We missed a female at one of the temples and now we have more puppies
Our projects of sterilizing the female dogs at 3 major temple areas here in Krabi is not an easy task. It got easier when we started having monks that wanted to help us out and I am always thankful for that because I don't think there would be any possibility of us getting this job done without them. At some of these temples though, especially the gigantic Tiger Cave Temple, it is simply not possible for us to know that comings and going of the more than 100 dogs that live there. New additions that are dropped off by owners unwilling to carry on with the job are normally dropped at the front gate but there are many ways to get in and out of these temple grounds. It isn't a fortress after all.
While we do our best to keep tabs on any new additions that arrive, without some sort of military level drone surveillance and tracking chips inside all of the current dogs we really can't monitor all of them. I think we have done a pretty good job but recently a female dog wandered onto the grounds and had puppies there, or she may have been hiding in the back with one of the packs and we just weren't aware of her being there in the first place.
We don't get upset because a female dog has babies. That is what female dogs do. What we are happy about is that they appear to be in reasonably good health and now we know that they are here. So we picked up the dogs and transported them to a clinic for a health check and to get them vaccinated and sterilized. It remains to be seen if the pups are old enough for that yet.
Approaching puppies is a lot easier than fully grown dogs but some level of caution must still be exercised. Young pups are too full of life and curiosity to really resist being around humans but the mothers are not always of the same mindset. We also have to be careful that the mother doesn't think the babies are gone and then we return with the pups later only to find out that she is not there anymore. So I think it should be obvious that we took the mother with us as well and this was a bit more complicated but a little bit of some delicious meat and bones normally turns the tide as far as if they want to be friends with us or not.
After a few chomps on this delicacy, both mother and pups were ready to follow us anywhere and the transport to the clinic went off without a hitch. There were no incidents although the mother really didn't enjoy being put in a cage.
Something that I haven't thought about in a while that I noticed with these pups is that you can always tell with some level of accuracy how old a dog is by how they handle sharing food. Even dogs that have grown up in an environment of zero competition for food will eventually develop a defensive or even aggressive way about them when it comes to food but puppies, they don't feel that way. They are happy to share and will even take their time. As dogs get older they tend to chomp down anything they are given at a very rapid pace and will become aggressive it if looks like any other dog wants to have a taste as well. While these 3 dogs are all related, they were calmly sharing the meat and it was nice to see.
Now, as far as us not knowing that an unsterilized female was in the mix at the Tiger Cave is concerned we do keep tabs on all the animals there both with names as well as pictures and descriptions of them. We are pretty meticulous about this actually. However, if the dogs in question do not come to the feeding areas there really isn't any chance we are going to know about them. This particular temple complex is huge and even though there are a lot of monks here it would take all day to patrol the entire area and take tabs on which animals are there.
We are already doing as much as we can and when you consider that the number of dogs at this temple has stabilized at around 100 and all of the dogs are in good health, this is a massive step up from what it was like 6 years ago before we got involved.
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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