The Russellville Democrat., 1880-05-20
Food for Animals. Philadelnhia Times

Visitors to the Geological Garden have noticed down in the lower end of the grounds, little to the right Of the place where the polar bears are kept, a line of low, rambling buildings, built against the fence which separates the grounds, from long strip of land lying between the gardens and the New York branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad. The last of these buildings is good deal better than the rest being tall, close, frame shanty of pine boards and having a door in it. The others, smaller, more uneven and without any doors, are nothing more than mere sheds or stalls Always in front of them will be seen pile of clover hay, with half dozen, more or less, sorry-looking horses, the sole occupants of the sheds, feeding thereon. An inspection ot these ami mels will usually slow plethora of de- fects in the way of damaged eyes or spavined joints or broken wlnd-gall, in the majority of instances being the reg ular accompaniments of old age, and being but another way of descrl ping a horse broken down by weight of years and past his stage of usefulness. Occa- sionally younger animals may be seen in the stalls, but these are also suffering from some affliction of body or limb, and stand on the same footing as the rest.
 These horses, once they get under the above-described sheds, have. all one common destiny-they are to be killed and dressed as food for the annals of the geological garden. The amount of food consumed daily by the animals, large and small, is no little. The chief meat-eating animals are the lions, tigers, leopards, pumas and hyenas. Altogether they consume about 175 pounds of horse meat day. Four horses week is the usual average in keeping up the supply of these animals alone. Next in point of heavy feeding come the elephants. Their chiet food is hay, If which it takes about four times as much to keep an elephant as it does to keep horse, the elephant eating 100 pounds of hay every twenty-four hours. And in order to keep up his appitite the hay must be the best going, being invariably timothy of the best grades. Other animals that eat hay are the giraffes, the camels, the deer, zebra and different animals of the cattle species. Most all these are fed on what is known as mixed hay, timo- thy and clover, which is about 20 per cent. cheaper than the timothy alone. Two wagon loads a week is about the amount used. Each wagon load is sup posed to contain 5000 weight, or a ton and half. The price for timothy is about S20 per ton, which makes the three tons per week equalito S60. The mixed hay costs in the neighberhood of SIS ton, thus making the weekly cost of that necessary supply S54, which added to $60, gives the weekly cost of hay alone in the sum of $1l4. e-a
 As to the cost of horse meat for the other animals, this Is not as much as might be imagined. The horses are usually purchased at the horse market by one of the employees at the gar dens. who has all such wo k in charge. The horses, as above stated, are usually animals which have been superannuated and useless. The average price paid per head is about $5. As four horses per week suffice the cost for horse meat foots up about $20 a week. The lions, tigers, leopards and pumas are not the only animals that are fed on horse meat. The wolves and foxes and prairie dogs and monkeys and black bears also come in for their share of the supplies, being fed almost altogether on this kind of Ditit. IL ID iCRiiito do tiidi these animals-lions, tigers and leopards
 should make no distinction between horse meet and beef, albeit it is point in favor of the pocketbooks of the cor porators of the gardens. For four years proceeding their discovery that the ami mals would eat horse meat as we'll as beef they kept feeding them on the lat ter. Two years ago it was found that they would eat horse meat as well as that of beef, and provisions was made accordingly. Since then the society has been practicing judicious economy by feeding the animals on horse meat alto gether and they save about SO per cent,
 The cost of feeding the lions, tigers, leopards and pumas as stated is about $20 week. Add this to $l44, cost of larger animals, elephants giratfes and others, and the cost Is $l64. This does not nearly represent all the animals fed in the garden, nor does it come near be- ing the chief item of cost There are a hundred and one other creatures re- quiring, in many cases, much more | dehcate and costly food. The sea-lions have to be fed on fish usually fresh and salt macIrel, each animal taking twelve or fifteen to each meal twice q day, and consuming altogether 100 pounds of fish daily. Next in point of dehcate livers come the Polar bears, Whose regular