True stories, all:
- Jennifer Watts, staff nutritionist at Chicago's Brookfield Zoo, is designing "a Weight-Watchers"-style points program for the animals, allowing them only a few extra points each week, to keep them from developing "love handles."
- Keepers at the Indianapolis Zoo are feeding their bears sugar-free Jell-O instead of the real stuff. Other treats in use at zoos around the country and elsewhere include salt-free crackers, and alfalfa-enriched "biscuits." These filthy hippies hide the snacks in the animals' enclosures, forcing them to locate them on their own!
- The Toledo Zoo has taken a far healthier and more natural approach, feeding their large cats whole calf carcasses, and their wolves roadkill (deer). This forces the animals to expend energy, and exercise to eat -- much as they would in the wild.
While a valid science, and a necessary one for many zoos and animals, feeding bears veggie-burgers and tofu-bars is a bit hippy-dippy, if you ask me!
© C Harris Lynn, 2008
No comments:
Post a Comment