Last week, Thailand’s Wildlife Friends Foundations rescued a baby monkey who was being treated like a living toy.
The family had taken in the dusky langur monkey after finding it on a rubber plantation near their house. Although they attempted to take care of it, they didn’t know how to care for the monkey properly, and their toddler began treating it as though it were a toy. So, on January 22nd, they called The Wildlife Friends Foundation Thailand (WFFT), an organization that rescues captive animals and campaigns against animal abuse.
“Despite the prospect of a 16-hour round trip drive,” the WFFT wrote, in a blog post later in the week, “the team wasted no time in setting off to rescue this little monkey.” Time was of the essence, as langurs have a very specialized diet and don’t survive well in captivity.
The handover was made by local police officers so that they could sign the necessary transport paperwork (as the langur is a protected animal and regulations are strict). When the WFFT team took the animal in, they were very concerned about its well-being, as it was missing part of its right ear and was in poor physical condition. They were unsure how the monkey had lost its ear, but noted that the daughter had treated it “like a rag doll.”
Happily, for animal lovers, the baby monkey was taken excellent care of by the team. They named him Vincent (after artist Vincent Van Gogh, because of his missing ear) and stopped to feed him “every two hours” to make sure he was in good health. He was also given a soft toy to snuggle, to replace his mother.
On arrival at the WFFT hospital, Vincent had a “preliminary health test,” one of many that he will receive over the next few months.
Vincent will be joining baby Kanoon, another young langur brought to the hospital in recent months. The WFFT plans to allow the two babies to “play and develop in as natural an environment as possible.” “We cannot replace their mothers or troops,” they said, on their blog post, “but hopefully they will be able to form part of a new troop with our other babies at the wildlife rescue center.”
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