Wildlife Friends Foundation Thailand, Part 2

Having been keen to update the website after a two week break whilst we were working (a six day working week from 6.20 am to 5.00 pm - if you were lucky enough to finish on time), we have since reflected and want to add a little more flavour of our experience. 

We want to start at the beginning of each day with the food preparation. In the food house, there would be around 30 people stationed around two large polished concrete benches surrounded by crates of fruit and veg waiting to be cut into various size pieces (sometimes peeled depending on whether the recipient had teeth or not) and placed in dozens of bowls and buckets of various sizes. It's hard to put into words the volume of produce stacked in the food house - it was phenomenal. By the end of the one hour morning food prep, hands, wrists and arms ached, particularly if you were on pumpkin duty. It was a great relief when we started sweeping up and cleaning down. But then we had to do it all again after lunch. Many afternoons several crates of sweetcorn would be emptied onto the floor and, sitting in a circle, we would then have to peel them all.   

After breakfast, once all animals had been fed and watered, we then had special projects which comprised sweeping up leaves in and between the enclosures and scrubbing out bear pools thick with green algae. This was always hard, dusty, sweaty work with temperatures in the low thirties. One of the volunteers commented that she didn't expect to be sweeping up leaves in a forest. 

And now a bit about some of the animals. Feeding the primates could be challenging. The langurs were particularly feisty and aggressive; whilst trying to fill their food baskets and water containers they would leap across the enclosure and land spreadeagled on the side of the cage level with your head. And if you were close enough they would try to grab you through the fencing. Even though expecting it, it was still unnerving and at least two of our fellow volunteers fell backwards off of ladders. The macaques could also be grabby as Sue learnt to her cost when she got too close and almost lost a handful of hair. Gibbons, with their long arms, would also try to grab anything close to their enclosures and Paul engaged in a tug of war after his hat was snatched from his head.

Many of the macaques had been rescued from appalling conditions which had resulted in them losing limbs; some had lost one or two limbs but there was one who only had one arm. There was also a blind elderly macaque, Rose, who you had to call her name and rattle her food basket. She was very partial to baby plum tomatoes.

There was also a three-legged cow and a bear with only one arm, the other being lost after being caught in a bear trap.

Bernie, a cassowary (large flightless bird), was one of the few animals that could be hand fed. He had been living at a temple, escaped from his cage and ran through the local village. The villagers, thinking it was a dinosaur, started throwing stones at him which resulted in him being brain damaged. If he wasn't eating, he would be tempted by hand feeding a few grapes.

On our last day working at WFFT we were with a young 20 year old guy from London. We had to go into the macaw enclosure which was next to an enclosure with three hornbills. He was convinced the hornbills had it in for him, trying to attack him through the bars. He hated the langurs, calling them devil monkeys and when we had to feed Mojito the pig that Paul scrubbed, our friend cowered by the gate saying Mojito is evil because he always tried to bite his ankles. This, despite Paul standing in the middle of the pen scratching the pig's head. He did however have a good approach for keeping the deer away from the muntjacs while they ate; he stood with arms stretched out wielding a big stick making a shield between the deer and the muntjacs.  

By the time we left on Monday morning, our hands and feet were covered with ground in dirt despite daily cold showers and Paul had blisters galore. 

Finally we should mention the 10 dogs and a number of cats who lived in the centre. One of the dogs, Sausage, made it his mission each morning to race our truck transporting us to the food house. And he won every time. Having grown up in thirty degree temperatures, he has since been adopted by a volunteer and is on his way to Wyoming where they currently have three feet of snow. 

If anyone wants to know more about the organisation, please see their website www.wfft.org