The Inner Ring House 2 has 4 yards in it but I only saw pandas in 2 of them – first up it’s Shui Xiu 水秀! Everyone that I saw in this area (which wasn’t many people actually, it was very quiet) seemed to be missing Shui Xiu which I think was due to the mum + cubs next door, but I loved seeing her. I think she wins the awards for roundest and fluffiest panda of the day, she just looked adorable sitting against the wall and tucking into her large pile of bamboo. I completely didn’t realise at the time, nor when I first looked through the photos, but Shui Xiu is missing her front left paw – once I knew I looked more closely at the photos, and you can tell as she’s not holding bamboo on that side, but it’s really not obvious at all. She is a wild-born panda and was found injured at around 2 years old, so was brought to the base for treatment. It doesn’t look like that injury has stopped her at all, she clearly still does well getting that bamboo in, and she has been a prolific breeder – I found a site online which suggests she has had 12 cubs! At 21, her breeding years are probably numbered, but she is now also a grandmother. I found one of her cubs, Xiu Qiu 绣球 who was born in 2015 has had a cub of her own in 2021 – You You 优悠 who I posed about in the previous post. And some of her other cubs have had their own cubs too – another important example of success at increasing the gene pool with wild-born panda genetics.