The Berlin Zoo has exciting news: Meng Meng, the beloved panda, is pregnant once again, mere months after Germany’s first-ever giant panda cubs were sent to China.
Over the past weekend, ultrasound scans revealed that Meng Meng is expecting two cubs. Though the cubs still have much growing to do, the zoo anticipates their birth around the end of August, should everything proceed smoothly.
Meng Meng, along with her male counterpart Jiao Qing, arrived in Berlin back in 2017. Meng Meng first made headlines in August 2019 when she gave birth to twin cubs, Pit and Paule, also known by their Chinese names, Meng Xiang and Meng Yuan. These twin cubs became instant stars in Berlin but were flown to China in December. This transfer was always part of the agreement but had been postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. For decades, China has gifted friendly nations with its unofficial mascot as part of a “panda diplomacy” policy, though the country now loans pandas to zoos under commercial terms.
Giant pandas are notoriously difficult to breed, making each birth a significant event. Currently, there are about 1,800 pandas living in the wild in China, with a few hundred more in captivity around the world.
Meng Meng was artificially inseminated this past March. The zoo highlighted that female pandas have a narrow reproductive window, being able to conceive for just about 72 hours each year.
