AsK about iT! >> ask How, Why, Where, or ...: Re: [Phoenix_Exotics] Thai tiger temple a con job, says wildlife group

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Re: [Phoenix_Exotics] Thai tiger temple a con job, says wildlife group

Is this CWI an AR group - 'cause it sounds like it..... Anyways, I hope the
temple isn't a con job - but I have mixed emotions about the tiger trading -
if they're doing it for new bloodlines to prevent inbreeding or something,
then I can almost be ok with it, even if it really is illegal - sorry, but
many laws passed with the aid of the AR nuts deserve to be broken....

If this place really is a con - well, some big name people got conned too -
Jeff Corwin's filmed part of an episode there. As far as psychologically
cowing -tigers- I don't think that's possible unless they're being
physically beaten, and that would leave wounds, bruises, scars that people
would see. Tigers know they can overpower people - heck my domestic cats
know how to 'escape' me picking them up, etc. when they don't want to be
picked up.

In the Jeff Corwin episode - it did show a monk grabbing a tiger by the
tail, in fact Jeff joked about the old adage..... but the tiger really
didn't seem to care that much, and the monk didn't show dominance or fear.
I would think that spraying tiger urine in their faces to establish the
dominance of a large male tiger over other tigers would be the best way to
establish dominance without using pain - very much like what the 'Dog
Whisperer' and others advocate with overbearing dogs - flip them over onto
their backs and hold them their establishing your dominance over them. It's
not cruelty - it's becoming 'top dog' or in this case 'top tiger'. That
would be using the language they understand best, wouldn't it?

Of course if they truly are malnourished or beaten - that will show in their
physical shape, which always looked fine to me, but then I'm not an expert.
Obviously if they are doped up in any way, then that has to stop.

Anyways, very disappointed that this may be a con job, I hope it's not, but
if there is true abuse, I hope they put a stop to it. :-(

Lisa

I can see how the original tigers were rescued, but unless they neutered
them, now they'd be breeding amongst themselves

On Mon, Jun 23, 2008 at 9:20 PM, <gemojungle@aol.com> wrote:

> Thai tiger temple a con job, says wildlife group
> By Nirmal Ghosh, Thailand Correspondent
>
> BANGKOK - THAILAND'S famed tiger temple, where monks walk around with
> tigers
> - and make money from tourists - is facing accusations that it is a con
> job,
> where tigers are traded on the quiet with Laos in violation of the law.
> Making the claim is the Britain-based conservation organisation Care for
> the
> Wild International (CWI), which this week released a report based on an
> extensive investigation of the Wat Pa Luangta Bua Yannsampanno in
> Kanchanaburi.
> The 28-page report - much of it a contribution by a volunteer working
> undercover at the temple - details extensive abuse and exploitation of the
> tigers.
> It also warns of a grave risk to tourists from tigers which, though
> physically weakened and psychologically cowed, are stressed out and
> therefore
> volatile - and have been known to injure staff and volunteers.
> The report also reproduces a document showing a deal between the abbot of
> the temple - which styles itself as a tiger rescue centre - and a tiger
> trader
> in Laos to exchange a tiger for breeding purposes. Such a deal is illegal
> under Thai and international law.
> The report was given to the Thai authorities last November, said Mr Guna
> Subramaniam of the CWI's Bangkok office. A reply was promised, but it never
>
> came, he said. Neither has any action been taken.
> That led to the CWI's decision to release the report.
> The temple has, in recent years, become Kanchanaburi's primary tourist
> attraction, surpassing even the famed bridge over the River Kwai.
> Based on the number of visitors, entrance fees and the price for having a
> picture taken with a tiger's head on your lap - 1,000 baht (S$40) - the CWI
>
> estimated that the temple earned about 45 million baht to 50 million baht
> per
> year.
> The estimates did not take donations into account.
> Despite claims to the contrary, it added that 'the tiger temple makes no
> discernible contribution to tiger conservation'.
> It said that the genetic make-up of the tigers is unknown, and the temple
> did not meet minimum standards for captive breeding for conservation.
> Monks and staff let an average of about 10 of the 15 or so tigers out of
> their cages daily at 1pm. The tigers are walked on short leather and chain
> leashes to a small abandoned quarry, where they are tethered on short
> chains, and
> tourists are allowed to have their photographs taken with them.
> The report said the tigers were kicked, poked, beaten, punched, dragged
> around by their tails, and had their ears and whiskers pulled.
> It added that the abbot and staff control the tigers - which were
> malnourished and kept in small concrete cages - by spraying tiger urine in
> their faces.
> This psychological tactic, which mirrors tigers' spraying of urine to mark
> their territory, aggressively establishes dominance and keeps the tigers
> cowed.
> Though the temple does not have the necessary licence to breed tigers, it
> does so anyway. But the CWI said it was impossible to say accurately how
> many
> tiger cubs had been born at the temple, and how many had survived.
> 'It is clear that (the temple) is not a sanctuary for tiger cubs rescued
> from poachers, but a commercial tiger breeding centre. Most of the animals
> at
> the temple now have either been bred on site or were brought in from the
> tiger
> farm in Laos,' it said.
> The report recorded cases of tigers disappearing overnight, and in some
> cases being replaced, in what appeared to be deals to exchange or sell
> tigers
> with a tiger farm in Laos.
> Even some of the original eight 'rescued' tigers which formed the nucleus
> of
> the big cats at the temple eight years ago were not rescued - but bought
> from a wildlife trader, who confirmed this to the CWI.
> Conservationists told The Straits Times that they were not surprised.
> The conservation community had long suspected something was amiss at the
> temple, where the tigers seemed oddly docile. Allegations had been made in
> the
> past that the animals were doped, but this had never been proven.
> Attempts to investigate such allegations had always been resisted by the
> temple.
> This article was first published in The Straits Times on June 21, 2008.
>

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

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