Guangzhou, China ? The civet cats are gone from their cages at the market, replaced by ducks and rabbits. The snakes, bats, badgers and anteater-like pangolins are missing, too.

For years, the hundreds of stalls at Chatou Wild Animal Food Market in China’s southern business capital of Guangzhou were a snapping, hissing zoo of exotic, endangered wildlife destined for the plates of the most adventurous diners.

Then came SARS and the discovery that civets and some other small animals carry the virus that has killed more than 600 people on China’s mainland and in Hong Kong. Authorities in Guangdong province, which includes Guangzhou, ordered an end to the wildlife trade this week and told farms raising exotic species to quarantine their animals.

Some traders have been detained, and violators are threatened with fines of as much as $12,000.

“These are the rules. What can we do?” said vendor He Dawei, who removed the Chinese characters for “wildlife” from the sign on his stall. “They say they’ll arrest you if you don’t comply.”

Diners in southern China long have prized exotic meats killed on the spot — a practice criticized by doctors as unhygienic and by animal-rights advocates as encouragement to poach endangered species.

On Sunday, the global death toll from SARS approached 770, with more than 8,300 people sickened since the severe acute respiratory syndrome virus first appeared in southern China in November. Most of the victims have been in China and Hong Kong.

China on Sunday reported no new SARS fatalities and two new cases on its mainland, the lowest figures for a single day since authorities began reporting cases on a daily basis in April. The death toll remained at 332 out of 5,330 cases.

Chinese call wildlife dishes “ye wei” — literally, “wild taste” — and say they boost virility and strengthen immunity to disease.

Even in urban Hong Kong, conservationists say 30 percent of the population has eaten wildlife at some time.

The offbeat cuisine includes dishes such as “dragon and tiger head” — actually a snake and house-cat casserole.

Fox, boar, raccoon dog — name an animal and it might be on the menu. Many are listed by China as endangered species, meaning it should be illegal to catch them, but enforcement is lax.

Conservationists wonder how long China can enforce the ban.

“If anything good is coming out of SARS, it’s that these markets are being closed down,” said Jill Robinson of the Hong Kong-based group Animals Asia.