please watch this video!!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3dHojKqaS4

That is just so heartbreaking. Do not feed donkeys on the side of the road. Donate to the sanctuary is how to help. Thanks for posting.

the reason why you see more donkeys on the road again is because there is no money to bring all the "healthy" donkeys into the sanctuary.
There are between 80 and 120 donkeys on the streets at the moment.

Is there a paypal to donate to for the donkey sanctuary?

Marge, I don't know how to put that on.
The best I can tell you is to donate on the account number that's at the end of the video, there you can find all the details about how to do it in dollars or in Euros.

Thank you. I found where to donate. www.supportbonaire.org and just pick donkey sanctuary. I just donated and I hope more will too. I read the stories about all the donkeys and the hurtful things being done to them by some mean people. I hope you can catch the evil people that would hurt a defenseless mare and foals at the sanctuary.

Maike, I once saw a school visiting the Animal Shelter. Can you organize field trips for the children to see the Sanctuary and learn about the program and our island's donkeys? Start small..maybe a school can collect pennies and adopt a donkey..outreach in this manner often makes a difference.

Thanks for all you do.

Marge, thank you very much for donating, it really helps us.
Ann, we already have different schools coming to us, they get educated here first and then they go to be with the donkeys to pet them and they have to answer some questions about them as well, it works good.

Rather than attacking people like me that indeed DO feed the donkeys apples and carrots along side of the road, how about the people driving around Bonaire? They're going to DAMN fast!! Oh, by the way, I carry water and a bowl for them to drink out of too.

In your most elite opinion, will they head straight for the donkey sanctuary and bray to be let in if I don't feed them? Give me a break?? Marina does amazing work, and I contribute regularly, but I will not stop feeding them as I traverse the island.

One of my most favorite pastimes is to feed the wild donkeys. If GOD is going to condemn me to hell for helping out an animal along side the road, so be it....but I think not!!

Be it donkeys, goats, or dogs I encounter, I will ALWAYS feed them!! Instead of criticizing people like me, why not focus your attention on the real culprits? People who tear down the road in Bonaire, going to damn fast? I would prefer seeing them wild and safe, as opposed to safe and in the sanctuary.

Hi Tad, I hope you didn't take offense at my comment about feeding them road side. I didn't mean any. I have purchased bags of carrots and then on the back road returning from Rincon, we always see Donkeys. They run to the road to see if they're going to get a treat. We used to hand feed them there, but then I realized they would think cars=food,so we stopped. we still feed them. They just don't know it. We toss carrots into the brush, but only when we don't see donkeys. We figure they'll find it later and won't think a car/truck means food. I would just die, if I ever hit one. We agree, the speeders cause most of the carnage to the donkeys. I hope Marina can manage to save as many as she can, so we won't have to worry anymore.

Marge, I'm sorry you were attacked for posting appropriate information. Thank you for taking the time to ensure that the donkeys do not acclimate to cars/trucks. That endangers them even more. I usually avoid the donkey threads because of this type of reaction, but felt I had to say THANK YOU to Marge for taking the hit and being correct.

Marge,

None taken. I'm just a HUGE animal lover. My pups and kitty's are in control of my house. I'm just lucky enough to be the cabana boy. I will NEVER...EVER pass an animal by, and not help it out. I have done so many times, as Marina can tell you.

Acclimating to cars and trucks is not the problem!! It should be the rule, and when a donkey, goat or dog sees one, they should hope there is a meal waiting. It's the speed at which these people travel, and whether or not they give a crap about wildlife?

Want me to contribute to helping round up all of the wild donkeys? Fine, I will. Want me to help out Marina at the sanctuary....I already do. Want me to contribute to the Bonaireian police to do their job of enforcing the speed limit....GREAT!!

But I am not going to take any flack over feeding the wildlife? I can tell you are an animal lover as well, and thank you for being here with the rest of us. A band aid or non intervention is NOT the solution though. It's part of the problem...?

Tad,

I’m an animal lover too, and one of the founders of Foundation Animal Welfare Bonaire (although I speak only for myself today). A couple of comments:

Do people speed on Bonaire? Yes, they do. But you can kill a donkey (or goat, or dog) with your vehicle even while going the speed limit. What’s the harm in trying to keep the donkeys off the roads, for heaven’s sake? Do as Marge suggests and put the food far from the road if you can’t resist ‘helping’ them. To hope that the animals of Bonaire should look to cars as a food source is asking for many more animal, and potentially human, deaths.

The donkeys, dogs and goats of Bonaire are not ‘wildlife’. The donkeys are basically an invasive species brought by man hundreds of years ago. Same for the dogs, some of whom have owners (who may not be able to afford to care for them the way you care for your pets, but they do their best); some dogs are feral. The goats are livestock and have owners who care for them, and trust me, their owners do care for them. I lived on Bonaire for more than 4 years and never once did I see a sickly looking goat. Please don’t encourage goats to go near the road—they have plenty to eat (goats will eat just about anything) and their owners count on them for their livelihood—the loss of even one could be financially devastating to a Bonairean family.

There are short term solutions and long term ones. Feeding these animals is the short term solution. But what happens when you go back home? Population control is the key. The donkey population could be controlled with a roundup of young males, castrating them and releasing them. Sadly, there is not room for all of them at the sanctuary, so let’s have fewer who need the help. Spaying and neutering is the only solution for the dog problem (although I hear there is currently an epidemic of Distemper, which might well decimate the dog population…a truly tragic prospect).

So please continue your financial contributions to the animals of Bonaire, but be cautious with feeding the critters. There are better and more lasting ways you can help.

Alex

thank you Alex for explaining all of that.
we do have a plan at the sanctuary to castrate all of the male ones outside, but there's a money issue there, without it you can't get the people and equipment you need to do a project like that...
so for all of you that made donations for the donkeys...THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!!!! every dime helps

Maike

Who was that video targeting? People aware of the donkeys on Bonaire? Or, where they trying to spread the net?

As I can read on the Internet those animals cause a lot of damage. Goats destroying gardens, dogs destroying goats and sheep, donkeys disrupt public order and birds sitting on the harvest. A problem faced by the Bonairian for centuries. Feeding donkeys on public roads for the entertainment on an image only makes it worse. Seems to me to be with regard to the donkey problems that castrate indeed can be a solution.

i agree with marge. it was marina at the sanctuary who has been advising people not to feed the donkeys alongside the road. it is a good idea to leave food well off the road in areas where the wild donkeys congregate. but do it when they aren't around so they don't associate cars with food.

Tad..Obviously you mean well, but please don't do it! In the long run it will hurt the donkey and teach him that cars equal a free meal. Then the inevitable will occur.

As far as speeding, yup, we're in agreement on that. Unfortunately the animal will ALWAYS lose when contact is made with a moving vehicle. They are much better off being afraid of man, unless of course they reside in a sheltered/sanctuary area.

By the way on the subject of speeding vehicles striking animals, this also applies to people. It's always a prudent practice to walk or jog facing oncoming traffic. This way you can see a vehicle approaching and can take evasive action at the last second.

Vince, Marge, and Alex,

I appreciate the input, and I will indeed think about it very seriously. However, I CANNOT, and WILL NOT, leave an animal hungry and thirsty along side the road. Maybe heading back into the woods is the answer?

Let em' die, or to be rescued a few months later, is not an option for me. Like I said, I'd be willing to contribute to rounding them all up. But I am NOT going to drive by nonchalantly!

I don't even come close to pretending I have all of the correct answers. I guess that others out there do though? Maybe college degrees in just this sort of thing? Or maybe it's just one opinion versus another?

In some countries (e.g. Belguim. Pinalty: 250 EUR.) it is not allowed to feed animals in public area. In Holland is something similar; disposing of waste. Maybe something like that can be introduced on Bonaire, for those who don't wanna listen and understand. I am born and bred on Bonaire.

Did you mean to say, "I was bred and born in Bonaire," or "I was born and breed in Bonaire?"

Tad,

Thank you for (re)considering your position. I don't have all the answers either, no one does, but common sense tells me encouraging animals to come near the road endangers them. Experience tells me animals learn to beg for many reasons; it isn't always because they have no other option (my pets routinely leave their dinners to ask for some of mine instead). No one with any compassion wants to drive past a hungry or thirsty animal and do nothing. But if you see a stray and skinny dog along the road, you can call the dog catcher (assuming his truck has been fixed in the past 3 years!) or you can call the Animal Shelter directly. If you see a donkey in distress, you can call the Donkey Sanctuary. Help from the agencies charged with caring for these animals will give the animals a long term chance, not just a full belly for the moment. And again, I really don't think you need to worry about the goats .

Thank you for your concern for, and contributions to, the welfare of animals of Bonaire.

Alex

Bill, there is new discussion about the DK milk. I like that one. Oh so funny. I have not breed in Bonaire in the sense of multiplying. Make your own choise which is aplicable. What I can tell you is, that I grew up in Rincon with story about Kompa Nanzi and the King who used donkey milk to stay with a young skin.

There you have it. And people wonder about the medical benefits of a donkey bath.

I can't tell anything about it. Never took a donkey bath. Hihi Haha Hoooo. Seems that there are also cows along the roads on Bonaire waiting for food.

When I think of the Donkeys, my first thoughts are of Marina and what a great and noble thing she has done. Then I think of the few wild donkeys that were left, problem is they are not few anymore. They will breed and in a few more years we will be right back to the bad old days of to many wild donkeys, being hit by cars, being abused and/or neglected or being shipped to Curacao for the lions.

I do not see castrating the males as a solution, it only take one missed lucky male to do a lot of mating. Performing a vasectomy would be much better as they would stay in the competition and keep a harem, but that is also a difficult and expensive surgery. The same goes for tying a female's tubes.

This seems like a possible solution, if they made an equivalent for donkeys.

Dear BT writers and readers , indeed we ask every visitor who tells us that they feed the donkeys, not to do that, with al reasons mention before. Donkeys are use to a very poor meal , they find there water and during their walking they eat.
To avoid al the car accidants , it is better for the donkeys , not to get used to see a car stopping with the idea of getting food.
As an advise from the Dutch funding Usona and Sei we wrote a detailed catch programm , toghetter with the help of Zoo vets who are willing to help with it, but one of the funding rules are, that the Bonairean Gov , must ONLY SIGN , that this is a good solution , so we wil get the funding to do it! But guess wat, the governement is not willing to sign , neither the give a straight answer, but we already hear it by mouth speaking , that they don't want to sign it because they don't want us to get funding, they want all the funding for people and not for the donkeys. So we are ending up now in only HELPING the donkeys who are sick or wounded , see www.donkeysanctuary.org , and one day we wil end up in a very good solution for the donkeys who are on the streets and for Bonaire.
Drive slow if you see a donkey , there can be more donkeys in that area.
After these rainy period the donkeys wil go back into the kunuku\thank you who are helping us already , but we realy need more support!
Marina and the donkeys