I bought two guinea pigs from Petco in Springfield, IL, a week apart. The first was bought on February 23 and the second a week later. I chose each of them from the female cage at the store. The cages were clearly marked female and male, and I want to reiterate that I wanted two females.
By April I realized that one was getting bigger around the middle, so I searched the internet to find out how to tell the sexes of guinea pigs, which you can determine when they are two weeks old. My pigs were well past that when I bought them. I checked each pig and, to my amazement, I had a female and a male. Needless to say, the rounder one was the female and she was pregnant.
I called the store in April to express my total disgust. I was told that I could bring in the male, which I did, and Brett gave me my money back. He also told me that I could bring the babies in when they were weaned and able to be away from their mother.
On May 24 the female gave birth to five male guinea pigs, which would have to be taken out of the cage before they were three to four weeks old because the babies could get the mother pregnant again. So I bought another cage to house the babies, plus extra supplies like food, bowls, water bottles, vitamins, and other things necessary for baby pigs.
On August 12, I called Petco to see if they could take the babies now, since they were outgrowing their cage and I could no longer keep the mother plus five babies and maintain two cages and their care. Danielle hesitated but said she could make room for three of the male babies. I said I would be there soon and put the three males in a glass aquarium with bedding and food.
When I arrived at Petco, I told my son (age 12) to find someone to help us since no one was up front manning the cash registers. Danielle and a sales associate, Ellen, walked up with my son, saying, "You must be the one with the guinea pigs." I said yes, and they said I would have to sign a release that releases the guinea pigs to Petco. While they were off putting the babies in the back and helping other customers, I read the release and had a problem with the wording, because it said I was returning my pet to them. That was not what I was doing. I was merely giving them what had been their mistake to begin with, in return for reimbursement for raising a product that I had no intention of having in the first place.
Ellen asked if I had a question since I had not signed the release yet, and I said yes, I have a problem with it saying I am returning my pet. She said she could get Danielle (the manager in charge of the store while Dawn was in DC) for me again. I said yes, and Danielle came out again asking if I had a problem. I said, "Yes, I do. I am not returning these pets. I am bringing them in because the pregnancy, in retrospect, was the store's fault." Danielle said that she could only take them if I signed the release and turned them over so they could be adopted out. I asked, "So I will not receive any reimbursement for these babies?" and she said no. She said she could call her manager, but all she could offer was a bag of food in exchange for the three guinea pig babies.
I said she needed to call her manager, and she went to the back to call her. She came back saying she could not reach her, and we went over the conversation again. I asked her to try her manager again, so she went to the back once more. She came back and said her manager said they could give me nothing for the pigs, and I said that the whole problem started here in the store in February. Danielle said she had the store manager on the phone and I could speak to her. I retold my story, and Dawn (the store manager of the Springfield location) said she could not give me anything but could take the guinea pigs off my hands. I responded that they were the ones responsible for putting them in my hands in the first place. Dawn told me she would not argue with me, and I finally said fine, I will take my pigs with me, but I will look further into her claim that the store does not guarantee the sex of its animals even though they are in separate cages stating whether they are female or male!
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