Hong Kong Panda Ying Ying Is Oldest First-Time Mom at 19
On the day before her 19th birthday, Ying Ying the panda delivered two cubs, making her the oldest giant panda ever to give birth for the first time. The new arrivals, tiny and pink and as yet unnamed, are also the first pandas born in Hong Kong.
The twin cubs, a female weighing 122 grams (4.2 ounces) and a male at 112 grams (nearly 4 ounces), arrived last week after five hours of labor and several years of unsuccessful efforts by Ying Ying and her partner Le Le. Giant pandas are notoriously difficult to impregnate, largely because the female has just one brief fertile period throughout the year, lasting only one to three days.
Hong Kong’s Ocean Park says it will be a few months before visitors can see the babies, as the newborns are under round-the-clock intensive care.
“Both cubs are currently very fragile and need time to stabilize,” the park said in a statement, “especially the female cub who has a lower body temperature, weaker cries, and lower food intake after birth.”
Native to southwest China, there are about 1,600 giant pandas in the wild, and another 650 or so in captivity around the world. Designated as “vulnerable” by the IUCN, the giant panda is a “conservation-reliant species,” meaning it can only survive in strictly protected areas, namely within the 40 reserves in China. The Chinese government gave Ying Ying and Le Le to Hong Kong in 2007.
Ocean Park explains the difficulty of getting pandas to mate in this short video.
Photo credit: Ocean Park Hong Kong
