‘Kaew Petch’ meaning ‘Diamond Glass’ was rescued in the early days of April 2014 from a tourism elephant camp in Pattaya where she was being exploited as a trekking elephant. The 50 year old female elephant was forced into working in the tourism industry for over 35 years, carrying people on her back from sunrise to sunset and consequentially was suffering from severe skin infections that were covering over 60% of her body. Fungus lead to the infections and would have been extremely itchy and uncomfortable for her, however she had no accessible water to bathe or shower herself and was constantly at work and in the direct sunlight so had no time to heal. Upon arrival at WFFT, Kaew Petch was treated daily by our medical team for over 6 months to help soothe her skin and nurse her back to health. The beautiful lady is now clear of all fungus and has settled in well with the others at our elephant refuge. She has recently become the surrogate grandma of our baby elephant along with her first friend after her rescue; La Ong Dao, further helping to put a smile on her face.
