# Petco is suddenly hedgehog experts?



## Tabi

A lady came by to pick up her baby from my litter yesterday and told me about how she was in petco and they were telling her "OH NO! YOU CANT HAVE A HEDGEHOG WITH KIDS! THEY BITE AND SPIKE AND SHOOT QUILLS AND JUMP AND HISS!" And it just made me laugh. Her kids are 4 and 6. They were great with the little guy and he's very well socialized and he enjoyed every second of the attention. I told her that was nonsense. They cant shoot quills and they wont behave badly unless they arent played with often or they just have a bad little temper.. Gosh. Last time I checked, petco wasnt an expert on hedgehogs, nor do they sell them. And even when they sell an animal, they never know anything TRUE about them! 
Sorry, rant over  
proof hedgies are good with kids. This is leeah, shes 3 and this is our little boy, uno


----------



## smhufflepuff

Oh... the HUMANITY!!! Thank you for posting pictures of how Uno is mauling that poor human child. They show the true devastation that a hedgehog can unleash upon a small human. Though perhaps a bit grotesque for a family-friendly forum such as this one... I'm not sure if I would have posted them. But, you're probably right to have done so... Better for the public to understand that hedgehogs are wild beasts that will shoot your eye out with their quills than to think they can go in for a snuggle.


----------



## Tabi

smhufflepuff said:


> Oh... the HUMANITY!!! Thank you for posting pictures of how Uno is mauling that poor human child. They show the true devastation that a hedgehog can unleash upon a small human. Though perhaps a bit grotesque for a family-friendly forum such as this one... I'm not sure if I would have posted them. But, you're probably right to have done so... Better for the public to understand that hedgehogs are wild beasts that will shoot your eye out with their quills than to think they can go in for a snuggle.


oh i know! I'm a horrible person


----------



## MurE

Bahahaha! You two are hilarious


----------



## Lilysmommy

:roll: at Petsmart but :lol: at smhufflepuff! Those pictures are adorable, it's great to see a little one who's good with our prickly babies!


----------



## jerseymike1126

petco can have good employees who are knowledgeable but in a lot of cases you have someone clueless who pretends to know what they are talking about


----------



## moxieberry

Yeah, it depends on the individuals. I like the staff of our local PetCo - they recognize us as the "hedgehog people" and are really excited when we come in, want to meet whoever we have with us that day. They ask a lot of questions, which I'm happy to answer in detail for the sake of anyone else who might come in needing hedgehog info. The last time one of the women there offered us a sample of a dog treat of some sort to feed them, and without me even asking she showed me the ingredients to make sure it was okay for the hedgies to try. Another girl regularly gets distracted from cashier duty by asking us questions and wanting to hold them.


----------



## Tabi

moxieberry said:


> Yeah, it depends on the individuals. I like the staff of our local PetCo - they recognize us as the "hedgehog people" and are really excited when we come in, want to meet whoever we have with us that day. They ask a lot of questions, which I'm happy to answer in detail for the sake of anyone else who might come in needing hedgehog info. The last time one of the women there offered us a sample of a dog treat of some sort to feed them, and without me even asking she showed me the ingredients to make sure it was okay for the hedgies to try. Another girl regularly gets distracted from cashier duty by asking us questions and wanting to hold them.


sounds like my petsmart people when i bring in neytiri. They love her. This petco was in a town over that she stopped in on the way to my house. Made me laugh though!


----------



## jerseymike1126

i get phone calls from petco/petsmart employees about animal questions from customers they have. this is a good thing, when they dont know the answer they dont give out wrong information


----------



## bmaditz

My three year old niece absolutely adores my hedgehog. He gave her a little nibble on the finger one time, but she thought it was the funniest thing EVER!!! :lol: I checked her finger she was fine not even a mark....but so true hedgehogs should NEVER be allowed around young children because of their pure, raw aggression. I actually had to seperate them because she refused to let him sleep...also because I just didn't feel it was a safe for her :lol: hehehehehehe


----------



## Tabi

bmaditz said:


> My three year old niece absolutely adores my hedgehog. He gave her a little nibble on the finger one time, but she thought it was the funniest thing EVER!!! :lol: I checked her finger she was fine not even a mark....but so true hedgehogs should NEVER be allowed around young children because of their pure, raw aggression. I actually had to seperate them because she refused to let him sleep...also because I just didn't feel it was a safe for her :lol: hehehehehehe


oh yeah leeah loves the hogs. When I'm working on cuddle bags, I bring them downstairs to show them off, and she says "is that your baby? Can i pet her?" haha I'm like no... just a bag, cutie


----------



## bmaditz

Tabi said:


> oh yeah leeah loves the hogs. When I'm working on cuddle bags, I bring them downstairs to show them off, and she says "is that your baby? Can i pet her?" haha I'm like no... just a bag, cutie


 That is soooo cute! My niece Tia loves ever animal she's like her Aunt that way. When Tia and her brothers are over and I can't find her she'll be in my room looking at Briar sleep. :lol: We actually got kittens recently from my sister and Victoria cried and cried until my sister said she would keep one.  Ohhhh I love that little girl!


----------



## LarryT

Just wanted to say I love those pics!


----------



## Tabi

bmaditz said:


> Tabi said:
> 
> 
> 
> oh yeah leeah loves the hogs. When I'm working on cuddle bags, I bring them downstairs to show them off, and she says "is that your baby? Can i pet her?" haha I'm like no... just a bag, cutie
> 
> 
> 
> That is soooo cute! My niece Tia loves ever animal she's like her Aunt that way. When Tia and her brothers are over and I can't find her she'll be in my room looking at Briar sleep. :lol: We actually got kittens recently from my sister and Victoria cried and cried until my sister said she would keep one.  Ohhhh I love that little girl!
Click to expand...

Haha cute! I wish crying would work on my boyfriend to let me keep a kitten


----------



## PinkHedgehog

They're just idiots, love the pictures!!


----------



## sweetergrrrl

Some people get the wrong information sometimes. I work at a Petco and always try to give people this site as well as all the info I can about proper homes, food and toys for the new hedgie parents. There is a lot of :roll: "information" that associates from other chains give, but all the Petcos around me call my store now and leave notes to call people back about their hedgies lol. Thats how I got Navi.


----------



## hedgielover

:roll: "they shoot quills" Hedgehogs look nothing like porcupines and people still insist on mixing them up, the size difference alone should be enough. Although I'll excuse the ignorance in most people especially people here in the city because it's entirely possible that some people have never seen a live porcupine or a hedgehog so by rough description they could be mixed up. (I had never seen a porcupine until this summer when I saw one at the zoo) But I think pet store people should know the difference. The basics of the species at least.

I do agree that they don't always make good pets specifically for children but there is no reason they can't be around children. It's good for children to learn to handle sensitive animals and put the animal's needs first it does a lot for cognitive development and for development of empathy and emotional awareness. And I've found that most animals seem to have a sense that this weird creature is a baby human and they are better behaved and more gentle than they are with adults.


----------



## Quinn

I go to Petsmart quite often and an employee there told me to buy my hedgies some rawhide. She continued with some other bad advice that she does with her hedgie and told me that I was doing everything all worong. I feel bad for other hedgie owners who would follow her poor advice because she works at a petstore and owns a hedgie as well.


----------



## hedgielover

Quinn said:


> I go to Petsmart quite often and an employee there told me to buy my hedgies some rawhide. She continued with some other bad advice that she does with her hedgie and told me that I was doing everything all worong. I feel bad for other hedgie owners who would follow her poor advice because she works at a petstore and owns a hedgie as well.


Wow! A similar horror story about trying to find natural/healthy cat food is why I stopped shopping at petsmart. Also I avoid certain PJ's because of the advice I've gotten from people there.

I'm surprised we don't here about more hedgehogs dieing from rawhide it is seriously bad, I've read stories about dogs being on deaths door from eating it. I'm pretty convinced that some combination of rawhide and using a water bottle are what caused my old guy to loose his fangs before he came to me. When people at pet stores give me bad advice like that I counter them. I'm not subtle at all, I just flat out tell them how horrible I think it is and why I would never do what they are suggesting. It at least stops them from treating me like I don't know anything if they don't believe me that's their choice. They might think I'm doing everything wrong but the judgement goes both ways.


----------



## Quinn

I told her hedgehogs are not rodents and don't have teeth that grow constantly. And she said "I know but hedgehogs like to chew and mine chews on everything." No matter how much I told her that her info was incorrect she was insistent that I was wrong and I should do more research. If I wasn't so confident with the info that I learned here I might have started double guessing myself because of sure she was and so demeaning. So I thank you guys but there are so many people out there with old info or just plain wrong info. It really sucks when that person works in a petstore and can more readily pass that info on.


----------



## Chihirolee3

We don't have Petco (if we do, haven't been there yet)...but I do go to PetSmart...They have nothing for hedgehogs, and the staff does not seem to know much about them, but all the people I have asked seemed excited to see one, and have encouraged me to bring mine in when I get it (in a cuddle sack of course  ). They do seem to know a lot about the animals they have, they seem take good care of them (I have seen them at work!), and they are interested in my ramblings about hedgehogs...but as I said somewhere else on this forum, it all depends on where you go (and who you talk to). I am not vouching for Petsmart (as previous posts tell of some stupidity), but I just want to stress how important it is for any pet owner to get information from multiple sources. You can't go buy one book and believe it, just as you can't go to one pet store and expect them to know everything about every animal.


----------



## Avarris

I love stories like this. When I took my *greyhound* out to places like Petco and Petsmart, I was repeatedly told I was a bad person for starving my great dane (or) pit bull like that, and that I should be locked up! I was also told that greyhounds were bad in apartments because they need so much room to run... Umm, yes she's a greyhound, yes she USED to race, but um, she sleeps more than my cat does, goes to the dog park and runs for 10 minutes and snoozes the rest of the 3 hours we spent there. Greyhounds really are cats in dog bodies. They just happen to be sprinters. LOL. When dealing with such "informed" masses, I chuckle, educate as best I can, walk away and guffaw all the way to my car. Gawd, that just makes me miss her more.... ah well, such is life.

The best thing hedgie owners can do when they come across people who obviously are misinformed is gently guide them in the right direction, and hope that they take this new found knowledge to heart and change thier ways for the betterment of the species and quality of thier hedgies worlds.


----------



## danilious

Tabi said:


> A lady came by to pick up her baby from my litter yesterday and told me about how she was in petco and they were telling her "OH NO! YOU CANT HAVE A HEDGEHOG WITH KIDS! THEY BITE AND SPIKE AND SHOOT QUILLS AND JUMP AND HISS!" And it just made me laugh. Her kids are 4 and 6. They were great with the little guy and he's very well socialized and he enjoyed every second of the attention. I told her that was nonsense. They cant shoot quills and they wont behave badly unless they arent played with often or they just have a bad little temper.. Gosh. Last time I checked, petco wasnt an expert on hedgehogs, nor do they sell them. And even when they sell an animal, they never know anything TRUE about them!
> Sorry, rant over
> proof hedgies are good with kids. This is leeah, shes 3 and this is our little boy, uno


my mom watches kids and they all adore hedgehogs some of them are more afraid of my hedgehog than the hedgehog is afraid of them .


----------



## PJM

I took several of our hedgies to a friend's kindergarten class. There were a total if 80 kids. Each one got the chance to come up and pet the back of one of the hedgies. Glad I wasn't arrested for the potential harm those hedgies could have caused! :lol: 

That being said, if someone is giving uneducated advice, I would SO much rather it be on the far side of caution. Would rather they say a hedgie would mame a child, then for them to say a hedgie is the perfect pet for a child.


----------



## jholstein11

that poor child- exposed to such a blood thirsty, vicious creature... 

kinda like my son, being exposed to my "killer" pit bull. :lol:


----------

