It is really important to remember that buying a pet from a pet store is NOT rescuing it; it’s purchasing. You’re putting money into the pockets of the shady breeders and pet stores that give them business. You’re opening space for another animal. You’re creating more demand, which creates more supply and leads to more shady breeding. Pet stores don’t care what your motives are. If you bought the animal, that’s money in their pocket. I know it’s hard, but don’t buy the sick reptile. A market for “rescuing” sick reptiles from pet stores is still a market for buying more sick reptiles from mill breeders.
And honestly sometimes pet stores have multiple sources for their animals, and some of them will be decent or reputable, and some of them won't, and if they don't know the difference, then they probably don't care about where they get them. Slowly things are improving, and some stores that have poorly sourced animals are genuinely looking for reputable breeders, but especially for some popular animals, one or two independent breeders just do not will not cannot produce enough animals to meet "demand". Capitalism mandates that even in the most ideal situation, consumers either do the investigative work themselves, or accept some modicum of exploitation-- in this case live animals. And those stores "need to make a profit". Whether you excuse some amount of that as choice or forced violence under capitalism is up to you, but asking where the animals come from and learning to identify healthy animals are great first steps to supporting a more ethical pet trade.
