Now for the next* 3 pandas at Chimelong Safari Park – Yue Yue, Ai Ai and Mei Qing! Now technically Yue Yue and Ai Ai were the next pandas I saw, they were in adjacent yards following on from Ting Zai and Long Long, and actually Mei Qing was in the last yard I saw in the first panda section. But based on the photos I got, I decided to group her here, and actually she lives in one of the best/most popular yards – it’s the one with the train!
Yue Yue 悦悦
In the third yard I saw Yue Yue 悦悦 – a 9.5 year old female panda. After Long Long‘s yard, this was the next on on the right hand side. This yard is directly opposite a second one, with the two built on a hillside, and the walkway for visitors goes through the middle, so this is the upper half of the hill and the other is the lower half. There is both clear viewing and viewing through glass here – I found the glass quite mucky and difficult to see through, so I only really took photos at the glass-free section, but I did like the overall design for the yards and the viewing. This yard had lots of wooden climbing and enrichment, with the big platform in the centre being a favourite eating spot, but I was happy to also see the swinging hammock getting a go too, this is cute and I like these (or similar) in panda yards. Yue Yue was the only panda born in 2015 here in Chimelong. Her sign doesn’t provide much information, that she is the 5th princess (so I’m assuming, 5th panda born in Chimelong after Long Long and the triplets) and that she is a picky eater XD
Her mother is Ting Ting (so she is half siblings with Ting Zai, I think I can see the family resemblance) and her father is Lin Lin (also the father of the triplets and Long Long, and I can really see the resemblance with Long Long). She has a very cute and round face with a slight fluff to her cheeks – there are lots of cure photos of her online from across the years. She doesn’t seem to have been included in the breeding season yet, but perhaps it will soon be her turn being now over 9 years old.
Ai Ai 爱爱
Directly across from Yue Yue is Ai Ai 爱爱, an 8.5 year old male – he is one of the twins born to Mei Qing in 2016, so he is half sibling with Long Long. I found this yard really difficult to view because it’s the lower half of the hillside, so you are at the top looking down the hill. There were a lot of climbing and enrichment items and giant toadstools, which made viewing quite tricky and Ai Ai seemed to prefer a quieter more peaceful time. He spent most of the time at the far end of the yard or sleeping behind a tree so I really couldn’t get a good view of him at all.
The sign doesn’t say a lot about him, but I was really confused about the phrase 大小耳 which translates to big small ear – it’s only now when I was looking up more about him that I see it means he has one big ear and one small ear (which in fairness, the drawing of him does indicate, but I just didn’t notice), sadly I didn’t really get a good enough look at him to see this! According to the internet Ai Ai has been quite destructive to his yard in the past, so they would only let him out a few days a week to limit the damage, sounds hilarious, but I’m not sure how true it is – maybe I just caught him on a calm day?!
Mei Qing 梅清
And the third panda for this post, and actually the last one I saw in this panda section was Mei Qing 梅清, a 22.5 year old female. She was born in Wolong and spent the first 10 years of her life around the Wolong and Ya’an bases before moving to Chimelong in 2012 and has been here ever since. And let me say, she looks great for her age, she didn’t seem in her 20’s at all when I saw her! So she was in the indoor yard with the train which was very exciting for me to finally see, but I think it looks like her and the panda in the outdoor yard next door alternate between yards based on the signs that were up as I saw more information about her at the outdoor yard. When I first got to her space I was so excited to see that she was sitting in the train carriage, honestly made my day! I had hoped to see the train going around the track, but sadly didn’t see it (something for next time^), but she was super cute sitting there and enjoying some bamboo! I came round by her yard several times, so saw her in the train, taking a snooze against a tree, relaxing ontop of her ice block, climbing, and eating more bamboo – she really was quite active, so I was super lucky with this! While she was very popular, I was able to get good spaces to get photos of her – this yard was completely glass-free so the viewing was excellent, I just found it was quite dark especially as it was so bright outside. Her signs say that she has quite a lazy personality and that she likes to eat slowly, as well as saying that her four children are very handsome and beautiful (I think I can agree to that =D).
Mei Qing is very special to be the first panda to successfully breed at Chimelong, giving birth to their first panda cub, Long Long (posted about last post), and then after that she further had twins in 2016, Qin Qin and Ai Ai (who I saw in the photos above). But Long Long wasn’t her first cub, she had successfully bred in Ya’an and had a cub there, so she came to Chimelong as a proven fertile female with experience. She has then since gone on to have another cub in 2019 who I will also post about (and was an absolute highlight to see!) – so she has been a great success in the breeding programme for Chimelong.
