Trading a dog life for a plastic bucket in Thailand
“Take the easy one first, if you can not catch them come back in the night for more” says the owner of the dogs pointing at some dogs they hunters could not take. The dogs screaming at the end of the rope the former owner does not mind as she looking at her new plastic buckets.
From the loudspeaker of a pickup truck. “3 Dogs will give you 3 buckets exchange your dogs for plastic buckets $1, wave your hands if you want to exchange your dogs for a bucket.”
The dog hunters drive around the rural area in Thailand, and stop at different houses where owners of dogs have handpicked a dog he does not want anymore. The dogs waves his tale greeting the new visitor, but gets picked up and ends up in the back of the pickup with all the other dogs who are on their way to be slaughtered. Only when the dog sees other dogs clubbed unconscious does the dog taste the fear. There may be a death cry but it is too late, there is no saving him now.
“We only catch dogs with owners” the dog trader declares trying to somewhat justify what he is doing meaning the owners willingly give the dogs away to them, for a bucket.
Once the pickup is full they move all the dogs to a big truck, and it is mostly here by luck or chance are dog smugglers caught and maybe intercepted by animal activists. However, if the smugglers manage to bribe the police or sneak past them they end up at a big “factory of death”.
Back at the slaughterhouse a “skinner” will get 4 THB for each dog in one day he can skin about 100 dogs and earn $13.
The Butcher earns about 1 THB per kilo and he can do about 300 Kilo per day making him $10 per day.
Nowadays, the dog meat traders have stopped trading live dogs over the Thai border to avoid capture, but it does not mean they have stopped trading dog meat. This trade needs to stop. Support the 999 KM run for awareness and raise funds to end the trade.
international Dog Meat Trading 2012 A.D. from aaathailand on Vimeo.
