Playing Dr. Doolittle 扮演杜立德醫生

Playing Dr. Doolittle

A beautiful butterfly landed on my palm on a sunny morning, allowed me to take as many close-up photos as I like without flying away, Cool! It surely would make anyone a happy man, believing that he/she has gained the trust from a butterfly. I have seen butterflies stopping on the surface of sweating human bodies, probably attracted by the warmth and humidity, or the contents of human sweat. But it could be even worse - dying or too weak to fly away.

People like me always willing to believe that animals do have human feelings and can be friendly to humans. I have always been dreaming of myself being Dr Doolittle, able to communicate with animals, understanding them, and able to give them the help they need and gain their trust. But the brutal fact is, wild animals are instinctively either too timid or alerted in response to human’s approach, just like having an instinctive dread of fire. Humans are bounded to be their natural enemy.

A wild animal that would not go away on your approach normally means two things : it is either too sick or weak to escape, or there is something it needs or needs to protect from you so desperately that it is worth risking its own life. Of course, it could be the reason that it has never seen a human before and is unaware of the fatal danger. Some people love to feed wild animals, thinking that this will do them good. In fact, apart from making them depend totally on human feeding, the animals will also loose their alert on humans which are always the major potential danger to their life, and thus destroying their instinctive survival ability in the wild.

And then again, it could be even worse – the wild animal would not go away, simply because it wants you as food!

Sad, cruel, but true.

扮演杜立德醫生

一個陽光燦爛的早上，一隻美麗的花蝴蝶降落在我的手掌上，留連不去，任由我不斷為牠拍攝微距距照片，正點啊！任何人遇到這種情況，大概都會開心不已，願意相信自己居然有獲取蝴蝶信任的能耐。我曾多次見過蝴蝶停留在別人濕透汗水的衣衫上，很可能是因為喜歡衣物表面瀰漫著的暖濕氣息，又或者是汗水中某些物質吸引了牠，亦可能是牠正處體弱無力，甚至瀕死邊緣，無法起飛。

不少的人都會像我這般，一廂情願地相信動物擁有人類感情，願意親近人類。自已一直都依然會夢想自己可以像故事中杜立德醫生般有與動物溝通的能力，明白牠們，了解牠們的需要，幫助牠們，從而得到牠們的信任。但殘酷的現實是，對於野生動物來說，人類根本就是牠們的天敵，對人類的怯懼和戒心，是與生俱來的生存本能，就像牠們天生都怕火一樣。

野生動物不會避開你，通常有兩個理由：一是牠們可能受了傷或正病重，無法逃離現場；二是你身上或現場有牠們極急需或重視的，而且程度足以令牠們以性命相博。當然，亦有可能是牠們從未見過人類，不識人心險惡。有些朋友熱愛餵飼野生動物，堅信是為了動物的福祉，但實際的情況是，這樣不單令野生動物逐漸變得完全依賴人類餵飼，牠們亦會無選擇性地放下對所有人類的戒心，因而大大削弱了牠們的天然生存能力。

但對你來說，野生動物不會避開你，可能是另一個更壞的原因－你是牠們的獵物！

可悲，殘酷，但卻是現實。