Saturday, March 13, 2010
Eleven Siberian tigers have starved to death over the past three months at a zoo in northeast China, after the cash-strapped animal park fed them cheap chicken bones, state media reported.
Liu Xiaoqiang, the vice head of the wild animal protection office in Shenyang, the capital of Liaoning province, said the 11 tigers had died due to malnutrition, Xinhua news agency said. Two hungry tigers at the same zoo in Shenyang severely mauled a zoo worker in November, in an attack officials said was due to the predators’ lack of food. The man survived, but the tigers were shot during the rescue. After the incident, work safety officials asked the zoo’s owners to confine the remaining tigers to their cages, which added to their health problems, the report said.
China has more than 200 zoos, according to the Chinese Association of Zoological Gardens. But only large zoos in major cities such as Beijing and Shanghai receive government funding and attention, state media say. China said last month it had nearly 6,000 tigers in captivity, but just 50-60 left roaming in the wild, including about 20 wild Siberian tigers. afp
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010%5C03%5C13%5Cstory_13-3-2010_pg9_9
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