Lopburi Province, a small city in central Thailand, has always attracted the attention of international tourists for its rich history and wild monkey population. But just recently, there was a spectacular "monkey war" here, which was shocking. Fierce clashes erupted over weeks between the two groups of monkeys over turf, with as many as 3,500 monkeys in the city engaged in brutal "street fighting".
It is understood that the cause of the incident dates back to March this year. Due to the sharp decline in the number of foreign tourists caused by the new crown epidemic, many monkeys have migrated to other places, but when they return here after the epidemic situation has improved, they find that the number of local monkeys has increased significantly, and the survival resources are more scarce, forming a huge survival crisis. This prompted a fierce confrontation between the two main forces--- "temple monkeys" and "city monkeys".
In order to seize the territory, the two groups of monkeys launched a desperate struggle in the vast urban area. The angry and manic monkeys resemble gangsters, not only blocking normal traffic, but also wreaking havoc on street shops. One local resident reluctantly said, "It feels like the monkeys are the real masters of the city." "
Faced with such a horrific scene, the local police acted quickly and set up a "special forces" to be responsible for catching the "gang monkeys" who took the lead. After a lot of hard work, they captured 37 aggressive male monkeys, including the notorious "City Monkeys" gang leader "Ai Krao". With the arrest of these "bandits," the originally frenzied "street fighting" began to subside gradually.
Almost at the same time, the Thai government is also actively responding to this "monkey war". According to Thailand's Minister of Natural Resources and Environment, Pacharava, the government plans to establish a macaque control center in Lopburi province and systematically sterilize the monkey population in the area to control and reduce the wild species' population at source, with a view to eventually turning the tide.
Strictly speaking, the proliferation of monkeys is not a new problem in itself. It is reported that the monkeys of Lopburi Province were once popular with foreign tourists, and those "willful and bewitching" little ones often swaggered around the human community, and even learned to take short "trips" by train, showing excellent environmental adaptability.
But living in an environment in close contact with humans does "teach" some not-so-good habits to these monkeys: they like to eat some high-sugar, high-calorie foods and drinks, which lead to the early "ripening" of the body, and the breeding period is twice a year; In addition, there is a gradual increase in conflicts with humans when they enter human banquets without permission...... As a result, an originally robust and flexible ecosystem ended up developing in a dislocation and out of control.
Now, while the Thai government is taking the initiative to "sterilize", the local government has also considered relocating some of the monkey herds to the primeval forest areas of Thailand, but has not implemented it for fear of affecting the lives of residents in other areas. However, it can be seen from the sterilization measures that human intervention is a helpless move to deal with the already uncontrolled expansion of wild animals, but it is a better way to deal with the root cause if these natural consequences are taken into account in advance.
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