We look after a lot of dogs either directly in our kennels on our land, or by checking in on them at the temples where the monks are their care-givers.
In Thailand, most of the dogs are your run-of-the-mill shedding medium length hair sorts but every now and then a temple ends up with a non-shedding dog that needs haircuts. These tend to be cold-weather breeds and this can be particularly problematic because it's not like the monks are trained groomers. Often the dogs' hair will just grow like mad until a monk crudely takes a scissors to the matted up hair.
This can be a real problem because matted hair attracts more parasites and the dog itself cannot scratch the itches anymore. This can be very uncomfortable not to mention very hot when a dog cannot shed.
In comes "Pui" and she is one of the more popular dogs at the temple she calls home. Probably because she is friendly and doesn't look like your average soi/street dog.
As is often the case with temple dogs, Pui was not thrilled about being crated and transported but it is the only safe way that we could transfer her in our pickup truck. We kept her in there for as short a time as possible.
Once at the groomers, Pui was perfectly fine being let out of the kennel and was very quick to come to us for all the steps of the process of having her hair cut, nails clipped, a nice luxurious bath, and we snuck a vaccination in there as well.
At no point in time did Pui panic or become aggressive. Mostly she was just really curious about all the new smells in this place with the nicely manicured grass.
I will admit, we went seriously overboard with the haircut and she does look a bit silly afterwards. But this is because this isn't for fashion and we can't be running back here to give her another haircut every month. She'll be fine. Pui doesn't care at all what she looks like and I think she was really enjoying how much more effective scratching herself was after the chop.
She is going to return to the temple looking a lot more like all of her other doggy friends and we have asked the monks to keep a special eye on her for a few weeks to ensure that she doesn't go overboard with scratching herself because she is accustomed to having a much larger layer of fluff between her paws and her skin.
Non shedding dogs are rare (thankfully) on the streets of Thailand, but we have to pay special attention to them when we do encounter them.
If you see a non shedding dog on the streets where you live, please consider reaching out to help. It can be quite uncomfortable for a dog that can no longer scratch any itches that it has and often animal-rescue operations like our own will provide this service with no charge at all.
If you would like to see how you can help out or simply spread the word, please visit our website at
http://krabianimalwelfare.org
Krabi Animal Welfare is a charity run entirely by volunteers and are a registered non-profit organization in Thailand and the U.K.. We aim to relieve the pain and suffering of dogs and cats within Krabi Province.
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