A firm favourite next – it’s Tai Shan 泰山! I didn’t actually know he was now living here, so this was a nice surprise, in fact I knew it was him as soon as I saw him, I didn’t need to see his name sign^ This is now the 3rd time I’ve seen Tai Shan after seeing him at the Dujiangyan Base in both 2016 and 2017, so it’s been a while. He’s still such a handsome boy and has such a distinctive and recognisable look to him. He’s now 19 years old, having been born in 2005, the first cub of Smithsonian National Zoo pair Mei Xiang and Tian Tian so it’s lovely to be able to still follow him through his life. His yard was very sunny in the Kindergarten House 2 area, and he was enjoying his breakfast and lunch when I was there with plenty of bamboo. He even took some of his bamboo up onto his rocky platform to enjoy it there.

Next moving to the central portion of the base and the Kindergarten houses – there are two, named 1 and 2. House 1 has 3 yards and all were very large, with lots of rock and wood climbing options along with trees. House 2 has 4 yards, these were a little smaller than in House 1 and actually I only saw adult pandas living in this house! I didn’t end up spending much time in these two areas as there just always seemed to be more activity elsewhere, but there were cubs living here to see (just sleeping when I saw them^).

The final pandas to share about from the Outer Ring houses are Su Lin 苏琳 and her cubs! I didn’t realise at the time, but Su Lin was born at the San Diego Zoo in 2005, the third cub to be born there – so special to see another San Diego-born panda! She moved to China in 2010 and is now 19 years old and an experienced mother. I didn’t really see too much of her – she was sticking to the shadows and enjoying some bamboo while the cubs weren’t looking for her attention^ These two were super sweet and very much were tree-babies – I went past several times during the day and there was always at least one up a tree and the second was either also in a tree, or climbing up/down the tree too!

Next up from the Outer Ring houses, and our first mum with cubs, it’s Rui Rui 蕊蕊! Now I didn’t see a lot of mum Rui Rui, she was inside initially while a keeper was out with the cubs, then later I did see her out in her doorway having a good rest – and quite right too with two babies to take care of! Rui Rui is 7 years old, I couldn’t find any information about her online, but what I did find out when I was there that these are not twins with her. The girl cub is her biological baby, she spent the whole day up a very tall tree – an independent girl! The cub who was more up for playing and wanting attention is a male, who Rui Rui is the surrogate mother for. He was absolutely adorable – when I first went to the yard the keeper was playing with him and trying to entice him onto the little rocking horse. He did eventually sit on it alone for about a minute, then quickly chased after the keeper as she tried to get inside! Honestly so so so cute, one of the best moments^