San Marcos — Not quite 24 hours after fire broke out at the Amkon General Store on S. LBJ Drive, a few wisps of smoke still rose from the wreckage — and behind the piles of twisted, charred tin were intact shelves on which were bottles with still-bright labels.

They glinted in the sunlight, but won’t be of use to anyone.

The 1920s-era building and the contents of the feed store and Critter Shop that inhabited it were all totally destroyed by fire that broke out around 2 p.m. on Sunday and drew an estimated 30 firefighters from San Marcos, Hays County and New Braunfels.

Officials said there were no fur-bearing animals in the pet shop, and a few snakes were saved. However, many more reptiles died, as did birds and fish — some of the latter, ironically, not from the fire but the freezing temperatures Sunday night. 

City and state fire investigators combed through the rubble on Monday, though Assistant Fire Marshal Bill Shroeder cautioned that it takes some time, for example, for samples sent to state labs to be analyzed.

“We’re trying to determine an area of origin and possibly the cause of the fire itself,” he said. 

Wherever the fire started, it quickly spread throughout the building, sending up a column of smoke that was visible from miles away. The San Marcos Fire Department issued an “all call,” which drew all on and off duty firefighters, then asked for mutual assistance from South Hays in fighting the fire and New Braunfels in answering other fire calls.

A “defensive” attack that included putting water on the building from all four sides and from above brought the flames mostly under control within a couple of hours. Machinery was then brought in to knock down walls so that firefighters could douse areas that still smoldered.

Even before the fire was out, concerns broadened to include the possibility of fertilizers and other substances in the feed store flowing into Purgatory Creek and from there, into the environmentally-sensitive San Marcos River.

“When we saw water going down into Purgatory Creek we called for a couple of backhoes and a Hazmat truck to put out booms to hold it in place,” Assistant Fire Chief Len Nored said. Then, the backhoes built one earthen dam in front of the booms and another 200 yards down the creek’s channel, a move that Nored said completely contained the runoff.

“The owner said he had very little high level pesticides, the kind you’d have to have a license” in order to sell, Nored said. “So as far as nasty stuff going down the street and into the ditch, it wasn’t that bad of a problem. We called out the Environmental Health Department, they did preliminary tests and said it didn’t look that bad.”

Nored said the plan is to have a pump truck pump out the detained runoff.

Amkon owner Randy Marbach was meeting with insurance adjusters on Tuesday and could not be reached for comment. Richard Kinsey, who owns the building, said he doubted Marbach knows yet whether he will reopen. 

“I have no idea what he wants to do. I think he’s still in a state of shock. I mentioned to him what his intentions and thoughts were, and he was like ‘I haven’t even had time to think about it.’”

Some residents, though, have.

"I would like to see the Amkon owner buy 'Stewart's Hardware' store and restock as soon as possible," reader John Mulhollan e-mailed the Record. "We need this store, not more chain stores. I would donate if someone would start a 'Save Amkon' fund drive. "

A family member said the Amkon store had been in that location for 25 years. Marbach has a second store located at the Junction on Ranch Road 12.

Dozens of local residents watched behind yellow police tape as the building burned. Nored acknowledged the store was a landmark. “When anyone said Amkon Feed, everybody knew where it was,” he said.