underground reptiles

not trying to put them down. i ordered two 6 inch mata matas from them and received two dead 8 inch mata matas. they were very nice and professional over the phone and said they would make it right. said they were having a hard time locating 2 more to send me so i told them to just send me that amount of moneys worth of several other species. i received a 2 year old "hatchling" common snapper missing more than half his tail. a red belly cooter that died a few days later, a perfect yellow belly slider, a penninsula cooter with extra scutes, a beautiful 4 inch pink belly side neck im proud to show people, a perfect western painted, a southern painted with deformed scutes, and a hatchling snack neck that died a few days later. i emailed them when they arrived, before any of them died, and told them "overall im happy other than the missing tail and deformed shells" but i didnt get any emails back. they were just trying to get me out of the way and sent me B grade turtles. so they were great in sending me turtles quickly, and working with me, but the few deformed/sick turtles they sent me was kind of sorry. i didnt even call back to try to replace the bad turtles because i just dont feel like going through the mess of receiving more sick turtles. sorry, im not going to take any pictures of the few that are messed up, and the dead ones were disposed of. im not bashing them, just sharing my experience.

You should have contacted them as soon as you recieved those turtles. Sending sick and deformed animals out is a big no no. You should have retured them for a full refund. They have just made my "do not buy from" list.

i did contact them as soon as i received the turtles, before any of them had died. they didnt email or call back to discuss this. so i just gave up on them altogether because i am lazy. lost a ton of money but i didnt want this thing to drag on. oh and if anyone is wondering, ive had turtles for years, i keep my setup by the books and pay close attention to details. theres a difference in having an unhealthy environment and being sent turtles that came from an unhealthy environment.

i also need to add it wasnt quite their fault for the dead arrival of the mata matas. they sent them through fed ex. i asked them not to because we have a lot of problems with fed ex around here, especially me living out in the county. they said they had to send fed ex because ups no longer ships live snakes, i havent confirmed this but i beleive them, being in the reptile industry. so instead of the next day shipment coming in first thing in the morning the fed ex guy drops it off at 4 in the afternoon. it was in the 90s that day and the turtles fried in the back of the truck all day. i contacted them that night after i got home from work at 8 oclock. my girlfriend was at my house and got the package when i tcame in and told me they were dead. i waited till i got home to be sure they were infact dead.

so it is fed exs fault for the dead turtles, underground said they were doing some investigation. so i guess they didnt have to do anything for me at all. they could have just told me to deal with fed ex.

so they impressed me there. my only complaint is i was sent sick and deformed turtles and after the deal was done they didnt care anything about me or the fact i was sent such B grade animals.

to me this is like buying a car from a dealer. you get the car home and the motor blows up. the dealer is quick to replace the motor no questions asked. and they are super nice about it. then they cant get that model motor for whatever reason and agree to put in a different motor of equal performance. then they put in a peice of crap motor and send the car to your house and forget all about you.

I wasn't really going to post anything because I don't expect them to do anything for me but I just received a sick water monitor from them about a week ago. They shipped via Fedex and due to temps they called me the day before to let me know it was going to be held at the local store for pick-up. Well 7am rolls around and I call Fedex, nothing yet they said the truck would be there around 8am. 8am, they received their stuff but nothing for me. I called their 800 number and they were able to track my package down. Underground apparently did not put the hold on correctly so it was on the truck. I spent the next hour going back and forth trying to intercept the truck driver until finally they just sent him back to the store. Finally got the package, rushed home, and immediately noticed she was very very thin and had a wet nose. I have never had a reptile shipped to me before but a pillow sack and news paper in a cardboard box seems a bit skimpy, no insulation or padding. I already had her home set-up (40g reptile cage, mercury vapor heat/uvb, swimming pool, hides, and 2 levels of basking with temps of 120 on top 100 on bottom) so it was by the book and has been successful for all my other monitors including my other water monitor. Her nose was constantly wet, bubbling, she was very lethargic, and her stools were pure liquid. From everything I have read these are signs of parasites and or a respiratory infection. A few days went by and she was refusing all the food I offered (crickets, fish, ground turkey, worms, mice), no matter what she wouldn't touch it. I sent an e-mail to underground expressing my concern about her not eating and what else I could try and received a pretty generic e-mail stating that she was eating crickets, worms, and other foods prior to them shipping. Yesterday I found her dead sitting right next to a full dish of turkey.

Point of all this is that I found this very questionable what condition she was in prior to shipping because she was showing signs of respiratory infection as soon as I opened the box and you could see her bones and lots of loose skin meaning she probably hadn't eaten in a while. I don't expect anything as their terms say I only have a short window to do anything, however I don't really see this as anything other than a death sentence for the animal if I send it back when it is already sick and I am in this hobby for the animals, not the money, so I tried my best to rehabilitate her. This will be my last purchase from them and definitely makes me leery of buying any reptiles sight unseen anymore. As you can see from the ad, they definitely don't look skin and bones.

http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/foru...d.php?t=178134

Originally Posted by jordanabbott

... they said they had to send fed ex because ups no longer ships live snakes,...

But mata matas are turtles. What does shipping them have to do with UPS's policy about snakes?

yea theres no question their animals are unhealthy. the mata matas could have been sick before they were even shipped out but they would have died from the heat in the fed ex truck anyway. and judy i asked the same thing, they told me since they mostly deal with snakes they just closed their account with ups and do everything through fed ex. i used to do shipping and receiving for an electric motor company and i can tell you from experience fed ex is not as reliable as ups. especially since ups is much larger, they have more trucks out, fed ex gets to you when they can.

I am so sorry to hear about everyones experiences I have never dealt with them, other than at shows, but I dont think I have every bought anything other than a t-shirt...now I dont think I ever want to.

oh completely forgot, they also sent me a baby miss. map in that shipment and it died a few days later too

I would first like to take a moment to address Jordan's concern. Jordan I'm not sure why your bringing up this issue over a month after we sent you your animals. You had expressed to me on the phone that you were happy with the animals you received except the baby turtle with extra scoots which you had expressed on the phone was no big deal and you were going to keep him. Never once was I called or emailed about any turtles dying, I al swas not sent pictures f any unhealthy or dead turtles. I am not questioning your setups but I assure and anyone who has come to our store would agree, that we keep our turtles in very nice setups open to be seen by the public. All the baby turtles we purchase from one of the best breeders of baby turtles on the market. This not to say that sometimes animals don't die. Unfortunately they still can especially as babies. If you would have simply contacted me I would have been happy to work with you. You could have pictured the dead animals, and or sick ones, as well as your setups and this matter would have been resolved, but instead you waited over a month after the purchase of the animals to complain. As far as your UPS question, we stopped shipping with them and closed our account because they won't ship snakes, therefore in order to ship an overnight package would cost to much for us.
To address John's issues go. Again I apologize, but I was only notified of the animal dying this morning and our store open at 12 p.m. This being said when you first contacted me, several days ago, we had suggested you making some changes to your tank and setup. I assure you when the animal left it appeared in good condition, but since you called I extended your warranty. I was going to email you that I just need some pictures of the deceased animals so I can send you a new one on Monday. Again keep in mind these are baby farm bred water monitors and as such occasionally have problems. We do our best to make sure all animals are feeding and are healthy before they leave the facility if there is a problem, we fix it. In the future just email me and if I don't get back to you right away give us a call and ask for Ryan Borkan. You will come to realize I am easy to work with and strive to make our customers very happy. Here is our phone number (954)428-8005.