I’ve already talked about the pandas at Copenhagen Zoo – now for the rest! It’s a large zoo with a lot of different species to see. It’s just outside the city centre, you can take the bus, however we walked from the centre and it took around 35 minutes and was a pretty direct walk. Even in late January it wasn’t too bad to walk in the chillier weather. The vibe of the zoo really reminded me of Edinburgh Zoo, maybe it was the similar cold January climate, or the design of the buildings and enclosures. The zoo has been able to expand across the street, with an underpass connecting the sections. The zoo is split into different themed regions to split the species on show – it’s well indicated on the map, but I didn’t feel the difference so much while I was there myself. But it makes it a good path to follow through the 4 main regions.
Copenhagen Zoo is one of the most recent European zoos to become home to a pair of pandas! Copenhagen Zoo is one of the oldest in the world, whilst some parts show the age of the Zoo, there are also some new modern buildings and designs – which include the brand new panda enclosure. One thing I quite liked was the live webcam before the pandas even arrived so you could watch the enclosure being built – that’s definitely something different! The pandas have now lived there for a year following their move to Denmark in April 2019, and their enclosure was officially opened by Royalty. The pandas are based very centrally in the zoo between the Asian and Northern areas, so it’s easy to check out some animals and then come back in case the pandas aren’t out or aren’t doing too much when you first arrive.
At the moment, seeing a panda in the fur isn’t so possible – luckily we can watch pandas live online with plenty of choice to choose from! I’m sharing my top live webcams for panda viewing today. It’s not an extensive list, but just the places I look to for my daily panda fix =)
iPanda
This is the place to be to view pandas in China – iPanda has a huge choice of cameras to pick from. You can see view pandas from either Chengdu or CCRCGP bases and you can choose specific age groups, or even specific pandas in some cases. The ‘cub cams’ are definitely one of the more popular choices!
The iPanda Facebook and Twitter pages are also popular, they upload new pictures and videos super regularly, there’s always new content popping up to enjoy, particularly of some of the fan favourite little cubs. The social media pages also share information on when new cubs are born.
Edinburgh Zoo
Of course I have to include my ‘home zoo’ of Edinburgh on this list – it’s my first go-to when I need to watch some panda cam, and I have the advantage of it being in my time zone, so I know it won’t be the middle of the night if I look during the day! Everyone can watch male Yang Guang, and members can also enjoy watching female Tian Tian on the members homepage. Panda updates are fan favourites, so there’s often something new on the Facebook or Twitter pages – at the moment a lot of the staff who are still working have been posting updates on a lot of the different animals, pandas included! You can also watch penguins, a tiger and a koala on the Edinburgh Zoo webcams too.
Smithsonian’s National Zoo
The Smithsonian National Zoo is one of the most well-known panda zoo’s, and it’s had pandas for a very long time – and you can watch the current residents male Tian Tian (not to be confused with Edinburgh’s female!) and female Mei Xiang 24/7! There are two camera views to choose from, one on each panda. When the zoo was open, these cameras were manned by volunteers during the day, so the cameras were actively changing their position or view so you could pretty much see a panda all of the time. This was a super fun way to keep updated when their cubs were just little babies – I watched Bei Bei a lot!
Calgary Zoo
Calgary Zoo is the one zoo on the list here that I haven’t been to yet – it’s on my ‘to visit’ list! Meanwhile I can keep up with female Er Shun and male Da Mao on their choice of 3 panda cams. As write this, there’s no panda on any of the videos but I’m getting a great view of the running waterfall and stream, it looks like a cool enclosure – and that’s on the inside! The cameras a split so 2 cams show the indoor enclosures and 1 is showing the outside which also looks like a nice space. The only downside to this camera is that you can only watch live between 9AM and 6PM Calgary (GMT-6), usually I’m trying to view too early!
While neither Pairi Daiza nor Berlin Zoo, the homes of the youngest pandas in Europe, have live panda cams on their websites, both are great at updating their social media pages with pictures and videos of the cubs progress!
Zoo Berlin has so much more to offer than just the Giant Pandas – they have many species from big to small, there’s something for everyone! Within Berlin the zoo is very central, which means there are expansion limits, however it’s still a pretty large zoo and there seems to be constant work going on to bring new additions – for example there is an incredible new aviary building (World of Birds) with so many bird species from all over the world, and the current project is a new area for the big cats. I have also included some pictures from my previous trips in February 2018 and September 2019.
