On my last day in Belize one week ago today, I was so fortunate to find the Caye Caulker Animal Shelter just a few doors down from my hotel. There I met Kenny and his lovely 16 year daughter Meredith who live and work there and rely solely on donations and the kindness of others to help them save the stray dogs and cats living on the streets of their developing country. Sadly, in Belize it is common and legal for the government to poison the street animals in attempts to control the population. When I visited they had eight dogs available for adoptions and over twenty cats and Kenny was headed back to Belize City to rescue more the following day. If you’d like to help, you can click on the link HERE to get to his Go Fund Me page. For anyone visiting Caye Caulker, they are always looking for tourists to come take the dogs for walks and I met several doing just that while I was there. Always heartbroken and falling in love with every dog I see on the street when I travel, I can’t believe I never thought of this before: every time I am going to visit a new country, I will google to see what shelters are in the area and contact them directly to see what I can 1) bring with me and 2) do to help raise awareness through photography and any other means possible. Currently I am looking into raising funds to buy nice harnesses for Kenny’s dogs as many are not trained on leash yet. Here are some highlights from my wonderful afternoon spent playing, walking and photographing the animals. (Photographer sidetone: I generally only travel with my 24-105mm lens. I like kicking it back to the old school days of just me, one camera and one lens as well as not be weighed down as I backpack and carry everything myself. However, lesson learned here. I will also now carry a portrait lens with me too but I made the best of it with what I had with me for this impromptu shoot!)
Nightly feeding. So well behaved!
Kenny with Senior Dog Maya who is about eight years old.
Next up is sweet three year old Princess.
Yup. Kinda fell in love with this dude: Spot whose about 2.5 years old.
OMG. Eight month old Chica. Those ears. Such a love.
The next three are 16 week old puppies from the same litter: Tiny Whiny (more black), Cayo (more tan) + Jack (mostly white).
Sweet and playful Sheba – about 2.5 – who loved chasing the cats around the compound
Sheba getting ready to go for a walk with volunteer Vickie
So many cats! Impossible to get all their names straight but here’s as many as I could photograph that day.
Thank you Kenny for all you do for these sentient beings! You are a kind soul. #livingbuddha <3
Please “Share” and/or “Like” if you do to spread the word and follow them on Facebook here. You can also reach Kenny directly via email @ kenrickcatken@gmail.com.
©Kiki Larouge Photography. Unauthorized use is prohibited.
#rescuedismyfavoritebreed
Timeline 3/7/18
