Panda Updates – Monday, March 12

Everyone is settling into the new routine in PandaLand – giant panda care team and pandas alike. We have routinely been coming to work and finding everyone happily asleep in the mornings, which is always a good thing. Sometimes the twins stay asleep until 10 a.m.! This is normal as they’re still growing and need the extra siestas. The only thing we wish could change is the weather! Rainy days means that the giant pandas don’t go outside (they don’t like getting wet).

In other news, we are in the final stages of prepping Habitat 3, the off-habitat outdoor space which will make both Lun Lun and Yang Yang very happy. This outdoor area has a bamboo forest within it which enables the pandas to harvest bamboo naturally. The bamboo forest isn’t very large, and the adults decimate it within a couple of weeks. Afterward we have to let the forest grow back for another couple of years before it can be used again, but for the next couple of weeks Lun Lun and Yang Yang will be super-happy pandas! The twins won’t get to experience Habitat 3 until they are a little bigger; first they need to explore Habitat 2 since they’ve never been there!
Jen W.
Keeper III, Mammals