Foo - Bangkok dogs

BANGKOK, Thailand — Tonight, there are six. Six stray dogs. Six snouts. Buried in six soggy mounds of rice. (http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/thailand/081208/the-dogs-bangkok)The pack dines in a semicircle around Khun Somthanat, a housewife squatting near Pheung Mi Lane. Her left hand, fitted with a neon-orange industrial glove, rests in a pot brimming with rice and chicken bones.

Each dog eats from an upturned tin lid. And above the din of traffic, there is the smacking of dog tongues and metallic scrapes as the dogs nudge their lids across the pavement.

"I've been doing this for three years now. It's a form of making merit," Somthanat said in a lilting rasp. "They come with saliva spilling out of their mouths to eat here. I see them and feel extreme sorrow."

It is difficult to view Somthanat's nightly deed in a bad light. But municipal dogcatchers and animal welfare groups agree: Soft-hearted Buddhists are perpetuating Bangkok's stray dog problem.

Buddhists, who make up 95 percent of all Thais, are taught to revere living creatures and perform selfless acts called "making merit" that reduce suffering in the next life. Few merit-making acts are as public or entrenched as feeding strays. Each night around dusk, merit-makers across Bangkok dump leftovers into the street — often on a banana leaf or scrap of cardboard to dignify the meal.

"Feeding dogs, without sterilization, makes them healthy enough to produce bigger litter sizes," said Sheridan Conisbee, founder of Soi Cats and Dogs, a Bangkok-based stray animal advocacy group."Soi" means side street in Thai.

"With the merit-making idea so firmly entrenched," Conisbee said, "it's really difficult to change this."

Greater Bangkok is home to some 140,000 stray dogs, according a 2007 Bangkok Metropolitan Authority survey. But animal rescue groups dispute that count, suspecting the figure to be closer to 300,000.

The math of reproduction, however, is hard to dispute. Female dogs, on average, can birth two litters per year. Fat pregnant dogs typically birth more puppies. And with well-fed strays delivering up to 10 puppies per pregnancy, many can become great-great grandmothers before they die.

Exempting the city's sanitized downtown, stray dogs fill Bangkok's streets. At night, they roam in packs, eyes glowing green in the headlights' glare, slinking through traffic, toppling trash bins for food. (More Tramp than Lady.)

But in Thailand, most strays are regarded as "community dogs," which Humane Society International distinguishes from "ferals." Both types are homeless, but community dogs stick to one area, receive food from locals and produce bountiful litters. Ferals are wanderers, diseased and desperate, and they typically produce weak and puny litters.

This isn't to say community dogs are pretty. Some female mutts are so weathered by pregnancy their teats drag on the dirty asphalt. Others, crippled by run-ins with motorbikes, are reduced to pogoing around on one good leg. More still are devoured by mange, forever clawing at pink, sticky sores.

"There's no one to clean them up. No one to bathe them," said Wee Pornsawat, a furniture maker grilling shrimp off Bangkok's Sumkhumvit Road. "But there will always be someone to feed them."

Giving food is among the simplest and truest forms of merit-making, said Phra Mahajatuphom Thummopalo, a monk and radio disk jockey at Bangkok's Thammongkol temple. Thais, aware of monks' devotion to sustaining all life, often drop their unwanted dogs at temple gates after dark. When food is scare, he said, monks will actually forego dinner to feed the strays.

"Us monks, we don't know that overfeeding dogs makes more puppies. Maybe the laymen need to educate us," Thummopalo says. "We have a lot, we give. We have a little, we give also."

Along Pheung Mi Lane, a seventh arrival waddles towards Somthanat. The soi dog godmother reaches behind her back for a fresh tray. Tonight, she's offering Charoen Pokphand chicken — a brand name — and it falls from her glove with a wet plop.

"I pity them," she said. "People who are hungry can ask for food. Animals can't."

dare i ask if you have a point?

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3602/3354950525_57a424ccfc.jpg

Photo Set (http://www.flickr.com/photos/toni_uni/sets/72157603255281227/)

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/44/153398069_f255632af9.jpg

yeah. so what. point?

Thailand Dogs

yeah. so what. point?

This is Foo. No point needed.

Soi Dogs (http://integrity-legal.com/legal-blog/miscellaneous/the-soi-dogs-of-bangkok/)

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3148/2577883641_97f72a128b.jpg?v=0

Airwick = Constable Cut & Paste.

Airwick = Constable Cut & Paste.

Then go do something better.

Airwick I'm torn between disgust and sympathy. :)

EH, have a homeless dog issue up there?

Some here, but not bad.


Airwick I'm torn between disgust and sympathy. :)

Holly, first saw a blog about the dogs over at blogspot. The author would document individual dogs and share their lives. (follow them for months) Then, something good or trajic would happen,....

wish I could find that blog.

EH, have a homeless dog issue up there?

Some here, but not bad.



Holly, first saw a blog about the dogs over at blogspot. The author would document individual dogs and share their lives. (follow them for months) Then, something good or trajic would happen,....

wish I could find that blog.

ever been to thailand?

EH, have a homeless dog issue up there?

Some here, but not bad.



Holly, first saw a blog about the dogs over at blogspot. The author would document individual dogs and share their lives. (follow them for months) Then, something good or trajic would happen,....

wish I could find that blog.

is this the blog (http://bkkstreetdogs.blogspot.com/)?

is this the blog (http://bkkstreetdogs.blogspot.com/)?

yes! :)

thank you, wolfie da packs.

EH, have a homeless dog issue up there?

Some here, but not bad.


Can't say as we do. The greenbelts around here are home to coyotes--smaller dogs don't have much of a chance against the coyotes, and neither do cats :( .

yes! :)

thank you, wolfie da packs.

you're quite welcome Airwick. :)

example from the blog (http://bkkstreetdogs.blogspot.com/)

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1323/755721346_82c26690b6.jpg

"This is Julie, a black and white mutt that lives in the Chatuchak Weekend Market in northern Bangkok. She's zoning out, looking at the crowds of people walking by, from all over the world, and it's hot, and humid, and blazingly sunny, and you might even say the weather conditions aren't fit for a dog.

But there's great shopping here. Julie knows this, and she's contemplating just how powerful the draw of the market is. And she's trying to figure out how to capitalize on it by opening up her own business. Because that cart full of feather dusters to her right is just not the glamorous, hot item that shoppers are flocking to on this day.

But Julie has no business experience, which means she's jumping around from idea to idea - dog toys, liver flavored milkshakes, and tongue massages are a few of the ideas she's come up with -- but she has yet to come up a guaranteed moneymaker of an idea. Once that happens, Julie plans to open her own shop in the empty space upon which she's standing."

Airwick = Constable Cut & Paste.

correct.

http://static.flickr.com/114/303341722_c1d8e26430.jpg

"This is my buddy Ronnie, she's a two year old light brownish mutt who loves to run, and spends most of her time training with sprints up and down the streets of Bangkok. She's developed a healthy enthusiam over the years for racing cars and buses, and more often than not she wins these races easily.

Ronnie is pictured here catching her breath after spending an afternoon doing wind sprints up and down Ratchadapisek Road on a humid, 95 degree day. She also loves going to the motorcycle races that take place all over the capital on Saturday nights, which are fueled by large numbers of bored young people looking for excitement. (Much as they are in the rest of the world, from what I hear).

Ronnie has yet to win one of her races with the motorcycles -- which is hardly surprising when one considers that the motorcycles often exceed speeds of 110 miles per hour -- but she regularly beats tuktuks and taxi meters whenever they challenge her.

In a city where every human and dog seems to be constantly running from one place to another, Ronnie has carved out a niche as Bangkok's premier canine sprinter. The 2008 Olympics are just around the corner and I wouldn't be surprised to see Ronnie bring home a few medals from Beijing."

Soi Dogs

http://static.flickr.com/114/303341722_c1d8e26430.jpg

"This is my buddy Ronnie, she's a two year old light brownish mutt who loves to run, and spends most of her time training with sprints up and down the streets of Bangkok."

great blog. Problem is you start to care about one of them and then something unexpected happens.

I feel a mixture of happyness and sadnessas i feel for both sides, the woman want to take care of a few homeless dogs right? but before you know it there will be more and more dogs to feed, and then is when the food starts to run low, and infectious disease spread, and fleas infest your yard, then your home, then you start running out of money, it goes on and on, then who do you call? thats right, animal Control.
Then they get to say,"I told you so!" I love animals to death, but have just gone thru exactly that, but with cats, never again, I had to get rid of all the strays in the yard (as I tried to spay neuter but just didn't have enough cash to do them all) spent over $800.00 having our dogs and cats treated for fleas! not to mention the $500.00 spent having the house treated for fleas! and the sadest part of all was when I took the strays to the "no kill" animal shelter I was told that half of them were going to be sent to the SPCA due to over crowded conditions at the no kill and were more than likely going to be putn down! When all I had to do in the begging was to listen to the animal controls advise and take three stray cats to the no kill shelter, then three cats would have been treated and adopted out instead of most of their offspring killed. :(

Soi Dogs ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdNIWKKI53Q)

are you going to keep on posting cut and paste posts, or are you actually interested in helping those who are dealing with the situation there?

I feel a mixture of happyness and sadnessas i feel for both sides, the woman want to take care of a few homeless dogs right? .............

You tried, ilikebikes. Problem will never be solved, just help when you can.

are you going to keep on posting cut and paste posts, or are you actually interested in helping those who are dealing with the situation there?

I think we would be better off if we took care of our situation here at home first then try to help the rest of world with thier problems.
If we do that we will then have a solution that we can hand over to whoever needs it, and then help the world as at that time we would be able to. We have plenty of homeless dogs (and people!) right here in the good ole US of A, and that problem has to be solved before we can offer help to others.

I think we would be better of if we took care of our situation here at home first then try to help the rest of world with thier problems.
We have plenty of homeless dogs (and people!) right here in the good ole US of A.

can't disagree with that, but airwick seems pretty obsessed with thailand.

some dogs have all the fun,.....


http://farm1.static.flickr.com/55/189502928_d3e0d4835d.jpg

can't disagree with that, but airwick seems pretty obsessed with thailand.

I don't think she's "obsessed," just concerned. :) I personally think just by bringing things like this out in a forum like this one will bring more attention to it. :thumb:

You tried, ilikebikes. Problem will never be solved, just help when you can.


I think it will be solved when people realize that animals cannot be taken from the wild an "domesticated," if humans tried harder to "keep the balance" with nature they'd be in a way better position than they are today.

I do look rather fetching in a sundress,...........

:lol: this i have to see. :)

I don't think she's "obsessed," just concerned. :)

never realized that airwick is a woman. her posts make much more sense now: all that obsessing about dead glamor girls, and the like.


I personally think just by bringing things like this out in a forum like this one will bring more attention to it. :thumb:

regarding the situation of bkk soi dogs, actions help more than well wishes.

:lol: this i have to see. :)


Carowinds? :)

Disappointing to see the Bangkok street dog blog hasn't been updated in a bit.

Take me to Thailand and I'll wear my sundress.

Carowinds? Yes. :)

Thailand? Hmmmm. Will have to think on that one...

Carowinds? Yes. :)

Thailand? Hmmmm. Will have to think on that one...

Hey, if you really care, you'll take me to Thailand. :)

Kim's Dog

well, i do need a vacation. when ya wanna go? :)

sundress out and ready to go,....


"Meet Happy, a brown and white female who lives near the Asoke/Sukhumvit Road intersection. Happy spends most of her days sprawled on the sidewalks of local malls and markets, napping through the afternoon heat. She might look lazy and shiftless during these times, but in the evenings, Happy turns on the charm and sets off in search of food.

Her most effective tactic is to walk around with a friendly smile and wagging tail, gazing dreamy-eyed through the windows of local restaurants at the people eating inside. More often than not, someone will come out and throw her a few scraps of their meal, which she devours in milliseconds.

Happy is one of the most easygoing, optimistic characters in the Bangkok street dog community, which is surprising in light of the difficulties she faced growing up. As the smallest of a litter of 14 puppies, Happy had lots of trouble getting enough of her mother's nourishment. In fact, the larger puppies would often muscle the poor little gal to the sidelines, where the nipples did not bear as much milk.

However, instead of growing bitter and disenfranchised, Happy learned how to use her infectious smile to solve conflicts and open doors. Thusly, she was able to eventually gain a spot at the front of the line at suppertime. She continues to use her disarming smile to solve problems and mediate conflicts wherever and whenever they arise."

http://photos21.flickr.com/26006293_575aa9191d.jpg

no, i think wp needs to see sundress first before heading to Thailand.......;) could be wp would look better in said sundress, then Airwick should take wp to Thailand..:p

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3651/3446162957_4f85e1bd8e.jpg

Orangutan And Stray Dog Become BFF
May 15, 2009
http://www.uniquedaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/orangutan-dog-bff.jpg
“Odd couples come in all shapes and sizes but the story of the primate and the canine who are best friends has proved to be a match made in showbiz heaven. Suryia the orang-utan and Roscoe a Blue Tick hound became friends when they crossed paths at a South Carolina sanctuary for endangered animals. Now they swim together, play together and Suryia even takes the dog for his walks. Such is their bond that the pair drew the attention of National Geographic magazine and Oprah Winfrey, who will feature them tomorrow in a special show called Amazing Animal Friendship. The pair first encountered each other two years ago when Roscoe followed staff from The Institute of Greatly Endangered and Rare Species (TIGERS) in Myrtle Beach home. He was immediately spotted by the orang-utan who ambled over to make friends.” w/ photos..

Awww.

The original story made me :). I'm quasi-Buddhist myself.

Too bad the local vets there don't donate time etc to spay and neuter at least some of the homeless dogs.

Awww.

The original story made me :). I'm quasi-Buddhist myself.

Too bad the local vets there don't donate time etc to spay and neuter at least some of the homeless dogs.

they are,.... some great stories out there on just that.

unrelated,.....

Elephants and Dogs

http://thailandlandofsmiles.com/wp-content/gallery/dogs-and-cats/dogs-cats-6_800x600.jpg

..

In Bangkok, it's a tough life for elephants (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/world/asia/13iht-elephants.1.9172548.html)

BANGKOK — Of all the illegal activities that animate the streets of Bangkok - the vendors who hawk pirated DVDs and fake watches, the brothels that call themselves saunas - one stands out more than others.

Elephants are not supposed to saunter down the city's streets as they do almost every night. For at least two decades the giant gray beasts have plodded through this giant gray city, stopping off at red-light districts and tourist areas where their handlers peddle elephant snacks of sugar cane and bananas to passers-by.

Occasionally the elephants knock off the side-view mirrors from cars or stumble into gutters and cut themselves on sharp objects.

The police shrug, politicians periodically order crackdowns and animal lovers despair.

The creation of a Stray Elephant Task Force in 2006 didn't keep the elephants off the city streets. Nor did the team of undercover elephant enforcers who periodically cruise through Bangkok on motorcycles scouting for the beasts.

"To be honest, nobody wants to do this job, nobody wants to deal with the elephants," said Prayote Promsuwon, the head of the Stray Elephant Task Force, which was formed after an elephant handler, fleeing the police, raced his elephant the wrong way down a large Bangkok boulevard, causing traffic chaos.

The police shy away from detaining the elephants' handlers, also known as mahouts, because they fear they will not be able to control the animals on their own.

"This is a dangerous job," Prayote said. "An angry elephant can destroy cars and make trouble - and then we have responsibility for the damage."

The government says there are 3,837 domesticated elephants in Thailand today. Only a tiny fraction come into Bangkok - usually no more than half a dozen each evening - but they are hard to miss. Many Thais say they serve as a daily reminder of the inequalities in Thailand, the gap between provincial poverty and urban wealth.

Mahouts bring their elephants into the city for the same reasons that the sons and daughters of rice farmers try their luck as waiters, golf caddies and massage therapists in Bangkok: They need the money.

But to critics, elephants in the city highlight the persistent impunity of lawbreakers in Thailand, a country with no shortage of rules but gaping lapses in enforcement. Thailand has eight distinct laws that can be used to arrest mahouts who bring elephants into the city, rules ranging from moving violations to wildlife protection, public health and urban tidiness.

"We've been fined many times," says Nattawut Inthong, a 24-year-old mahout who travels around Bangkok with his 2-year-old elephant, Gra-po.

Nattawut treats the fine of 300 baht, or about $10, like a business expense: he pays it and moves on. Most evenings he parades Gra-po through the Nana red-light district, a warren of go-go bars in Bangkok's bustling Sukhumvit neighborhood. The elephant adds to the carnival-like atmosphere of thumping music, hawkers dressed in hill-tribe costumes and bar girls twirling around poles in bathing suits.

Nattawut makes about 2,000 baht a day selling sugar cane to passers-by, good money in a country where a typical factory wage is 8,000 baht a month.

When the nightlife quiets down, Nattawut leads his elephant by the ear to an abandoned lot on the outskirts of the city where he and the animal sleep.

Bangkok has many animal problems, among them snakes that occasionally cause panic when they slither into homes and the city's ubiquitous and mangy stray dogs, which have been known to bite pedestrians.

But elephants stand apart because for centuries they have been considered noble beasts, collected by kings and used in preindustrial times as the tanks of the battlefield. Like pandas for China, they were also tools of diplomacy. In the 19th century King Mongkut offered a few pairs of elephants to the American government, thinking it might help cement a budding friendship between the two countries.

(Abraham Lincoln, president at the time, replied that the United States might not have a favorable climate for the animals: "Our political jurisdiction," Lincoln wrote, "does not reach a latitude so low as to favor the multiplication of the elephant.")

Before motor vehicles took over, elephants were the taxis of the rich and the workhorses of rural Thailand, especially prized for their help in clearing thick swaths of jungle. It was not until the late 1980s, when the government banned logging to save its dwindling forests, that hundreds of elephants found themselves unemployed.

Some elephants found jobs in the tourism industry, lending their backs to jungle trekkers and amusing visitors with their ability to paint or even play in an "elephant orchestra." For others, the unemployment line led to Bangkok.

Eight years ago, former Prime Minister Anand Panyarachun lamented that when Thais see elephants walking down the streets in Bangkok, "we are not only sorry for the elephant but we're also ashamed of ourselves."

"The elephant was a symbol of honor, of dignity and leadership," Anand said, "but today it has become the symbol of the failures and injustices of Thailand's development."

Since Anand made that comment the government has experimented, unsuccessfully, with two projects to confine the elephants to Thailand's rural hinterland. In 2002, elephants and their mahouts were offered jobs as scouts in national parks. The project failed because it was underfinanced and the elephants and their trainers were "lonely," said Kritapon Sala-ngam, secretary of the Thai Elephant Association, a nonprofit group.

In 2006, the government started the "Bring Elephants Home" project, offering to pay mahouts 8,000 baht a month if they agreed to live in a specially designated area in Surin, a province about 400 kilometers, or 250 miles, northeast of Bangkok.

However, there is a shortage of water and tall grass - the staple of the elephants' diet - in the area. The project started with 181 elephants but is now down to 64, according to Kritapon.

Surin Province is home to 1,005, or about one-quarter, of Thailand's domesticated elephants.

Their mahouts are generally Gouay people, a small ethnic group that speaks a language distantly related to Khmer and that for centuries specialized in the art of capturing wild elephants from the jungle.

Weerasak Pintawong, the chief veterinarian at the National Institute of Elephant Research and Health Services in Surin, said the concentration of elephants is a big problem.

"There are too many elephants in Surin, and there's not enough money," he said.

Weerasak, who treats wounded and sick elephants from around the country, said it was common for elephants to be injured by cars. Often, he said, young elephants will carelessly bump into parked vehicles and bruise themselves.

"Sometimes they fall into a hole," Weerasak said. "Sometimes the elephant is frustrated at being commanded too much, and it runs away."

Yet unlike the romantic notion held by many city people toward elephants, Weerasak and others who train the animals have a more practical view. They offer a note of caution for the drunken tourists who enjoy patting the elephants on backside and the Thai bar girls who duck under elephants' bellies in the belief it brings good luck.

Elephants, Weerasak says, are powerful, restless creatures prone to rebellion.

The single most appropriate word for them, he says, is "fierce."

http://www.environmentfilms.org/soi_dog_foundation_files/shapeimage_1.jpg

Ella Todd, Founder of Environment Films refers to the two weeks shadowing The Soi Dog Foundation as...


“A wonderful strain. ‘Soi’ meaning ‘Street’ in Thai represents the 20,000 plus dogs who live wild on the island. The circumstances and horrors the Foundation face daily is more than dog charities in UK would face in a month. We produced ‘Soi Dogs’ with the aim of drawing attention to the Foundations work, which has made vast improvements to the problems with dogs on the island. Laws governing responsible animal ownership do not exist in Thailand. There are no shelters and culling by poisoning, gun fire or machete is a daily reality - then when euthanasia is the kindest gesture, they then face Religious beliefs which prohibit it! It’s a very difficult situation, that as a dog lover requires a hardened heart to cope with let alone get stuck in and help. I have huge admiration for the Foundation and am delighted we have been able to produce a film about their remarkable and inspiring work”

ht tp://ww w.environmentfilms.org/soi_dog_foundation_files/shapeimage_1.jpg

Ella Todd, Founder of Environment Films refers to the two weeks shadowing The Soi Dog Foundation as...


“A wonderful strain. ‘Soi’ meaning ‘Street’ in Thai represents the 20,000 plus dogs who live wild on the island. The circumstances and horrors the Foundation face daily is more than dog charities in UK would face in a month. We produced ‘Soi Dogs’ with the aim of drawing attention to the Foundations work, which has made vast improvements to the problems with dogs on the island. Laws governing responsible animal ownership do not exist in Thailand. There are no shelters and culling by poisoning, gun fire or machete is a daily reality - then when euthanasia is the kindest gesture, they then face Religious beliefs which prohibit it! It’s a very difficult situation, that as a dog lover requires a hardened heart to cope with let alone get stuck in and help. I have huge admiration for the Foundation and am delighted we have been able to produce a film about their remarkable and inspiring work”

not entirely correct.

Mmm, soy dogs.

http://img36.imageshack.us/img36/9774/img00040s.jpg

(I do not stand by any claim that soy dogs are mmm-worthy.)

I do look rather fetching in a sundress,...........

Sorry dude :o "Airwick" made me think of freshness, freshness made me think of clean, and they both made me think of women, so I assumed you may be a woman due to the "airwick" thing.....never mind! Sorry dude. :lol: ;)

never realized that airwick is a woman. her posts make much more sense now: all that obsessing about dead glamor girls, and the like.



regarding the situation of bkk soi dogs, actions help more than well wishes.

Which takes us right back to this:
"I think we would be better of if we took care of our situation here at home first then try to help the rest of world with thier problems.
We have plenty of homeless dogs (and people!) right here in the good ole US of A."

Ship 'em to Viet Nam for Thịt chó.

Apologies to any vegetarians out there.