[silvercat]

I just wanted to share a pleasurable pet store experience.

Jungle Pets, specializing in exotic animals just opened near my work and on my lunch break I thought I would run over & check them out. Not to mention the poster said they had a hedgehog so I wanted to see.

Well the little guy was darn cute! & very social for being woken up. The owner of the store was there and while I didn't catch his name, had a nice chat with him. He was very interested speaking about what's best for a hedgie in housing and feeding. His set up was very good. While the cage was a bit small (but ok for a baby) said he'd just ordered a larger cage which I was pleased to learn. The lil guy had a good ceramic bowl for his food & a water bottle. I mentioned about switching to a bowl (and why) & the owner was very receptive. He also said that he's very interested in trying to use local resources be it breeders or suppliers.

There were a number of other animals in the store as well, though I can't speak to them as I don't know much about reptiles, birds, ferrets, etc.

All in all, I wanted to give a good word to Jungle Pets. Being open in the area only a few weeks(I believe it's their 2nd store. 1st in NL, this one in NS), it's nice to see a pet store that's not 'commercial' in their approach but rather a home grown interest in the well-being of the animals. http://www.nljungle.ca/

 

[AlesanaHedgie]

Wow, that is very good to hear!
I've personally had really good
experiances from exotic pet
stores, but this is very nice to hear!
Did the hedgie have anything evil in
his/her cage like a mesh wheel, bad
food, or pine shavings?

 

[silvercat]

the food was L'Avian Hedgehog food. Being an exotic pet store I can understand them not stalking cat foods. I recommended he switch to Spikes delight or Sunseed Hedgehog food if shelving a commercial food. I've only seen Sunseed and one other (pretty bad) hedgefood in this area.

The hedge was on pine (as were all the animals). He knew about cedar being bad. Checking around on this site I found a lot of people saying 'kiln dried pine' is ok. I did comment about linners. He's thinking about switching all his cages over to Carefresh. Again, checking around on this site, seems carefresh (while not highly recomended) is okm past a concern for dust? As a shop owner, he cleans all the cages daily.

The lil guy didn't have a wheel yet, the size of the cage was limiting it. The owner was going to get a silent spinner for him & I recomended either a comfort wheel or flying saucer. He was shocked to learn about the concerns with silent spinners & toe nails and said that one of his suppliers does carry comfort wheels. There was a second man in the shop working who commented he'd had a silent spinner fall apart on him (not with a hedgie).

I was very glad to see that it was a single male hedgie housed by himself and not with others.

Oh, & as I said, he's looking for local breeders. We're in Halifax, NS & the current lil guy came from Mtl. So if there's any breeders in the Maritimes, you could give him a contact.

 

[Lilysmommy]

The only other thing to watch out for Carefresh is to make sure the hedgie doesn't try eating any of it. And that's good he only has the one male, but you might make sure he knows not to house males and females together, or any males together if he's planning to continue selling hedgehogs. Pregnant females from having males and females together seems to be a big problem with pet store hedgehogs.

 

[HedgieIsabella]

silvercat thats great to hear! i'm out in lower sackville and was deciding if it was worth it to go to dartmouth just to go to a pet store. i saw the ad on kijiji and noticed they had hedgehogs on the list also, unfortunately my boyfriend decided that i was a bit too obsessed with hedgehogs and opted not to take me

are the prices good? and is there much variety? i know the pet stores in sackville had, dogs, cat, and hamsters. some have lizards, but only geckos.

i look forward to going
and i may mention your good review

 

[Mitchell C]

I just wanted to share a pleasurable pet store experience.

Jungle Pets, specializing in exotic animals just opened near my work and on my lunch break I thought I would run over & check them out. Not to mention the poster said they had a hedgehog so I wanted to see.

Well the little guy was darn cute! & very social for being woken up. The owner of the store was there and while I didn't catch his name, had a nice chat with him. He was very interested speaking about what's best for a hedgie in housing and feeding. His set up was very good. While the cage was a bit small (but ok for a baby) said he'd just ordered a larger cage which I was pleased to learn. The lil guy had a good ceramic bowl for his food & a water bottle. I mentioned about switching to a bowl (and why) & the owner was very receptive. He also said that he's very interested in trying to use local resources be it breeders or suppliers.

There were a number of other animals in the store as well, though I can't speak to them as I don't know much about reptiles, birds, ferrets, etc.

All in all, I wanted to give a good word to Jungle Pets. Being open in the area only a few weeks(I believe it's their 2nd store. 1st in NL, this one in NS), it's nice to see a pet store that's not 'commercial' in their approach but rather a home grown interest in the well-being of the animals. http://www.nljungle.ca/

"Oh wow, i live in halifax, NS :shock: i cant seem to find a location on the website though, would you mind telling me theyre adress? =]

 

[silvercat]

haha! Well hello fellow nova scotians!!

the store is 12 queen in dartmouth. RIGHT across from the ferry terminal, just up from Celtic Corner.

I don't know the prices unfortunately. He had tons of reptiles in one room & then the mammals in a second.

It was warm out today so was comfortable in the store. If anyone goes in on a cooler day I'd be interested in what the temperature is inside. One of the staff there commented he was once thinking about getting a hedgehog but was told it needed a large outdoor setup. Now if anyone knows NS weather, an outdoor setup would be very bad for a hedgie (which I told him).

I did mention the eating of carefresh to the owner, which surprised him.

 

[HedgieIsabella]

i thought i was the only nova scotian on here,
i'm happy to figure out that i'm not the only one, and not the only one from the HRM too !

i'm looking forward to going.

 

[silvercat]

Now I'm curious of those Nova Scotians (or Maritimers) on here, where'd you get your hedgie from? Maybe we have some brothers or sisters?

 

[LovePets]

The guy sounds nice, but it also sounds like he's pretty unknowledgable. Points for his willingness to learn, but perhaps he should have done some of that before stocking his first hedgehog?

 

[silvercat]

i agree. that's the downfall of petstores everywhere unfortunately though.

i'm wondering if anyone else in the area has gone in the store?

 

[silvercat]

So I dropped by the store today to see the little guy to learn he's been sold

But wonderfully he's been sold to a shop owner just down the street so I trotted on over for a visit. The store owner was uber friendly & very interested in learning more about hedgies. We had a nice long chat about housing & food & wheels and all sorts of good stuff. I actually gave her the URL to HC so maybe we'll see her on here soon. The hedgies name is now Nin (or rather NIN, after the band). He's only a tiny guy but supper friendly, curious and seems to have a really caring owner.

Makes the good petstore experience even better