Opium Eating Turtles

[mahtin]

Turtles rescued from temples

Merit act does more harm than good

Supoj Wancharoen

Children watch as turtles are taken care of under the Huay Ong Kot project in Nong Prue district of Kanchanaburi. Most of the donated turtles were collected from temples where their survival was under threat due to an unsuitable environment.

Many turtles and tortoises live in poor conditions at temples after being donated by people who bought the animals to be set free, thinking they could make merit from the act, according to a turtle rescue club.

The club said many of the reptiles were kept in dirty water and were in poor health.

The club organised an event to release the turtles it rescued at the Huay Ong Kot project under royal patronage in Nong Prue district of Kanchanaburi yesterday.

The sick turtles will be treated and rehabilitated at the Huay Ong Kot.

Co-chairman of the club Kajorn Chiaravanont, who is also senior executive director of True Group, said the club rescued the animals while campaigning for temples not to accept turtle or tortoise donations, or to attempt to raise those that had been donated.

In 2003, the club relocated 250 turtles and tortoises from Wat Bowon Niwet to a pond in Bang Sai district of Ayutthaya.

Veterinarian Nantharika Chansue, co-chairman of the club, said more than 400 turtles and tortoises released at the Huay Ong Kot project yesterday were picked up from temples and research centres in Bangkok and Suphan Buri.

The club cleaned the animals, checked their blood and gave them medicine to relieve them of parasites.

The club will also contact National Park offices for help in finding places to release the turtles after they have been rehabilitated.

Dr Nantharika said the places should be under government supervision, to prevent poachers, and have plenty of food and clean water sources.

She said, however, temples were afraid the club would mistreat the animals. But it is the other way around, albeit innocently, because many temples do not understand how to care for the creatures and therefore raised them in unsuitable conditions.

She said she has even seen turtles in ponds where water flowed from toilets.

"Some Thais believe freeing turtles will give them a lot of merit," she said.

Businessmen exploit this belief by renting space in the temples and feeding the turtles opium so they would come back to them after being released by merit-makers. The turtles are re-sold to the next customers, the vet said.

Kittikhun Boonraksa, the club executive, said the places where the turtles are released after rehabilitation are kept secret out of fear poachers would find the animals

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Last year I drove my wife and other family members to a pond where they released some turtles, never suspecting that they were Junkies!

Has anyone else any such experience?

[pampal]

Have the these turtles been drug tested?

[cloudhopper]

Merit act does more harm than good...

Most do.

[RakJungTorlae]

Yeah my friend clamed that aliens where climbing out of a poster. And I started to see the music notes float out of the speakers, it was potent stuff.

Cool turtles . I want to build a pond next to my house can I get a handful of them? With a supply of there daily fix

[TheDon]

I wonder what they taste like? Do they make Turtle soup in Thailand?

[girlx]

i used to have red eared sliders. i love turtles, but the problem with red eared sliders is they sell them in chinatowns all over the world by the bucketload, and though when they are babies the size of a quarter they seem like ideal pets, they grow up to be about a foot long and are very difficult to take care of as they need clean water, a properly heated and filtered environment, and a basking area with lighting. in NY, most people just throw them in the ponds in central park when they get too big, and that has thrown the ecosystem in the park into chaos. it appears the same thing happens here with various turtles. i suggest boycotting the turtle sales (they have buckets of them in chatuchak too).

[Scott]

Does opium help them come out of their shells?

[sriracha john]

Just as insidious is their easy addiction to tobacco...

[Shotime]

I read this in the paper today, and had to read it twice. The turtles would run-away and return to the Temple for their dope? It also said they were detoxing the turtles. Cold turtle would be too much. Someone already made the turtle soup joke but that's no excuse for my lame attempt to be funny. How sad. The poor f____g turtles. What's next? How about the birds they sell so you can release them? Do they rush back to the Temple?

[Shotime]

I read this in the paper today, and had to read it twice. The turtles would run-away and return to the Temple for their dope? It also said they were detoxing the turtles. Cold turtle would be too much. Someone already made the turtle soup joke but that's no excuse for my lame attempt to be funny. How sad. The poor f____g turtles. What's next? How about the birds they sell so you can release them? Do they rush back to the Temple?

[TheDon]

Just as insidious is their easy addiction to tobacco...

HAHAHAHAHA

The turtle looks like he is off his face.

[sriracha john]

Just as insidious is their easy addiction to tobacco...

I read this in the paper today, and had to read it twice. The turtles would run-away and return to the Temple for their dope? It also said they were detoxing the turtles. Cold turtle would be too much. Someone already made the turtle soup joke but that's no excuse for my lame attempt to be funny. How sad. The poor f____g turtles. What's next? How about the birds they sell so you can release them? Do they rush back to the Temple?

Actually, while the turtles have difficulties centering on opium and tobacco, it seems that birds, in general, seem to be prone to prefer marijuana...