Inflation Takes a Bite at Beijing Zoo Feedings

BEIJING — Inflation has hit hard at the Beijing Zoo, where the tigers are on a strict diet, the elephants have traded bananas for carrots and only the prestigious pandas still enjoy their traditional regimen of milk and bamboo shoots.

Zoo officials blamed soaring prices for the food cutbacks, noting that their 3,000 mammals were not granted the government subsidies that human urban residents received this year, according to the official China Daily newspaper.