Back in April, I went to the store to pick up a female candy cane corn snake. I saw an ad on KS and since I live in the Houston area, I decided to go and have a look. The store itself was cramped and filthy. There was a small 30gal tank with 30+ baby iguanas. The snake cages were not heated and in one 10 gal tank, there were 7 corn snake babies. I asked the guy (it was an African American guy who's at all the Repticon shows) if he still had any candy canes for sale. He said they were sold out, so I picked out an okeetee female. She looked healthy. No mites, no bites, good weight. She was very small (only 5g) so I asked the guy if she was eating regularly (I wanted to make sure that she wasn't fresh out of the egg with no meals in her). He stated that she had been fed three times with him personally feeding her. He said that he was feeding her live pinkies, but that she hadn't been fed in two weeks since they were out of pinky mice. I reluctantly bought her for $30 and took her home. I was skeptical about the "no refund policy" but I figured I wouldn't need it because she visibly looked healthy.
I got her settled into her new home and let her be for about a week before I offered her a frozen/thawed pinky mouse. She gobbled it up. Sadly, she regurgitated two days later. The mouse was still fully formed. I waited ten days and ordered extra small pinkies online. When they arrived, I tried to feed her a frozen/thawed extra small pinky mouse. Like before, she regurgitated a fully formed pinky mouse. Both times, the mice were not digested, but were rotting inside her belly and thus why she regurgitated.
I promptly made an appointment with my vet (who treats snakes) and they took a fecal culture. She didn't have any parasites. The vet was stumped as to why she wasn't digesting. He sent me home and told me to try one more time. Ten days later, I offered her another extra small pinky and sadly, she regurgitated this one two days later as well. At a loss, I made another appointment with the vet to have her euthanized. I could not allow her to suffer anymore.
After Lilly (as I named her the day I got her) passed, I called the store to ask about a refund. They did offer to replace her, but I kindly told them that I didn't want another snake from them since I was led to believe Lilly was eating regularly for them when in fact, she did not have the ability to digest (for whatever reason). I simply hung up the phone. Every time I see them at reptile shows now, I kindly walk in another direction and won't even stop to look at their tables. I cannot support a business that can't even sell animals that feed well.