Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 252, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 October 1914 — Zoological Park Walrus a Victim of Gluttony [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Zoological Park Walrus a Victim of Gluttony

NEW YORK. —Ephraim, the huge walrus of the New York Zoological park, afflicted with a multitude of hookworms, died of sheer laziness, superinduced by the most voracious appetite ever possessed by any animal.

He was caught' n%ar Etah, Greenland, by Paul Rainey; and was presented to the park four years ago. At that time he weighed 140 pounds, but he began eating his way to an early death on the day he arrived. Eatihg was a continuous performance with Ephraim, both awake and asleep, until he became so fat that it pained him to move. He weighed 600 pounds on the day of his death. In the last four

months his weight Increased at the 1 ' rate of half a pound a day. He was possibly the most expensive animal on exhibition at the park. He ate 40 pounds of clam meat and other items of expense were the labor of preparing the feed, the, frequent cleaning of his tank and adding sea salt to the water, so that the cost of keeping Ephraim was equal to that of two large elephants. Of lata the walrus never attempted to move away from the pan of clam meat apon which he fed. Unless it was kept continually full he raised a howl, which sent all the other animals Into throes of nervous excitement. He frequently went to sleep with his jaws In the feeding pan.