After Mei Xiang’s second cub Bao Bao was born in 2013, it was about 5 months before she made her public debut.
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Washington’s National Zoo says its female giant panda has given birth to a cub. It’s far from a sure thing, however: Mei Xiang has given birth to four cubs since 2005, two of whom died. Her second cub, Bao Bao, turns 2 on Sunday. The zoo has also had disappointments in the past.
The female panda was loaned to the zoo after being born in Sichuan, China. Zoo personnel are monitoring Mei through their panda cams, which may be overloaded at any time due to the popularity of the pandas. Its lungs hadn’t fully developed.
Mei Xiang was artificially inseminated in April with semen collected from Hui Hui, who lives thousands of miles away at the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda in Wolong.
Panda lovers are on baby watch at Washington D.C.’s National Zoo. The pair had five cubs while living at the zoo but none survived.
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“Today, we are cautiously optimistic”, Dennis Kelly, director of the Smithsonian’s National Zoo, said in a statement.
