In the summer, I live in an undeveloped part of South West Turkey. We deliberately chose to head 15 kms inland to the edge of a forest to escape the crowds and, 20 years later, we are lucky to still have plenty of open spaces and no near neighbours. An ideal place for walking a dog and letting him run around. You may wonder why I have a picture of Jake on his lead. A few days ago, I heard that Zeytin, a dog belonging to a friend, was fighting for her life because she'd picked up some rat poison while being walked in a public forest near Marmaris. The awful thing about this poison is that by the time the dog shows any symptoms, massive internal damage is inevitable. After days on a drip and lots of injections, Zeytin is thankfully rallying, but this news is a wake-up call. Not everyone appreciates the forest: in the past week two trailer loads of rubbish have been dumped not 200 meters from our garden gate. The most annoying aspect of this is the fact that this wasn't just a black bag, a plastic bottle, a coke can or picnic debris that was dumped, it was trash that was actually loaded on to a trailer or the back of a pick-up truck and, instead of bringing it to the forest, the perpetrator could have driven to the official rubbish dump just as easily. I'm not sure what we can do to stop this happening again as it's unlikely to be anyone living locally. We just have to hope we catch the guilty party in action and call the jandarma.
With such thoughtless idiots around, who knows what is being thrown into the undergrowth. I will certainly not be letting Jake out of my sight on our walks and keeping my fingers and toes crossed for Zeytin's recovery.
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I hope these fly tippers are caught... We used to have a lot of fly tipping near to our home in London. Sadly it happens all over the world, it seems.
ReplyDeleteIt is very sad.
DeleteIt always surprised me that I left a country where people carelessly throw their rubbish out of car windows to move to a country where people carelessly throw their rubbish out of car windows. It's mindless. And don't get me on the poison thing. Rant over!
ReplyDeleteCarelessness costs lives.
DeleteWishing the best for poor Zeytin.....hope all will be well. :-( It makes me so sad to hear of things like that.
ReplyDeleteRubbish....hate those careless and mindless people chucking trash anywhere they feel like it. Here in the city where I live we have Garbage Police...they actually come and look randomly at your garbage at the end of the driveway to make sure all is placed in the right bins.
Sadly it happens around the world in some countries more then some and when we get those new-comers here they just continue the same, whipping the trash around and have no concept of what to do with it or I'm just baffled I guess they don't know better..
Hope you can see who is behind these mindless trash throwing and get them fined.
Enjoy your walks....
Out of sight - out of mind seems to be the mind set.
DeleteHere, general littering has improved....but small businesses fly tip to avoid paying the fee at the dump.
ReplyDeleteFingers crossed for Zeytin: I can see why you're taking precautions for Jake.
I must check to see how much the dump charges - if anything.
DeleteIt's the one thing that really gets to me here...the dumping of rubbish everywhere. When we moved to this village house over 3 years ago, I took Beki for a run up the hill behind our house. There was rubbish everywhere, including broken glass. I was appalled. It seemed that because there were no rubbish bins up this far, people were too lazy to take it down to the village. My husband spent days gathering it all up and burning it. Horrible job.
ReplyDeleteWe've had quite a battle with the Muhtar about rubbish. We had bins for a while but they weren't emptied, so now they're gone, but at least we now have Milas Belediye bins and collection down in the village. And no-one dumps rubbish behind our house anymore because they know I'm watching!
I hope Zeytin makes a good recovery.xx
We've just been on the phone to the Muhtar and he's going to send a tractor and we'll load the rubbish and take it to the tip.
DeleteHello:
ReplyDeleteWe are appalled to learn that Zeytin picked up something so dangerous whilst on his walk and do hope that he will, given time, make a full recovery. As for the rubbish tipped in the woods. Words really do fail us.
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Unfortunately it's too late for Zeytin, but children also play in the area she picked up the poison.
DeleteSadly, this is a problem in Fethiye, too. In the forests, along the coast, along the harbour. We live where they've been building the new harbour for a few years (obviously, this was supposed to happen much quicker)and people openly turn up in pick-up trucks and drop all manner of house/restaurant refurb rubble and rubbish. Saw the sad update for Zeytin but hop you can continue to walk your dog in safety. We have emergency vets here (charity run and private) on standby should dogs/other pets inadvertently eat something along forest and mountain paths. Do you have anything like this in Bodrum?
ReplyDeleteWe have very good vets but unless you actually see your dog eat rat poison you won't know about it until it's too late.
DeleteJ and I took to carrying a couple of bags and made a show of collecting rubbish - it is a drop in the ocean but it has had a deep impact on our neighbours and those who come to picnic near our house who now use the proper bins at the end of the road. We've also organised the odd tractor and trailer for bigger dumpings. Keep on the case, smile a lot and don't give up - attitudes do change.
ReplyDeleteOn the poisoning front our old dog was twice poisoned by picking up bits of sheep carcass that had been laced with organo-phosphate poison that attacks the nervous system in very short order. It is put out to kill foxes and pigs. Knowing of the practice in some areas we always carried Atropin and hypos/syringes which saved her life. Atropin buys the animal time to get her to a vet, it is dirt cheap and available over the counter at the chemist. The British Army uses it to counter nerve agents.
We'll be collecting the trash and paying for the tractor tomorrow. The trouble with rat poison is that the animal show no symptoms until the damage is well under way. The poison that's put down for dogs/pigs/foxes makes them ill straight away so you've got time to get to the vet.
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