Giant panda gives birth at National Zoo, providing a 'much-needed moment of pure joy'

The unnamed panda cub is the size of a stick of butter, but is already bringing joy to the Smithsonian National Zoo in Washington, D.C.

Mei Xiang, a 22-year-old giant panda who has been at the zoo since 2000, gave birth to a cub on Friday night. She immediately picked up the cub and "began cradling and caring for it," the zoo said in a statement. Mei Xiang and her baby are being given their space to bond, and the zoo will determine the cub's sex during a future exam. The cub will also be named on the 100th day after its birth.

Female pandas are only able to conceive cubs for 24 to 72 hours a year, and because of Mei Xiang's age, the "chances of her having a cub were slim," Steve Monfort, director of the Smithsonian's National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute, said in a statement. "However, we wanted to give her one more opportunity to contribute to her species' survival. I am incredibly proud of our animal care and science teams, whose expertise in giant panda behavior was critical to this conservation success."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Pandas are vulnerable to extinction, and there are about 1,800 in the wild and 500 in captivity. Mei Xiang and her cub are in isolation, but there is a Panda Cam livestreaming from their habitat so people around the globe can see how they are doing. "With the birth of this precious cub, we are thrilled to offer the world a much-needed moment of pure joy," Monfort said. Catherine Garcia