More about Pet Store kittens

I went to a large popular mall in the lower mainland to pick my girlfriend up from work last Friday and of course I had to go to the pet store to look at the kitties. After caring for a cat and two kittens, from coming to me in rough shape to now being healthy and socialized, I was a little saddened by what I saw.

First, there are two display windows at the front of the store. In one window there were seven kittens and in another, there were eight. That's fifteen total kittens. In the past the store had told me that the kittens sell for $695 each, but if I get one 'today' I can get it for $550. No, in fact, make that $375, as a special prize, for 'this' kitten and for a short time only. And I've come and seen many kindles kittens go through the store.

This time, I saw a lot of grey tabbies, a few long hair domestics, one orange tabby, and one tuxedo kitten. They looked from six weeks to 8 weeks. And they were really small and SKINNY. I was really surprised. It was also obvious that they were likely not from the same parent, perhaps only one or two pairs were siblings. That many kittens from different genologies means that that they are coming froma large kitten mill.

Now, to describe what I saw in detail, these were skinny kitten that looked under fed (there was kibble in the food dish, that hungry kittens would walk by, sniff, then continue walking on. I'm sure they'll eat it when they are hungry enough). These kittens looked small, in different sizes, with the smallest looking like a 5-6 week old kitten. And they were ungroomed and looked downright MANGY.

They also looked unloved. They would sit there, looking angry. Only two of the 15 were active when I saw them, and they were fighting, like it looked like real fighting (I've studied my cat and kittens play fight and it looked like the pet store kitties were just more aggressive).

I'm sure that whomever buys them will treat them nice…for a while, but when they grow bored of them or the kittens turn into cats, will the average pet store consumer keep the cat for the long run, or will the cat be turned into the street to become a stray? I don't know what the statistics are, but say a pet store sells 250 kittens in a year. That seems possible. How many of the cats will end up as strays? I don't believe the answer is "none". I'm not saying that pet store consumers are bad people, just not always prepared. The pet stores themselves, well, it's a business for them, so money is the bottom line.

The better option for people in every major city, including Vancouver is to adopt cats through any of the MANY rescue groups. They make sure that you are informed about what a cat needs and you'll be saving feline lives by going through them.

Here are a few videos from Youtube that I saw a few months back. I'm not going to embedded them here as they are PG-13 material, but feel free to look at the links if you are curious to see what is happening behind the pet store and pet stray scene.

Life of a Petstore Pet

Pet Store Suppliers: Beyond the "waggily tail"

pet store and puppy mills

(These new two are must-sees, regarding over population of our shelters).

Doctor Death, Shocking Killing of Shelter Pets Part 1

Doctor Death, Shocking Killing of Shelter Pets Part 2

FYI: I am not against pet stores. I buy my supplies at pet stores. I am against poor treatment of all living things, regardless of who and where.