Tie Bento Box Rubber Bands Correctly: Protecting Animal Lives Starts with Small Places

When the author was a child, I picked up a nearly one-year-old stray dog on the street. When I first found it, its neck was bound by a rubber band, and the surrounding skin was almost entirely ulcerated.

Even after taking it to an animal hospital for treatment, and even though it grew up as fat as a pig, a full ring of scar where no fur could grow was always visible on its neck.

In fact, this kind of situation is all too common on the island of Taiwan.

For stray dogs and cats on the street, in order to survive in the city, when foraging, if they find a bento box, they will poke their heads in through the gaps of the box to look for leftover food.

But many people, out of ignorance or mere convenience, use the wrong way of tying the rubber band, so that when the animal pulls its head back out of the bento box, the rubber band is pulled and snaps directly around their neck. And as time passes, the rubber band gradually sinks into the skin and gets stuck in the flesh. In severe cases it can even cause serious wounds like lacerations.

What was originally a convenient little item in daily life has, through our human error, become a weapon that harms animals.

The culprit is a “rubber band” that can be seen everywhere.

When we finish a bento box and casually throw it away, we not only make the environment messy, but may also cause stray animals to have the rubber band around the box looped around their neck and strangle their throat, leaving strangulation marks, and even causing loss of life.

Out of respect for the preciousness of life, when you throw a finished bento box into the trash, do not tie the rubber band around it anymore. One habit may save a life.

The wrong (left) and correct (right) ways of tying a bento box rubber band

Please refer to the figure above. If, like a man who must find a wall to feel secure when urinating, you absolutely must tie on a rubber band, never slip it on directly (left of the figure above); instead, tie it diagonally (right of the figure above), to avoid the tragedy of “rubber band cats” and “rubber band dogs”, and contribute your own effort to maintaining a friendly environment!