We delivered 100 kg of dog and cat food to the largest temple in the area
Tiger Cave Temple (Wat Tham-Sua) is the largest temple complex in this part of Thailand and one of the largest Temple complexes in the entire country. Because of the vast expanses of land that the temple owns, there are a lot of stray dogs and cats that call this place home. While the monks couldn't tell us an exact amount it is estimated that 180 stray animals live here.
Normally these animals would be fed by the monks who operate off of food donations from the public. The restaurants that line the edges of the temple grounds also contribute to feeding the animals with the scraps they have after meals.
When an animal doesn't have a home, or a family decides they do not want the animal anymore, it is customary in Thailand to drop said animal off at a temple and the monks will look after it in exchange for continued donations to the temple. Whether or not the people who drop off the animals actually fulfill their end of the bargain is anyone's guess.
During the lockdown / quarantine period, the temple is not open to the public and neither are any of the restaurants. This diminishes the amount of food the monks have and therefore the amount of food that ends up in the bellies of the dogs. As the restrictions are gradually eased on travel (domestic travel that is) we are able to get inside the complex to make our relatively massive delivery to the hungry cats and dogs that call this place home.
Now to anyone who has one or two dogs 100kg of food probably seems like a crazy, never-ending amount of food to have in stock but this doesn't really go as far as you might think when we are talking about nearly 150 animals. We are hopeful that the local community and the monks themselves will continue to supplement the dog and cat's food need with whatever they can manage to get together for them. Of course we do understand that people have to look after people first, but hopefully our 4-legged friends come as a close 2nd.
It is also worth noting that in the absence of tourists, the monkeys that also call this place home have become increasingly aggressive towards the dogs and cats as the competition for food increases. I've always thought that this was a problem when food was sold to the visitors to feed to the monkeys because now they have become dependent upon that and it appears as though many of them don't actually know how to forage for food from the surrounding jungle. That's an entirely different conversation though. For the time being we are just really happy to be allowed to enter the complex and drop off this much-needed food.
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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