Store of the Month – February 2025

Pam’s Pets

Website: https://pamspetsabilene.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pamspetsandfish/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pamspetsfish/

(325) 675-6285
3366 N 1st ST
Abilene, TX 79603

Our store of the month for March is Pam’s Pets! This Texas-based store has been open since 1987 and offers everything you need for reptiles, birds, and freshwater/saltwater fish.

Pam first fell in love with animals as a kid catching horny toads. This quickly evolved into pets at home, and she kept dogs, cats, hamsters, fish, reptiles, and bugs. Her favorite was easily her pet praying mantis and she watched it tirelessly as it hunted its food and watched her movements.

Now her favorite pets to work within the store are birds, because she says even the hand-fed babies have huge personalities. At home she has a mini farm with cats, dogs, a horse, and a Fahaka Puffer named Prince Puff Puff. She even has plans to take up beekeeping come Spring.

Pam’s Pets is always improving and looking for ways to step out from the competition. When the store first opened in the 80s, they were inspired to take a step above the competition by making a better organized and cleaner store. Now they are constantly upgrading and renovating their animal sections to create show stopping displays.

Pam’s Pets offers school tours, teacher discounts, and military discounts in-store. When perusing, their store parrot Marco loves to draw attention and will be sure to entertain you. Customer service is a high priority for them, and they offer free water testing for both freshwater and saltwater.

If you live near Abilene, TX, make sure to show Pam’s Pets some love this month!

Get to Know the Owners

Q: Best and most difficult animals to work with in the store? 
A: Probably the most difficult animals to work with are the saltwater fish and coral. Largely due to the amount of maintenance required to keep their habitats clean, so everybody stays happy and healthy. The best….well everything else you can hold and interact with! Hand fed baby birds are always fun, especially conures and some of the other small parrots that have huge personalities! Ferrets are always fun and playful, and who doesn’t like walking around with a big bearded dragon on their shoulder?

Q: Did you have any pets as a child? What kind? What was your favorite?
A: I had many pets as a child.  Cats, dogs, hamsters, freshwater fish, a leopard gecko, a pac man frog, a preying mantis  and a spiny iguana.  The preying mantis was probably my favorite as she would watch everything you did.  Lot of fun to watch stalking her dinner as well!

Q: Pets outside of work currently?
A: Currently we have quite an assortment of pets at the farmhouse.  Several cats, a dog, a horse, and a Fahaka Puffer whose name is Prince Puff Puff.

Q: What made you get into the reptiles? Do you have a favorite species?
A: Catching Horny Toads as a child sparked my initial interest in reptiles. Panther chameleons quickly became my favorite after getting to work with several adults over the years.

Q: What made you want to open this store?
A: After visiting many pet stores in the 80s Pam and Terry decided they wanted to open a pet store that was cleaner and better organized.

Q: Plans for the future of the store?
A: Current plans include a few more upgrades to the reptile section and the fish department.  We are always moving stuff around and trying to improve the layout of the store and our ability to care for animals.

Q: Does your store provide any services or have unusual customs (school tours, live feedings, etc.)
A: We do school tours and free water testing for fresh and salt water aquariums.  Tours are especially fun with the store parrot Marco.  He loves having a crowd of children to interact with!

Q: Any trends you see on the rise?
A: BioActive terrariums have really become popular recently as well as morphs of pretty much any species that you can get a morph of.

Q: Interests outside of work?
A: Interests outside of work include building various things out of old pallets and restoring cars.  Looking at getting into gardening and beekeeping in the spring!