After reading the report from the woman who had a similar experience with a dog purchase there, I felt the need to report on our experience with this same Petland.
Prior to going to Petland, we were the owners of three cats. I've grown up with cats my entire life. We went to Petland on a Sunday with no intentions of purchasing an animal, as i have always got my cats from the Humane Society or the like.
When we were in Petland I fell absolutely in love with a small, orange kitten. There were 2 in the "cage" (behind a window). I held the cat and examined him before we paid $150 for him. He appeared to be ok. We also were told to take him to their vet within 5 days to get him looked at.
The 2nd day after we had him at home, he had come down with what appeared to be a horrendous cold of sorts. I brought him into that vets office, and in fact I remember it well because I held that poor kitty next to my chest while driving as he fit in my left hand. Was wheezing, couldn't breathe well.
When I brought him to the vet office, the vet said he simply had a cold, prescibed the needed meds for the cat - and he said everything else looked fine with the cat.
The cat's cold went away - flash forward 2 weeks.
My father was vaccuming our house and asked if we'd noticed that the vaccum did not scare Milo (our new cat from petland) away. Anyone who owns a cat knows that they usually run and hide when the vaccum is out. He then asked if Milo was deaf. I hadn't thought of that at all but then really noticed that the cat did not react to clapping of hands and normal things that cats usually respond to. So I took the cat to OUR vet to get looked at. Low and behold, the cat was, in fact, deaf - with what appeared to be a pest infection inside his ears. He is permanently deaf.
Upon contacting petland we were told the same garbage, that they get their cats from top breeders and there's "no possible way" that the cat was deaf - and since their vet said nothing about it there was nothing they could do aside from us either giving them the cat back and not get a refund - or get a lousy $50 card to use on merchandise in their store.
Needless to say, I was not going to return the poor thing to that store in the fear that he'd be resold to someone who would not treat the cat well, or he'd be put down because of his handicap.
This store does not take good care of their animals that are for sale. This condition was not heriditary (sp?) it was caused by unsanitary conditions in the cage and 16-18 year old employees that do not know how to take care of animals when they are sick.
Milo became deaf because he was sick, and the employees did nothing to treat what he had. Verified by my vet. Period. How their vet did not see this in his ears, I do not know unless this is a common scam.
However, even though this happened - to this day, this cat has been the best cat we've ever had and very interesting to raise, but he does need a special environment with other cats because he follows their "body language" as far as when there's food put in the dish or "danger" so he can hide - but if this was a first-time cat for a family, it would be hard to deal with.
This particular store does NOT take care of the animals properly. They DO NOT use certified breeders. And to me, this is ANIMAL ABUSE.
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