MEAT FOR ZOO

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 714, 13 July 1929, Page 7

MEAT FOR ZOO

Seventy Horses Arriving Te Be Eaten meals for the lions To serve as meat for the lions, ■ tigers and other flesh-eaters in the Auckland Zoo, 70 horses are arriving tonight by train from Whakatane. THE consignment, comprising eight or nine truck-loads, is one of a periodic order by the city purchasing officer on behalf of the zoo authorities. fntil a few months ago the zoo obtained its meat through a butcher, but It was found that the cost was higher than need be. Accordingly the council decided to And its own meat and now huys direct from farmers and anyone w ho has old animals to dispose of. The hides and bones are sold ami the horses being bought for a few shillings, the zoo gets cheap meat. Even in the clays when the zoo was privately owned the main meat supplies consisted of the flesh of melancholy old “nags.” They were often -een being driven along Manukau Road to Royal Oak for execution. Twenty ... thirty years ago, when horses far outnumbered motor-trucks, zoo-meat wa s plentiful. Horses in the city are now few and the ZOO has to look farther afield. There are always many to be had in the country, and near Whakatane they e said to be “as thick as rabbits." The Maoris capture wild ones which are sent to Auckland with all sorts and conditions of the domestic variety. The zoo consumes three or four a Week and while waiting for the knife the rest are farmed out in council Daddock?- ——