Maryland Zoo feeling red panda-monium as it welcomes two new furry friends

Some 30 feet up in the trees at the Baltimore Zoo rest the facility’s newest furry friends: a perky pair of red pandas.

The exhibit marks the zoo’s first combination of a new habitat and animals in more than 30 years. It features two lady pandas — a 7-year-old named Aurora and an 11-month-old who has yet to be named.

Mike Evitts, senior director of communications for the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore, said the zoo will soon host a naming competition for the toddler panda.

“We wanted to have animals and new experiences at the zoo,” he said. “We wanted people that haven’t been here in a while to come back and be amazed by something they hadn’t seen.”

The zoo will debut Aurora and her young friend to the public on Saturday in Main Valley, the oldest portion of zoo that is also undergoing a cosmetic rejuvenation to better accommodate visitors.

The pair of red pandas came to Baltimore on trucks from regional zoos in Front Royal, Virginia, and Cape May, New Jersey, but their species originates in the Himalayas.

This specific type of panda is “elusive” in the wild, and hailing from the Himalayas means they typically take better to cooler conditions, said Sarah Kriebel, one of the panda keepers at the zoo.

“It’s really hard to find them, it’s really hard to track them, and it’s because they don’t want to be surrounded by a ton of stimulus,” she explained.

With that in mind, Kriebel and her team outfitted a new habitat designed to provide the utmost comfort for Aurora and the younger panda. Six keepers tasked with caring for them.

Every detail, from the height of the exhibit to which trees are inside of it, was tailored with their needs in mind. There’s an indoor, 70-degree area for the pandas to escape the heat but still remain visible to the public. The space is additionally equipped with nest boxes, climbing structures, faux air-conditioned logs stacked in the grass and cameras to monitor their activities.

Those cameras also help a behavioral team create a heat map of the space to document where the bears spend time and adjust their accommodations as needed.

Red pandas also have a special wrist bone that gives them a strong grasp and inclination to climb vertically, Kriebel said. That bone makes it look as though they have opposable thumbs, but they don’t. That’s why the exhibit is around 30 feet tall, to allow the girls to climb up and traverse the tree canopy.

The trees inside the exhibit include osage orange and birch trees that are safe for red pandas to eat. Aurora and the younger panda, though carnivores, mainly eat bamboo grown on site at the zoo. They are fed three to four times a day.

The zoo has the capacity to accommodate a pair of breeding pandas in the future, and Evitts believes there’s a possibility for more animals to join their family. But for now, he said, the team is focused on helping both pandas feel at home in Baltimore.

Despite the playful nature of other panda species, these red pandas are likely to spend most of their time investigating their new home, laying down their scent and vegging out, Kriebel noted.

And while the lady pandas are the main attraction of the exhibit, they will not be living in those leafy quarters alone. Kriebel said a Chinese muntjac named Campbell and a peacock — both animals that they might occasionally encounter in the wild — will be keeping them company in the habitat.

“It’s a very fine balance for keepers to find a routine that is sustainable for our ability to care for them, as well as making sure that things are not too routine for a panda,” Kriebel said. “Our goal is to create the best life for them every single day.”