24 newborn cubs marks success in recent panda breeding efforts

During the Mid-Autumn Festival, Sept. 21, the giant panda “Xiuqiu” had her baby, which was born at the Shenshuping Base in Wolong Natural National Reserve of China’s Giant Panda Protection & Research Center (Panda Center). Both the mother and the baby are now safe after giving birth. Up until then, all the pregnant female pandas there have successfully given birth to their babies, with a total of 24 baby pandas in 15 litters, including 9 pairs of twins, with a survival rate of 100 percent.

According to news reports, all the pregnant female pandas have gradually been moved to the breeding area at the Wolong Shenshuping Base since February. Returning from overseas, the panda “Zhenzhen” had her twin babies on July 17, which marked the start of the season when pandas give birth. The giant pandas “Joey”, “Panqing”, and “Bingbing” also gave birth to their own twins, having got along nicely with their newborn babies. The panda “Baobao”, who returned from overseas, also had her male twins, and she is learning to be a good mother now, even though she’s not so skillful as a new mother quite yet. This year, the giant panda “Jiamei” found a happy match in “Qingqing”, who is new to the breeding program, with “Jiamei” having given birth to a healthy pair of twins on Sept. 12.

According to Li Guo, a specialist with the Shenshuping Base in Wolong Natural National Reserve, the high birth rate for twins this year marks ongoing improvements in breeding technology. In addition, an increase in the number of newborn giant pandas bred at the base also provides a solid basis for ensuring the eventual release of the pandas back into the wild to further expand the animal’s gene pool.

Something also worth noting is that with the help of “cloud communications” and “cloud mentoring”, a giant panda named “Fengyi” living overseas at the National Zoo of Malaysia also successfully gave birth to her baby. With both the giant panda “Fairy” at Tokyo, Japan’s Ueno Zoo and “Hubao” at Singapore’s River Safari both giving birth to newborns, international scientific cooperation and communication have also been effectively promoted.