Detroit Zoo has strong feelings about local football team

The Detroit Zoo is serious about its local NFL team.

How serious?

On Wednesday, zoo personnel placed a Chicago Bear into the lion's den.

OK, perhaps we should clarify. It wasn't an actual member of the Chicago Bears. It was a "meat-filled pinata" shaped like a Bears player.

The feeding was in anticipation of the Monday night showdown between the Lions and Bears and part of a daily enrichment program at the zoo. More than 50 people gathered to watch the feeding, and what is going on here?

"We introduce new items and elements to all the animals at the zoo on a daily basis as part of our environmental enrichment program," animal welfare manager Elizabeth Arbaugh told the Shelby-Utica Patch on Wednesday. "We don't always use food. The key is to keep it unpredictable, like nature itself."

In our experience, we've found it a bad idea to feed wild animals raw meat that's dressed to look like people. Then again, we don't actually have any zoo experience. Let's just get back to football.