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summer 2018
Catsplat18 wrote:My family likes to go on vacation a lot, whether just for the weekend or for a week (like during spring break from school, for example). So we must often hire petsitters. My first choice is always my neighbor and friend– let's call her "Taco." Taco is great! She herself has had Syrian hamsters, guinea pigs, a rabbit, leopard geckos, and countless fish. She knows a lot about animals and is good at taking care of them.
Now, I have a parrot (a green-cheeked conure) and a cat. I also used to have a fish tank, but I got rid of it... we'll get to that soon.
So, I love having Taco petsit. BUT, once I went away for two weeks, and Taco could only come the second week! So, the first week I hired an old "friend." She used to be my friend, but we went to separate middle schools and she changed for the worse. We'll call her "Dumpy McDump." So, I told Dumpy McDump what to do and left her written reminders. SHE FAILED. When I came back after two weeks, my fish tank was a complete disaster.
I had had three guppies (which were rare colors, btw), two albino corydoras catfish (I used to have three but one died and I didn't have time to replace it), two snails (one nerite and one unknown), and a dwarf gourami. When I got back, the water was disgusting, algae and MOLD was all over... everything, and half of my plants (Amazon sword) were rotting, adding to the mold problem. Uneaten moldy fish food coated the bottom of the tank. Oh yeah, and one of my snails was missing, along with two of my guppies and one of my catfish!!! Not to mention my gourami had fin rot!!! Obviously, I was furious.
My petsitter for the second week, Taco, walked over to my house with her mom to explain what had happened. Apparently, they found the tank like this! That means that Dumpy McDump, the petsitter for the first week, totally ruined everything! So Taco and her mom explained how the tank was all moldy and had dead fish. They had removed my dead snail, a dead guppy, and the dead catfish. But that left one guppy unaccounted for. It turns out that it had died and was INSIDE THE FILTER, ROTTING AND MOLDY. I don't blame Taco for not removing this one- I had told them not to mess with the filter.
But, basically the entire tank was screwed, unless I managed to buy two other, smaller quarantine tanks (one to hold the remaining guppy, catfish, plants, and snail, and the other for the sick gourami- not to mention I'd have to medicate the gourami for fin rot) and then completely re-do the original tank. Or maybe restart completely and buy a larger, better tank.
Well. Parents are parents, and my parents don't like fish. So I had to get rid of my entire tank and kill the remaining animals and plants by shocking them (plunging them into freezing water for 30 seconds or so. The other "humane" method is smashing them with a mallet through a plastic bag, but I couldn't bring myself to do that, even though it would probably be a slightly faster death).
It was horrible to come back from vacation and have to deal with that. Taco did the right thing by trying not to interfere, besides removing the dead fish. I don't blame her at all. Plus she has her own pet fish (several betta [in separate tanks obviously] and a bunch of neon tetras along with a snail or two), so she would know how to take care of mine! I still don't know the truth about how Dumpy McDump could've ruined the tank like that (SHE DIDN'T EVEN APOLOGIZE). I have a feeling she overfed them (which would explain the mold and excess food), but seriously?! I literally left written instructions on how to feed the fish!! WITH A WARNING TO NOT OVER-FEED!!! UGH.
Oh, and that's not even the end of this horror story. Anyway, Taco helped me disassemble the tank and send the animals to heaven, and after that, she told me the rest of what she had seen!
Kiwi (my parrot) is fed one almond a day as his breakfast. He also always has his pellets and water available. I always leave a container of almonds, his bag of pellets, a bag of Nutri-Berries (treats/snacks), and a container of seeds (treats) for the petsitters. Unfortunately, I can't leave fruit or veggies out (they will rot), and my mom refuses to let me keep some in the fridge for the petsitters. I always tell her that parrots NEED to have fruits and vegetables, but my mom says "it's fine if he doesn't have them for a week or two, we're going on vacation and it's too much hassle for the petsitters to get some from the fridge, blah blah blah." It's very annoying! Kiwi doesn't get a nutritionally balanced diet when I go on vacation! UGH!
But anyway, I also left several notes about how to feed Kiwi and stuff. Well. Taco told me about how when she came in the first time, Kiwi's bowl was full of seed shells and uneaten almonds!!! That means that Dumpy McDump had been giving Kiwi MORE than just one almond a day (which is why there were so many wasted ones- he's a small bird! He's not going to eat two almonds in a row!!!), and SEEDS AS HIS SNACK. NO, NO, NO. Luckily, he was still eating his pellets, but OMG!! Seeds are literally a TREAT! NOT FOOD! Oh yeah, and his actual snack, the bag of Nutri-Berries, was unopened. REALLY?! I TOLD HER TO OPEN THE BAG!!! OMG!!!! Luckily, Taco had fixed everything- removed the seed shells and uneaten almonds, opened the bag and gave him his real snack, stopped giving him the seeds, etc.
Okay, the horror story is almost over. BUT, Taco told me how Shiloh (my cat)'s litterbox wasn't cleaned out!! She guessed that Dumpy McDump cleaned it ONCE in the whole week that she was there. HORRIBLE. My cat is a BIG CAT, and he eats, poops, and pees A LOT. Maybe for some smaller cats it's okay to clean the litterbox less frequently, but Shiloh's litterbox has to be cleaned every other day. And again, this was WRITTEN DOWN. And btw, "cleaning" just means removing the pee and poop clumps. That's it. Takes less than five minutes to do that, put the waste in a bag, throw out the bag, and then wash your hands.
To recap:
1. Dumpy McDump ruined my fish tank and killed several of its inhabitants.
2. Dumpy McDump messed up my parrot's diet.
3. Dumpy McDump failed at cleaning my cat's litterbox.
4. Dumpy McDump left all of these problems for my good friend Taco to take care of!!!
5. I HATE DUMPY MCDUMP
OH AND GUESS WHAT
My parents made me pay Dumpy McDump, even though she completely FAILED at her job...
...and when I went to give her the cash...
She smiled at me.
She said that she loves my pets.
She said that...
*deep breath*
THAT SHE TAKES BETTER CARE OF MY PETS THAN ME AND THAT THEY LIKE HER MORE THAN ME.
...
At this point I was ready to punch her in the face.
Another fact about Dumpy McDump:
She used to have two guinea pigs. A male and a female. Not fixed. But they didn't breed. Why? Because the male was a cuy. Yep, that's right. A MEAT GUINEA PIG. Cuys are bad pets- mean to normal guinea pigs, hard to tame, and not even meant to be pets! They're bred for food! Not companionship! Anyway, the male cuy savagely attacked the poor female, so Dumpy McDump got rid of him. Okay, good choice. BUT THEN, she never got another guinea pig! The poor female lived a sad, lonely life. And a short one, too. Only five years. Dumpy McDump claimed that she had had a happy (obviously not), LONG life. WHAT??!! Taco, on the other hand, had had two guinea pigs- both lived for over ten years. They died within a month of each other. I have another friend who had a guinea pig that recently died- it had lived for over nine years. They promptly got another one to replace it, so that its friend wouldn't be all alone. As you can see, Dumpy McDump's guinea pig lived for HALF of it's normal lifespan, and all alone and sad.
If you read all of this, I applaud you. You are a cool kid.
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