Tai Shan's Departure Bittersweet for National Zoo
Say what you will about obsessive panda fans becoming overly emotional about Tai Shan leaving D.C. this morning for China, but there's one group of people who have every right to cry: the National Zoo's panda team.
Animal keeper Laurie Thompson has been taking care of pandas at the Zoo for 15 years, and has worked with Butterstick, as he's commonly known, since he was literally the size of a stick of butter. Watching him get loaded up in his traveling crate and placed on a FedEx truck bound for Dulles International Airport this morning was by no means the easiest thing Thompson's ever had to do.
"It's a little surreal," she said. "I don't think it hits you right away."
Tai Shan departed the National Zoo at 9 a.m. Thursday after a carefully rehearsed and orchestrated move. Zookeepers led the 4-year-old panda into his crate, loaded up a supply of bamboo, then slowly moved the animal onto the truck via two different forklifts. The whole process took about an hour from start to finish, plenty of time for the emotions of the last several months of preparation to sink in. There were several sets of teary eyes among Zoo staffers.
"It's very sad that he's leaving," said fellow panda keeper Mary Charlton. "But we are happy for him that he gets to help save his species, and gets to experience China."
The move came about after the Zoo's extended lease agreement for the animal with China expired, and the Chinese government decided it wanted him to enter their panda breeding program at Wolong’s Bifengxia Panda Base in Ya'an, Sichuan. Tai Shan, the only panda cub ever born at the National Zoo to have survived, is traveling there with another American-born panda, 3-year-old Mei Lan from Zoo Atlanta.
Remaining at the National Zoo are its two adult pandas, Mei Xiang and Tian Tian, who have been on loan from China on a 10-year agreement that expires in October. Negotiations to extend their stay in D.C. have yet to begin.
"It's very likely that these two pandas will stay," said Acting Director of the National Zoo Steve Monfort. "We fully expect our loan agreement will be renewed."
In the meantime, zoo keepers are on watch to see if Mei Xiang might be pregnant again. The female panda was artificially inseminated last month after going into heat early. Similar attempts over the last three years have been unsuccessful.
Butterstick's closest keeper, Nicole Meese, is traveling today with her charge on a customized FedEx plane, alongside a small staff of veterinarians and animal specialists. Her colleagues who stayed behind were certain they'd be hearing from her a lot today and tomorrow, as the 14-hour journey progresses.
"She got an international cell phone," explained Charlton. "She'll be calling from the road, from Dulles, as soon as they land."
After all the hard work that went into preparing Butterstick for his trip, you'd think the Zoo's panda keepers might kick up their heels a little bit tonight. But instead, they'll spend the afternoon cleaning out Tai Shan's area inside the Fujifilm Giant Panda Habitat. And then get some well-deserved rest.
"As soon as we know he's safely there, I'll probably just sleep," Thompson said. "It's pretty exhausting."