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Giant panda Mei Xiang gives birth at US zoo
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-07-10 08:50
Mei Xiang looked surprised, perhaps a bit put off by the shrill cries from
the first giant panda cub born at the US National Zoo in 16 years.
This black and
white handout photo from the Smithsonian's National Zoo, shows the zoos
female giant panda Mei Xiang bonds with her cub, outlined by a white box,
Saturday, July 9, 2005, in Washington. The National Zoo's giant panda Mei
Xiang gave birth to a squealing, vigorous cub early Saturday, zoo
officials said. The cub likely weighs 3 to 5 ounces and is about the size
of a stick of butter. [AP] |
Within a few
minutes, however, the first-time mother was licking and caring for her cub, so
fragile that zoo officials had yet to determine its gender or inspect it.
"Mei Xiang is the poster child for a wonderful mom," Dr. Suzan Murray, the
zoo's chief veterinarian, said Saturday at a news conference hours after the
overnight birth of the cub conceived through artificial insemination.
Zoo officials hope that the cub will fare better than the five previous ones
born at the zoo since 1983. All died within days.
Their parents — the now-deceased Hsing-Hsing and his female partner,
Ling-Ling — were gifts from the Chinese government in 1972 and the original
source of the capital's panda fever.
Cubs typically weigh only 3 ounces to 5 ounces and are about the size of a
stick of butter.
The public will have to wait at least three months to see mother and cub, who
will remain indoors at the panda exhibit area.
Until then the zoo's Web cam — expected to be accessible online at
http://nationalzoo.si.edu/Animals/GiantPandas beginning Sunday morning — will
provide the only public view of the two.
The father — Tian Tian — is expected to continue roaming outdoors in the
morning and returning to the air-conditioned enclosure during the day's warmer
hours.
Mei Xiang, 6, and Tian Tian, 7, are about half as old and in better health
than Ling-Ling and Hsing-Hsing were when they were conceiving.
That made zoo officials hopeful the new cub would become the third giant
panda to survive into adulthood in the United States. The others were born at
the San Diego Zoo in 1999 and 2003.
Giant pandas are rare. Their existence is threatened by loss of habitat,
poaching and a low birth rate. As few as 1,600 live in the mountain forests of
central China. An additional 120 are in breeding facilities and zoos in China.
About 20 pandas live in zoos outside their native land.
Few capital celebrities are as popular and closely watched as Mei Xiang and
Tian Tian. They came to the National Zoo in late 2000, on loan for 10 years from
the Chinese government in exchange for $10 million raised through private
donations to benefit conservation projects.
Their cub will be turned over to China after it reaches age 2, per the loan
agreement, the zoo said. Following tradition, Chinese officials probably will
name the cub after it reaches 100 days old.
By then the cub will probably weigh 30 pounds and be covered with fluffy fur,
crawling and exploring at "that very, very cute stage," Murray said.
Giant pandas are capable of becoming pregnant for only a day or two once each
year. For Mei Xiang, three attempts since 2003 to produce a pregnancy through
mating or artificial means had failed.
The zoo artificially inseminated Mei Xiang on March 11 after natural mating
between the pair appeared unsuccessful. The artificial process used has a 55
percent success rate, and the zoo was on watch in recent weeks as Mei Xiang
showed signs of pregnancy because of elevated hormone levels.
A volunteer watcher notified zoo officials at 1 a.m. Saturday that Mei Xiang
appeared restless and was repeatedly honking and grunting — all signs of
impending birth. The birth came at 3:41 a.m.
"The cub came out squealing, so we knew right away we had a nice, strong cub
from that healthy squeal," said Lisa Stevens, the zoo's associate curator for
pandas.
The mother seemed surprised at first but has been exceptionally attentive to
the cub, holding it, licking it and immediately responding to its cries even
while trying to take a nap herself, Murray said.
"You couldn't ask for a better mom," she said.
The first set of pandas were presents from the Chinese government just two
months after President Nixon made his historic trip to Beijing to reopen
U.S.-China relations. Ling-Ling died in 1992 and Hsing-Hsing in 1999.
The panda birth was welcome news for the National Zoo, which has been
criticized in the wake of about two dozen animal deaths in recent years. A
National Academy of Sciences panel of veterinarians, zookeepers and others began
investigating the zoo in 2003, and the zoo's director resigned in February 2004
after a report criticized the care that animals had
received.
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