• About BCR
  • News
  • News @ BCR
  • Rescues
  • Issues
  • Cat Laws
Friday, March 5, 2021
  • Login
  • Register
Big Cat Rescue
  • Get Involved
  • Cub Facts
  • The Sanctuary Cats
  • FAQs
  • Contact Us
  • Shop
  • Videos
  • Donate
No Result
View All Result
Big Cat Rescue
  • Get Involved
  • Cub Facts
  • The Sanctuary Cats
  • FAQs
  • Contact Us
  • Shop
  • Videos
  • Donate
No Result
View All Result
Big Cat Rescue
No Result
View All Result
Home News World

Horse meat, kale and crickets on menu at Bronx zoo

BCR by BCR
February 2, 2013
in News World
0
0
SHARES
7
VIEWS
Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare via Email

You might also like

Cub Petting Shame

Rules

GoFree

Mon Jan 1, 2007 5:26 PM ET
By Jonathan Oatis

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Shopping list: 750,000 pounds (340,000 kg) of grain; 100,000 pounds (45,000 kg) of meat; 10,400 cases of mixed fruits and vegetables; bees.

These are just a few of the ingredients for a year’s meals to feed the elephants, big cats, bats, birds, and other beasts at New York’s zoos.

More than 4,500 animals from more than 500 species are on display at the 265-acre (104-hectare) Bronx Zoo, the largest metropolitan zoo in the United States. It is the flagship of the Wildlife Conservation Society, which runs most of the city’s zoos.

In addition to Bronx Zoo, the society feeds a wide variety of creatures at Manhattan’s Central Park Zoo, the New York Aquarium, the Queens Zoo and the Prospect Park Zoo.

For the Siberian tigers at the Bronx Zoo’s Tiger Mountain, the main course is a commercial big-cat chow made of horse meat and nutrients.

Their keepers take a five-pound block of the stuff, divide it into meatballs nearly the size of tennis balls and put them on plastic sticks about 1-1/2 feet (0.5 meter) long.

As a small group of visitors watched recently, wild animal keeper Kelly Wallis carefully offered Sasha, a male tiger more than 8 feet long, a meatball on a stick, pushing it through strong plastic mesh. The big cat opened his jaws and took the meat off the stick.

“No one ever goes inside with these tigers,” Wallis’s colleague, Michelle Medina, told spectators.

The tigers, fed five times a day, also get knucklebones as a treat; they gnaw the meat off the bones. At the end of a feeding, they get a piece of rabbit to signal that meal time is over.

“That’s his dessert,” Medina explained.

BIRD KITCHEN

The Bronx Zoo has a central commissary that delivers food to kitchens scattered around the facility. But the 700 birds at the zoo have a central kitchen, which makes deliveries around the park.

The kitchen has sinks, a big metal work table, industrial metal shelves, a big scale and a large gas burner. In a corner, a large heap of kale waits to be sliced and diced. Two long whiteboards above the work table show delivery schedules and recipes for such dishes as “hornbill meatballs.”

The kitchen makes 20 basic diets, which can be tweaked for the 200 species of birds at the zoo. This includes a 12-ingredient mix of beets, blueberries, other fruits and vegetables, nutrients and vitamins dubbed “bird salad.”

For the bee-eating birds, the zoo has a bee hive on the kitchen’s roof where their food is raised.

For the birds that eat crickets, mealworms or bees, the live food is not a complete diet, especially when it comes to the calcium that helps build healthy bones and eggs, said Mark Hofling, assistant supervisor of ornithology.

So, the kitchen feeds the insects vitamins to make them more nutritious — a procedure called “gut loading” — and puts calcium carbonate dust on the crickets before giving them to the birds, Hofling said.

Because some tropical birds are better at extracting iron from their food, the kitchen found it had to cut back on that nutrient for them.

“We were overdosing our birds of paradise,” said Hofling, who was a “chef” in the bird kitchen for years before his current job.

BEE EATERS

The most unusual birds in terms of diet, he said, are the bee eaters, such as the white-throated bee eaters from Africa. They eat bees and other insects on the wing, grabbing them out of the air, then settling on a branch to eat their catch.

Filming these bird in action showed that “they remove the (bee’s) stinger with a head flip that is too fast to see,” Hofling said.

How an animal eats can be as important as what it eats. “We try to take into account an animal’s nature when we’re feeding them,” said Hofling. Some birds, for example, catch insects as part of a mating display Hofling termed “dinner and a movie.”

Linda Corcoran, assistant director of communications for the zoos, said zoo keepers also have to figure out what animals don’t eat, to keep them from wolfing down all the plants that are part of a display.

At the World of Reptiles, snakes, lizards, frogs, turtles and tortoises eat — among other things — rats, mice, fruits and vegetables.

“Rats and mice are a whole food. They’re really nutritious” because their bones contain the calcium needed by the animals that eat them, said Jennifer Pramuk, curator of reptiles.

Also on the reptile menu: wax moth larvae. “They have a lot of fat in them,” explained keeper Joe Abeni.

At one point, 45-pound (20-kilogram) pigs were procured for a python at the World of Reptiles. One pig would keep the python fed for a month, said Pramuk.

And then there are the cobras. How do you feed a cobra?

“Very carefully,” Corcoran said.

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=domesticNews&storyID=2007-01-01T222623Z_01_N28211300_RTRUKOC_0_US-ZOO-FOOD.xml&WTmodLoc=USNewsHome_C2_domesticNews-3

Tags: News World
Previous Post

Life back to normal for SF Zoo tiger that mauled trainer

Next Post

Witness: Tiger devoured SF Zoo keeper’s arm

BCR

BCR

Big Cat Rescue is Caring for Cats and Ending the Trade

Related Posts

Cub Petting Shame
Cat Laws

Cub Petting Shame

January 17, 2021
1.4k
Be Safe Out There!
How To Start A Sanctuary

Rules

March 31, 2020
112
Big Cat Rescue does bobcat rehab and release of native, Florida bobcats.
Articles by BCR

GoFree

March 29, 2020
436
Nik Tiger being Xrayed
How To Start A Sanctuary

What is a day like at Big Cat Rescue?

June 30, 2020
61
Cougars at Big Cat Rescue
Memorials

Artemis

January 28, 2020
219
Next Post

Witness: Tiger devoured SF Zoo keeper's arm

Leave a Reply

  • Default Comments (0)
  • Facebook Comments

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Help Feed Big Cats

One of the best ways to help is through general donations that can be used however it is most needed at the time.To make a general donation just click the Donate Now button below.  This is the best way to give as it has the lowest credit card processing fees and is immediate help for the cats.

Give to Big Cat Rescue

If you prefer to donate via Pay Pal, please use this link: Pay Pal

Take Action Against Abuse

Shop To Save Big Cats

More From BigCatRescue

  • Big Cat Rescue is Live 24/7 on Webcams
  • Rescue Missions
  • About Big Cat Rescue
  • Big Cat Rescue News
  • Reviews
  • Our Recent Work
  • Sanctuary FAQs
  • Big Cat TV

Sanctuary Cats

  • Jaguars
  • Leopards
  • Lions
  • Tigers
  • Bobcats
  • Canada Lynx
  • Cougars
  • Ocelots
  • Savannah Cats
  • Servals

Big Cat Information

  • Jaguars
  • Leopards
  • Lions
  • Tigers
  • Bobcats
  • Canada Lynx
  • Cougars
  • Ocelots
  • Savannah Cats
  • Servals

Ways to Help

  • Newsletter SignUp
  • Donate Now
  • Volunteer
  • Contact Us
  • View AMP Versioin
No Result
View All Result
  • About BCR
  • News @ BCR
  • Videos
  • Big Cat Facts
  • Cub Facts
  • Sanctuary Cats
  • Shop and Save Cats
  • Volunteer
  • Donate
  • Abuse Issues
  • Contact Us

© Copyright 2021 BigCatRescue.Org. All Rights Reserved.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password? Sign Up

Create New Account!

Fill the forms below to register

All fields are required. Log In

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.AcceptReject Read More
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled

Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.

SAVE & ACCEPT

Add New Playlist