ZooBorns

The Real Kung Fu Pandas

Favorite zoo video to date: rough-housing Red Panda cub footage set to music from Kill Bill at the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo. They have clearly mastered Crane style.

Juvenile Red Pandas play to learn skills that will be useful later in life. Wrestling skills for example may some day help them acquire a better mate, defend themselves from predators or get them a breakthrough role in a Tarantino movie.

Keti the Firefox Debuts in Calgary

Red Pandas, also known as firefoxes, may be called pandas but are actually more closely related to raccoons than Giant Pandas. However, watching the video below might lead you to believe they are most closely related to giant fluffy caterpillars. The Calgary Zoo's newest little firefox, Keti, debuted last week. 

Meet Mei Mei at Cleveland Metroparks

Three red panda triplets bounded into Cleveland Metroparks Zoo earlier this summer. Little Pang Pang and Xiao are currently on exhibit but Mei Mei required special veterinary care and is getting special attention from zoo staff behind the scenes. Mei Mei is pictured below at 4 weeks and 9 weeks.

In other Red Panda veterinary news, the Smithsonian National Zoo's newest Red Panda received a clean bill of health after an EKG pictured below.

Four's Company at the Denver Zoo

The Denver Zoo is proud to announce the birth of four endangered red panda cubs! The July 9th birth of quadruplet red panda cubs is extremely rare; this marks only the fifth recorded birth of quadruplets at an accredited U.S. zoo.

Adorable ZooBorns Video Round-Up

There's so much going on at zoo nurseries these days we can barely keep up! Enjoy this collection of outstanding videos from Smithsonian National Zoo and Bronx Zoo.

In a 24-hour-period between July 9 and 10, a clouded leopard cub, a Przewalski's horse, and a red panda cub were all born at Smithsonian's National Zoo's Conservation and Research Center

Looks like the Smithsonian National Zoo is gonna need a bigger bird house!

Watch a baby lemur grow from a sleepy eyed infant into a bouncing teen (in lemur years) at the Bronx Zoo

Lincoln Zoo has a New Fluffy Friend

On July 19th, the Lincoln Children's Zoo welcomed a brand new baby Red Panda. It's mother was unable to produce enough milk, so zoo keepers have been on constant watch and are hand-raising the cub. ZooBorns is also please to welcome the Lincoln Zoo to it's ever growing family of participating zoos.  Thanks and congratulations.

Unlikely Wet Nurse for Taiyuan Red Panda Cubs

How's this for a double take? These two Red Panda Cubs were abandoned at birth by their mother, and since have been nursed by a mother dog. The pair was born June 25th at north China's Taiyuan Zoo and are doing well thanks to their surrogate Mom.

"Mom" takes the cubs in as her own.

(AP Photo)

"Their mother, the first lesser panda bred at the zoo, was taken in from a nature reserve in the northwestern Shaanxi Province at the end of April. No one knew she was pregnant. Her plump body and bushy hair disguised her protruding belly until the babies were born," said zoo worker Ha Guo Jiang.

Trifecta of cute at the Smithsonian Zoo

Red panda cub + clouded leopard cub + Przewalski’s horse foal = hat trick for the Smithsonian National Zoo!

Red Panda Triplets from The Red River Zoo

We have our eyes on the Red Panda triplets from North Dakota's Red River Zoo. The babies (2 females and 1 male) were born on June 11, 2009.

Mom looks pooped

Red Panda Season

More Red Pandas, this time from Australia's Perth Zoo. Making their first public appearance today, the playful pandas seemed to enjoy the attention. The cubs are happy and healthy and have an attentive mother in Chori, who shuttles her cubs between all three nesting boxes in the exhibit. It's nice to have vacation homes.

 

Above photos courtesy of the Perth Zoo

Above photo credit: Kerris Berrington