Idea on where a zoo owner would start to get his animals apart from an exotic animal online site... but this doesn't seem like a standard way of doing it ... since how did they get there animals before the internet
Was there some thing equivalent to a travel agent i.e a local animal agent that could tell you who to get in contact with for zoo or farm animals..

Or if it was veterinarian then how did the veterinarian know where the animals where or how did the owners know where the veterinarian where. Either way even if they knew based on the yellow pages. Then Did the veterinarian log or keep track of all the locations of animals they serviced... either way without the internet I would think this would be to difficult to keep track of in terms of selling exotic animals and other things in general... but it was done to some extent so I don't get the big picture yet on this one.

Seems without the internet one would never know his options and what is available in the world... the internet brings all the information together to some extent. Though right now I am more interested in knowing how the old fashion way it was done

Maybe when I get a chance I will ask veterinarian they might know

 

You didn't ask for advice on whether or not to get a pet, but I'll offer some anyway.

There are some positives associated with having pets, but there are also some negatives.

Pets are big responsibilities. They must be watered, fed, housed, and (maybe) groomed. All of this costs money and/or time, and they need care every day, even when you don't feel like it or when you want to do other things (like go on a trip.) Pets need routine medical care and sometimes get sick; this can become very expensive and troublesome. Pets make messes with their food, water, defecation, shedding, noise, property damage, etc. Some pets cause odors in your residence. Pets can interfere with relationships with other people in your life, or who may come into your life. Pets die, and this can be difficult. Pets can grow old and become incapacitated and difficult to deal with. Unwanted pets can be a real burden.

If you are prepared for all that, get a pet. They can be great companions and bring a lot of joy into your life.

 

Pets are big responsibilities. They must be watered, fed, housed, and (maybe) groomed. All of this costs money and/or time, and they need care every day, even when you don't feel like it or when you want to do other things (like go on a trip.) Pets need routine medical care and sometimes get sick; this can become very expensive and troublesome. Pets make messes with their food, water, defecation, shedding, noise, property damage, etc. Some pets cause odors in your residence. Pets can interfere with relationships with other people in your life, or who may come into your life. Pets die, and this can be difficult. Pets can grow old and become incapacitated and difficult to deal with. Unwanted pets can be a real burden.

I understand all of this and if I where to get a pet I would want the best for it.
Would have exhausted almost all the possibilities for each thing before I got it. I have looked at the average yearly cost for the majority of most home animals so I am well aware of the costs.
The only questions I will be eventually faced with is weather I really want a pet , have the money to support it with easy , and am willing to take on the responsibility for caring/loving it. But before I can make a decision on these hard questions I first want to learn all there is to know (or know 99% of the info) for all the things that can arise for each animal considered... how to be my own vet sort of speak... and where/who are the best vet's for my pets ,...etc

Also for the outdoor animals I would have to look into microchip finder though I don't know how save it is and how much an animal will enjoy it so that may not be an option if it does not improve the dog or animals quality of life.
Pet hotels I would have to research how qualified each member was and weather I would trust the person to watch my dog if a trusted friend or family was not available in times of need.


The more theoretical question
still stands though about the zoo and animal farms how did they do it before the internet ?
I.e If I wanted to start an animal farm or zoo who would I get in contact to make it happen. And where would be the stores for animal farm supplies or zoo supplies .... i.e huge cages , fences , food troff's , chicken coops , animal pools ,... etc

How did people even know about these places since I don't see anything anywhere on these stuff in yellow pages

More general how did people that need animals for there farm or zoo know what there animal options where and what the animals price was based on ? I know we live in a world that values money I don't but indirectly people will force me to though...

 

testing pdf tages

 

Anyway this is some info on average pet prices for a baseline don't know how accurate but if I was to get a pet I would probably consider being able to pay at least 3 times the average just in case. And for catastrophes get pet insurances for 20 or so dollars a month maybe ... probably over kill in most cases but depends.
Also most likely up for safeing a pet so I would probably get it at an animal shelter. Though all animals are valuable so when people say sheltered pets are more loving then ones you pay for at a pet store that's a cock of ****.

Also just found out that the Ʃ icon is for latex so I can now do math symbols on this site great... though the only button I don't get is the pdf icon?
It say's it is used for wrap text though I tried it on the previous post and nothing really happened other then an paper icon on the left side

 

I got my hay from local farms and stuffed my ancient huge barn full with it each summer. The sweet feed I got from Agway.
I kept horses in northern maine

Recently I got me a new pet:
It's an American Alligator Snapping Turtle that I rescued from the pool skimmer. I have named it Muhammad because he will bite the hand that feeds him.
When he gets to about 50 pounds I'll sell him to a restaurant.

 

This is more about animals in captivity than as pets, particularly when the animal in question is being used for commercial gain and is obviously in distress.
There are probably many that have seen a recent commercial (not sure of the market) and find it cute etc, it is showing a young girl of about 4 or 5 in a zoo in front of a tiger glass cage and she is running back and forth with the tiger, who is constantly pacing.
This is a definate sign of stress in captive animals, tigers don't do it in the wild. It is not something you want to see and be proud of because we humans created the environment in which tigers display this abnormal behavior.
Sad to see, every time I see it.
Max.

 

I would imagine for the farmers horses , pig's , ducks , sheep ,...etc you must go somewhere else to get there food / vaccines / supplies

Feed stores; there are about a dozen in my area. They have some medical supplies, but anything that requires a prescription needs to come from a vet.

Petco and Petsmart carry a lot of things for fish, rabbits, guinea pigs, rats, etc, but their prices are high. I buy food for cats, fish, rabbits, guinea pigs, rats, chickens, and birds at Walmart. About the only things I buy at Petco these days are cat litter and aquatic plants.

I buy bales of grass and alfalfa from local farmers.

 

Old thread.

As for drugs used in veterinary medicine, prior to the 90's one could go to Mills Fleet Farm and similar stores in rural communities and buy without a prescription veterinary formulations of drugs that required a prescription for human use. Self treatment with those veterinary formulations was a problem in farming communities.

More recently, I found that even veterinary drugs without a common use is humans (such as heart worm) required a prescription. However, I could go to the vet who and seen my dog and buy the drugs without a specific prescription.

 

South of Boston, we have a farm store. You can buy feed and animals, as well as seed, seedlings and hardware.

 

I had a pet pig long ago. I'd usually just buy cracked corn from a local farm/feed store. It was very cheap and he loved it. Other then that mostly just fed him left overs. Favorite treat was watermelon or extra large marshmallows from normal grocery store.

 

I had a pet pig long ago. I'd usually just buy cracked corn from a local farm/feed store. It was very cheap and he loved it. Other then that mostly just fed him left overs. Favorite treat was watermelon or extra large marshmallows from normal grocery store.

We had an “uncle” who had two family pet pigs. One of his children worked at a donut store and another at McDonalds. They threw the left overs into an old VW Beetle and the pigs grew on that.

One day, they broke out of their own. My “aunt”’s picture was in the fron page of the newspaper as she chased the pigs down Main Street in her nightgown.

 

I had a pet pig long ago. I'd usually just buy cracked corn from a local farm/feed store. It was very cheap and he loved it. Other then that mostly just fed him left overs. Favorite treat was watermelon or extra large marshmallows from normal grocery store.

How did that pig taste?

 

How did that pig taste?

He was a little potbelly so we never ate him. I doubt he would have been all that tasty. Was always pretty active and spent most of his time running around with dogs and rooting through the woods so he never got all that fat.

 

He is kind of cute.

My neighbor has over 600 sow. It is a complete operation. He also grows all their feed and sells locally. It is the best pork I have had outside of Iowa.