'Extreme Animal Rescue'

Think you know your neighbours? Well, it’s amazing how a natural disaster can change things. The great deluge – an inland sea of floodwater that covered much of central and northern Thailand – is now draining into the sea. The country’s Prime Minister, Yingluck Shinawatra, said a battalion of pumps will help ‘dry the nation out’ by the end of December. However, the floods are still springing plenty of surprises.

Take Dr ‘Ning’ and her team of student vets for example. They thought they knew Bangkok pretty well. Based at the city’s Chulalongkorn University, they study and care for thousands of turtles, tortoises and tropical fish. They also run a popular ‘fish hospital’ which serves the local community. Over the past few months however, this adaptable bunch have ditched the lab coats and turned themselves into an ‘extreme animal rescue team’.

Exotic pets

The calls began in early October with panicked sounding ‘pet’ owners begging Dr ‘Ning’ Natarika Chansue to do something. Millions of Thais were evacuating their homes, taking only what they could carry. Everything else was left behind – and ‘everything else’ happens to include snakes, monkeys (including an endangered capuchin), wild boar, hundreds of deer, a couple of black panthers, Siberian tigers, black bears, a pride of lions and so on.  “It came as a huge surprise,” says Dr Natarika, who also serves as the President of Zoo and Wildlife Veterinary Society of Thailand; “Turns out there were enough exotic species in the city to fill up a pretty decent wildlife park.”

I got a chance to see Dr Natarika in action a few weeks ago, as she orchestrated the removal of a fully-grown gibbon from the front garden of a family home in Bangkok.  The gibbon was purchased by the Comprisart family when he was ‘a really cute baby’.  After a couple of years however, ‘Jaw-well’ the family pet stopped being cute and was put in a cage – where he remained for the next 23 years. “I’d stuff the owners in a cage if I could,” said the Veterinary Society chief, who was clearly upset by the whole situation.

Lions and tigers

In truth, she didn’t have time to deliver a talk on animal stewardship. She grabbed a mobile phone and started shouting down the receiver at someone who turned out to be the director of a government-run wilderness area.  ‘Yes you will make room for Jaw-well’, she said with feeling. This type of encounter, entirely typical I was told. According to Dr Natarika, the park director said he had neither ‘the space nor the money’ to feed another large primate. Her response was uncompromising; “well you better figure it out because this animal needs a home”. It seemed to do the trick. Space was found and the gibbon’s cage – complete with a drugged-up Jaw-well – was hoisted onto a truck.

Speaking of money, Bangkok’s ‘extreme animal rescue team’ are definitely on the lean side. They do not receive any help from the government – and with millions of people now homeless that’s not surprising. In fact, Dr Nantarika frequently has to dig into her own pockets to buy drugs, food and other supplies for the animals. Donors have come through with a number of vehicles for the group – something they are probably now regretting. The flood waters have destroyed the engines in four of them and the fifth – a nice, shiny gold number – isn’t expected to last long.

There is plenty of work left to do. As the waters recede, various members of the animal kingdom continue to emerge from the muck – and the suburban foliage. Yesterday, a wild boar was hit by a car on Bangkok’s outskirts. “A shame we didn’t find that one earlier,” says Dr ‘Ning’. Then there are the lions and tigers.

The owners of several Siberian tigers, who run a museum in north Bangkok, want their prized possessions back. “Well that’s going to be a treat,” says the country’s top vet and all-round good neighbour.