Tiger Temple
BySeeing a fully grown male tiger walking beside an aging Buddhist monk is an astonishing sight. But Abbot Phra Acharn Phusit does just that. We were enthralled about the story and loved the opportunity to be with and stroke adult tigers.
It all started in 1994 when villagers brought an injured jungle bird into the Wat Pa Luangta Bua Pagoda and gave it to a monk. In looking after the bird the monks inadvertently attracted other jungle birds. Since the Pagoda is near dense jungle on the Thai Burmese border near Kanchanaburi more birds started living in the pagoda complex including peacocks from the jungle.
One day an injured wild boar stumbled into the pagoda and the monks cared for him until he could be released back into the forest. The day after his return to the jungle the boar returned, followed by his family group of ten animals. Then villagers started to bring in unwanted pets and wild animals from the surrounding forest drifted in and stayed. When we visited, along with countless wild boar there are four species of deer, water buffalo, cows, horses and wild goats all roaming the grounds of the monastery.
The first tiger cub arrived in 1999 in a very poor condition. She was only a few months old when her mother was killed by poachers. When she arrived at the monastery she had been badly treated and was frail and terrified of the slightest sound. Despite the care of the monks she fell seriously ill and died. People who knew about the incident did not want to see another cub mistreated again.
The jungle near the monastery is the largest protected area in Asia and believed to be the home of the largest surviving tiger population in the region. Unfortunately, whilst the area is protected, poaching still occurs frequently. A poacher can earn up to $6,000 for a tiger body, several years salary for a farmer. So the profit is considered well worth the risk by some. When a mother tiger is killed the cubs may be taken as a bonus but they are sometimes left to fend for themselves in the jungle.
A few weeks after the first tiger cub died two healthy male cubs were taken from arrested poachers and brought to the monastery. They were tiny, just a few weeks old. Some months later the local villagers presented another two male cubs. Soon after this a border police patrol captured a group of poachers with four female cubs and took these to the monastery for care.
The Abbot welcomed the animals but as he had no previous experience in looking after large carnivores he had to learn on the job. At first he built some concrete pens – all he could afford, to house the growing cubs and prevent them from killing and eating the other temple animals. As the years went by the tigers grew up and to the Abbot’s surprise and delight started to reproduce. However, as the tiger family grew the Abbot became faced with the need to create more living space for his charges. In 2003 the Abbot conceived an ambitious plan to create a large open air enclosure where each tiger was given sufficient space.
We were able to walk slowly into the tiger canyon with volunteers, when the tigers were sleeping off their mid day meal of chicken. We were assured that the tigers were so used to human contact we could stroke and scratch them safely. We were amused that one precaution was not to wear sunglasses because if a slumbering tiger stirred then saw his own reflection in the sunglasses he might mistake the reflection for another, strange tiger and react badly. It was great getting up close and personal to these magnificent beasts. Tickling a tiger cub was of course a pure delight.
There is more information on the pagoda website;
www.tigertemple.org
