Watching people eat isn’t lovely isn’t appealing and watching animals eat can be downright nauseating — especially if they’re devouring whole horses.
So safari parks in China has decided to make a tiny change:
Safari parks in China have agreed to stop feeding their lions and tigers large live animals such as horses — at least in public.
The gory eating habits could lead visitors to believe that animals, both hunter and prey, were only human playthings, Xinhua news agency on Wednesday quoted Xie Youxin, the deputy general manager of the Wild Animal World in Chengdu, as saying.
“The bloody scene could also have implanted violent tendencies in youngsters,” he said.
But lest the kiddies be disappointed, officials are still going to let the kiddies have some fun, the news agency says:”Feeding when the park is not open is permitted. Parks are allowed to continue to sell small birds for visitors to feed the wild beasts.”
“Come here birdie…Come here kitty..Take this, kitty..Mommy, this is COOL!”
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.