Photo by As part of its ongoing efforts to breed a new panda cub, the National Zoo artificially inseminated Mei Xiang back in January (but only after they let Tian Tian have a go at doing it the old fashioned way). Today zoo officials say they have detected a rise in Mei’s progestagen levels, which means we’re now just 40 to 50 days away from discovering whether it worked. At the end of that time period, she’ll either give birth, or we’ll know for sure that this was just another pseudopregnancy.
We’ve been through this annual, often heartbreaking ritual eight times now. The only time Mei Xiang was successfully impregnated was back in 2005, when she gave birth to Tai Shan, aka Butterstick. Now that he’s been sent back to China to enter his own breeding program, nothing would make the National Zoo, or the residents of Washington, for that matter, happier than to have a new panda cub. But given Mei Xiang’s history, it’s probably unwise to get our hopes up.
Still, with Tai Shan gone and the loan agreements on Mei Xiang and Tian Tian set to expire at the end of this year, it’s hard not to daydream up an ideal scenario where we get a new bundle of fuzz, and get to keep at least Mei, who’ll have motherly duties to attend to.
We’ll be keeping our fingers crossed, but steeling ourselves for another letdown.
