6th Avenue Aquarium

Picked up an electric catfish, five star general cichlid and bichir. You help yourself. They also have plants and crystals for sale. Great selection of equipment and saltwater fish Chopped it up with the owner he’s just crass not racist. Too many bleeding hearts locally. Quarantine your newly bought fish if you have a community tank. I’ve been coming here for 20 years. Parking is a crapshoot best to come on a weekday in afternoon. If it’s on Sunday there’s usually a farmers market going on down the street.

Sketchy. I mean it’s an SF institution so you keep going back for certain stuff but let’s be real: this is a concentration camp for fish. They pump the water with very high oxygen and copper and who knows what else to keep the fish alive as long as possible but every animal in here is in the process of dying to some degree. I still shop here because they have a incredible selection of products and the shrimp are very affordable. Lights and tanks they have good selection and price. But again, livestock situation is sketch. I will say well more than half of the fish I’ve bought here over many years have just died immediately when I got them home (to my pristine heavily planted tank that’s been established for years) best advice on livestock is try to get fish right after they arrive. Or don’t at all lol. I’m not hating, like I said I still go here. One thing that may help customers is to test the water you get in the bag when buying fish here. I’ve done it a few times and got almost purple reading, AKA super high PH, I’m guessing due to dissolved oxygen and maybe copper or some disease treatment?? I don’t know but if your tank is 7 or below 7 the fish just die of acidity. Anyway this place will surely survive the apocalypse but the fish won’t survive a week so get ‘em while they’re hot!

This is the sad and cruel side of the aquarium trade. The fish are not treated well. Captured in the wild and mailed to this place to hopefully not die in the store. If you walk around this place you will find dead fish in the tanks. The only good thing I can say is they have a large variety of equipment and supplies. Don't buy fish here.. you would be better off buying them yourself online.

Review from 2023 edited for typos. Have not returned recently. Really inhumane setup for the hermit crabs for sale. Literally a pint size plastic container with a bit of dirty water in the bottom. Truly was shocking. My guess from experience is that these crabs would be hard to bring back from these conditions after purchasing, might die soon but even if they didn't it's probably cut their lifespan by a few years. For a store setup they need minimum shallow fresh and salt water dishes, a bit of a shell selection, and a food dish with some pellets and veggies, and a substrate of some kind in the cage. Can't say anything towards other fish as that's not my area. If you're a fish only shop that doesn't have the setup for land hermit crabs, just don't sell them instead of trying to make a quick buck like this. Whether you look at it as sacrificing the quality of your pruduct or the health of the animals it's not a good look for this business.

I don’t know why they can’t Invest the Time to quarantine new fish shipments?? I got an infected platinum albino Discus and wiped out half my tank in 3 days time! I tested my chemistry and all normal. These were healthy until add this new pair. They run a low quality operation, sell “cheap” but costs you more in the end.