We focus a lot of our efforts in Krabi, Thailand on temples because this is where unwanted cats and dogs are traditionally dropped off when the owners can't or wont continue to care for the pets. It is a tragic tradition but I suppose it is better than the alternative where the animals would just be abandoned somewhere or even worse, intentionally killed with poison.
Because we know that temples are always going to need help with the dogs and cats, we stop by a few major ones on a regular basis but a concerned follower of Krabi Animal Welfare made us aware of the pretty sorry state of affairs at a lessor temple called Wat Nong Chik.
While the monks do their duty to look after these animals as well as they can they are not veterinarians and they also aren't supposed to have any money of their own so they can't dig into their own pockets to care for them. Mostly, the monks do what they can with products that they have available to them and normally this consists of trying to keep the animals clean and providing them with leftover food from meals meant for the humans that inhabit the temple grounds. Basically they, like us, are completely dependent upon donations to keep these animals in as good of health as possible. Sometimes it isn't enough though and we are glad that this temple was pointed out to us.
I point exactly zero fingers at the monks as they were doing the best they could. Often in Thailand, knowledge of skin and parasite problems are things that the average person doesn't even know about and honestly, why would they? Of the 20 or so dogs at this temple, every single one of them had parasite issues and although you can't really tell in these photos, almost all of them had mid-level mange, which is a problem that always gets worse unless someone intervenes. Thankfully we were able to intervene.
In most dogs, dealing with mange and other exterior parasites is extremely simple. The problem is that you need to treat all of the inhabitants at the same time otherwise the pests simply jump to another host. We just needed to be careful that we got all of the dogs accounted for and ensured that everyone was treated. Most dogs jump at the chance to have one of these medications disguised as a treat, but others need a bit of coaxing by hiding it inside of meat. No matter the method, we had to get all of them. These dogs are not as accustomed to interaction with strangers like they are at more frequently visited and popular temples, so thankfully the monks and even the abbot, were there to assist us in getting all of the dogs together.
This made the job a lot easier because if a dog doesn't know you, it normally isn't very keen on being put into a cage for transport to the vet. We needed to remove all of the females as well because they were, as you might expect, replicating like mad and the dog population was already well over the amount that the monks had the ability to feed. This was causing infighting over food and these fights will lead to wounds which will lead to infection. We are lucky that we were alerted before the problem got out of hand. Judging by what I saw I think we were only a month or two away from a really horrible situation, so it is fantastic that we were able to intervene when we did.
In total 5 females were transported for sterilization and were returned the following day. One particular monk was really eager to learn about our operation and was very thankful that we came to their aid. He has promised to keep an extra close eye on the females while they recover and I feel absolutely certain that he is going to do exactly that. We also provided them with 40 kilograms of dog food as well as multiple phone numbers to contact us in the event of an emergency. Having someone that is there all the time makes our job so much easier because we are already spread very thin as far as our volunteers are concerned and we simply do not have the manpower, let alone the vehicles to be checking up on all the temples in the region on a daily or even weekly basis.
One particular dog that is named "Fluffy" seems to be a favorite of the monks and Fluffy basically rules the roost sitting on just whatever he wants to. He is extremely friendly and is not to be feared at all.
We don't really have the capacity to take on another temple project but because this one monk is so eager to help out we have decided to add this small temple to the list of projects and our aim is to keep a "clean sheet" at this temple. The overall population of dogs is still relatively small and we aim to keep it that way. Our only concern is that people will continue to drop off unwanted pets because introducing a diseased outsider can negatively affect the health of all of the pack. Thankfully, the monk seems to keep very good inventory of all the animals there and seems genuinely attached to all of them. This is immensely helpful for all of us here at Krabi Animal Welfare.
I'm just so delighted that we were contacted before the situation got out of control. Prevention of a problem is a lot easier than correcting one, so this is a win in my book.
if you would like to see how you can help out or simply spread the word, please visit our website at
http://krabianimalwelfare.org
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