PECO's Tree Trimming Benefiting Philadelphia Zoo Animals
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Animals at the Philadelphia Zoo are benefiting from an area utilities company's preventative tree trimming program.
PECO routinely cuts down over grown vegetation near its electrical lines to help protect its power supply. The utility is now delivering the leaves, twigs and branches to the Philadelphia Zoo for its animals to munch on.
Barbara Toddes the director of Animal Nutrition at the Philadelphia Zoo says 300 pounds of the trimmings known as "Browse" come in once a week.
"We rinse it all off, we divide it all out for the animals, we weigh the amounts that we are going to give, and we also have the browse analyzed. So we know what the nutrient composition is so this browse is actually formulated into the animal's diet." said Toddes.
Forty species of animals eat browse, including Giraffes who love the Mulberry branches.
